A measly 18,000 jobs were added to the U.S. economy in June, far below expectations for a rise of close to 90,000, and the unemployment rate ticked up to 9.2 percent. The numbers are a reality check, indicating just how poorly the job market has been making up for the more than 8 million jobs lost during the recession. –BF

The New York Times:

The report said that 14.1 million people were out of work in June, among them 6.3 million who have been jobless for six months or longer. In May, the total number of unemployed people was reported as 13.9 million, with the long-term unemployed at 6.2 million.

The numbers showed the continuing challenges of adding jobs to the economy even at a rate that keeps pace with population growth, two years after the official end of the longest economic downturn since the Great Depression.

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