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According to the Labor Department, the U.S. economy lost 263,000 jobs in September, more than the revised figure of 201,000 lost in August. With the exception of the government and the health sector, all the other sectors lost jobs, with manufacturing, construction and retail as the most severely affected. Still, the figures for August and September are much better than the monthly average of 700,000 jobs lost during the year's first quarter.
The unemployment rate increased from 9.7 percent in August, to 9.8 percent in September. This is very close to the double-digit figure feared by President Barack Obama at the beginning of his mandate.
It used to be that it took almost a year to regain the jobs lost in a recession. However, during the last two recessions, of 1991 and 2003, the Bureau of Labor Statistics estimates that it took 21 and 18 months, respectively, to regain the job losses.
The present recession is already the longest since the end of the Second World War. Since then, only once in 1983, the unemployment rate has climbed into double digits in the United States.
The unemployment figures immediately became part of the polarized debate in Washington. The Republican opposition claimed that the figures are proof that the economic stimulus package approved by the government is not working. While government economists claimed that the stimulus package contributed to avoid a depression and that without it unemployment would be worse. Be it as it may, something else should be done to stop the increase in unemployment.
Isaac Cohen is a former Director, Washington Office of the United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC). He serves as a commentator on economic and financial issues for CNN en Espaņol TV and radio.