The Economy Is Creating Jobs. Will It Continue?

Friday’s employment report for April was generally positive, and, at least for now, it has alleviated fears that the economy is stuttering. On Wall Street, traders cheered the numbers. The Dow flirted with 15,000, and the S. & P. 500 topped 1,600.

Both surveys from the Labor Department—of firms and of households—showed solid job growth. According to the survey of firms, the economy created a 165,000 jobs last month; according to households, it created 293,000 jobs. The unemployment rate edged down another tenth of a per cent, to 7.5 per cent. And the job figures for February and March were revised up substantially, presenting a much more buoyant picture of the labor market. After the revisions, the payroll survey shows job growth averaging almost two hundred thousand per month—196,000 to be precise—since the start of the year.

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