CNN Money is reporting that the job market hit a major roadblock last month, as hiring slowed to a crawl and the unemployment rate unexpectedly rose.
The economy gained just 18,000 jobs in June, the government reported Friday, sharply missing most expectations and coming in even weaker than the paltry 25,000 jobs added in May.
It marked the weakest month since September, when the economy was still losing jobs.
"At first, when I heard it, I thought maybe they had announced the wrong numbers, they were so bad," said Robert Brusca of Fact and Opinion Economics.
Economists were expecting government job losses, but few had predicted that private businesses would pull the reins back so tightly.
Private businesses added only 57,000 jobs in June — the weakest growth since May 2010. Earlier this year, businesses had been adding more than 200,000 jobs each month. Private-sector job growth, which has grown steadily since September, has come to a screeching halt. Meanwhile, the total number of unemployed people rose to 14.1 million — 44 percent of whom have been unemployed for six months or more.
This is completely unacceptable as the government plans to bleed more jobs and cut services to already struggling Americans. The fact that so many people have been without work for so long is unconscionable. We don't know how the president and members of Congress sleep at night. Actually we do — they have jobs.
Read more at CNN Money.
In other news: Mother Turns Her Kids Into Police for Looting.