Unemployment Rate Edges Upward to 7.1%, U.S. Says: Factory Jobs Fall...
The nationÛªs civilian unemployment rate rose slightly to 7.1 percent last month as a surge of more than half a million persons into the Libor force more than offset a strong gain of 370,000 jobs, the Labor Department reported yesterday.</br></br>However, the number of manufacturing jobs dropped by 110,000, the largest one-month loss since the end of the 1981-82 recession. Manufacturing employment has declined by about 340,000 since January, due primarily to a large rise in the volume of goods imported from other countries.</br></br>The volatile unemployment rate for blacks rose to 15.3 percent after dropping a full percentage point to 14 percent the previous month. The rate for whites fell from 6.2 percent to 6.1 percent.</br></br>The September rate compared with the rate of 7 percent in August. A separate measure of the unemployment rate that includes members of the armed forces in the labor force rose last month from 6.9 percent to 7 percent.</br></br>The continued relatively high level of unemployment, and the need to meet the threat of imports, are holding wage increases to their lowest level in many years.