The latest job numbers were released today and the economy showed a gain of 74,000 jobs in nonfarm payroll employment. Employment rose in retail trade and wholesale but declined in information.
The number of people counted by the U.S. government as unemployed is now 10.4 million people decreasing the unemployment rate to 6.7 percent. This decease in rate was due to a large number of workers giving up.
The number of long-term unemployed (those jobless for 27 weeks or more), at 3.9 million, showed little change; these individuals accounted for 37.7 percent of the unemployed.
As pointed out by the New York Times (2014), the overall labor force has shrunk by about 550,000 in the last 12 months.
References
Schwartz, N. D. (2014). U.S. Economy Added Only 74,000 Jobs in December. New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/11/business/economy/us-economy-added-only-74000-jobs-in-december.html?smid=gp-nytimes&_r=0
U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. (2014, January 10). Employment Situation Summary, December 2013. U.S. Department of Labor. Retrieved January 10, 2014, from http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.nr0.htm