The idea that things are getting better seems to be based on the fact that things are getting miserable more slowly now, or that the increase in misery has turned from a downpour to a drizzle, but it’s still coming down.
For instance, according to this article in the New York Times, Joblessness increased last month by “263,000 jobs in September, and the unemployment rate edged up to 9.8 percent from 9.7 percent in August, according to the Labor Department’s monthly snapshot of the employment picture.”
So the actual unemployment rate is still going up, people are still losing their jobs, and in no real way is the recession over as far as how actual people are experiencing it.
Can anyone call this good news?
Though the job market worsened, the pace of deterioration remained markedly slower than during the early months of the year, when roughly 700,000 jobs a month were disappearing. That improvement seems consistent with the widespread belief that the recession has given way to economic growth. Yet the report also buttressed fears that economic expansion would be weak and hesitant, with scarce paychecks and economic anxiety remaining prominent features of American life well into next year.
