At 8:30 A.M. the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) will release its employment situation report for the month of September. This will be the last look at the national employment and unemployment picture. This report could have significant implications for the November elections. (Since this post BLS reported that the unemployment rate was unchanged at 9.6% in September and that the economy lost 95,000 payroll jobs (64,000 private sector increase.)
Yesterday, Gallup reported that its tracking of the unemployment rate stood at 10.1% at the end of September (a not seasonally adjusted number). It went on to note that this suggested BLS would report an increase in the official unemployment rate.
Bloomberg has an article on the potential political implications of today's report that can be found at Pre-Election U.S. Jobs Report May Intensify Voters' Rejection of Democrats.
The consensus of economists surveyed by Bloomberg is that the report will show an uptick in the unemployment rate to 9.7% -- the same rate reported for January of this year. In terms of the consensus estimate for payroll jobs, the median estimate of economists surveyed by Bloomberg is for a decline of 8,000 non-farm payroll jobs and a gain of 85,000 private sector jobs. However, most observers expect the risk is to the downside in the private sector after ADP reported an unexpected decline of 39,000 private sector payroll jobs on Wednesday. The decline in government sector jobs anticipated in today's report is primarily due to the wind down of temporary census positions.
