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James S. Brady Press Briefing Room 9:36 A.M. EDT        THE PRESIDENT:  Well, thank you very much, everybody.  Appreciate it.  This is mostly an economic conference, and we have Steve Mnuchin with us, Larry Kudlow. I’d like to just announce the spectacular news for American workers and American families and for our country as a whole.  There’s not been anything like this — record setting.  It was just put out that the United States economy added almost 5 million jobs in the month of June, shattering all expectations.I was watching this morning, and the expectations were much lower...

CNN wants its viewers to know it’s committed to holding President Donald Trump accountable on the economy — even if the network hasn’t recently updated its tracker of how many jobs the economy has presented since Inauguration Day. The network’s “Trump Jobs Tracker” is part of CNN Digital’s effort to keep its audience updated on whether the president is keeping his promises to release the full potential of the American economy after eight years of anemic growth under former President Barack Obama.

Did White House know about fabricated and manipulated job numbers before 2012 election? Is it possible to kill quantitative-easing painlessly? Sorry kids, but this debt's on us Let me be the first to ask: Did the White House know that employment reports were being falsified? Last week I reported exclusively that someone at the Census Bureau’s Philadelphia region had been screwing around with employment data. And that person, after he was caught in 2010, claimed he was told to do so by a supervisor two levels up the chain of command. On top of that, a reliable source whom I...

A couple weeks ago, this column analyzed the inflation rate reported by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), and concluded that you should rely on your common sense when the government reports questionable statistics. If they don’t make sense based on what you see, experience, and hear from your friends, then they’re probably wrong. Last week’s unemployment number – which decreased to a still-dismal 7.8% – should not only make no sense to you, but should have never made sense to the BLS and therefore should never have been issued. So am I just popping off or is there a...

The number of Americans filing new claims for jobless benefits fell last week to its lowest level in a month, an upbeat signal for a labor market that has struggled to create enough jobs. Initial claims for state unemployment benefits dropped 12,000 to a seasonally adjusted 365,000, the Labor Department said on Thursday. It was the first drop in new claims since the week that ended Aug. 4 and the lowest level since then as well.

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. A dramatic beat by the ADP jobs number at 201k vs expectations of 140k is the third month in a row of beating expectations for jobs and the highest add of jobs in 5 months.

Of course it's good news that 243,000 new jobs were created in January, shaving the unemployment rate to 8.3%. But thanks to massive policy errors by the White House, we're still way below where we should be. President Obama, speaking in Arlington, Va., immediately took credit for the bullish report, crowing that "altogether, we've added 3.7 million new jobs over the last 23 months." According to data from the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, the economy is just 0.7% above its previous high. Usually at this point in an expansion, it's 13.5% above the last peak. In other words, thanks...

The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported on Friday that the official unemployment rate for January was 8.3%, down from 8.5% in December. There were also 243,000 net jobs added during the month of January. But what does this really mean? Let us explore how this is calculated. The BLS keeps track of six unemployment rates, which are defined as follows: U1: Persons unemployed 15 weeks or longer, as a percent of the civilian labor force. This rate is 4.9% for January 2012. U2: Job losers and persons who completed temporary jobs, as a percent of the civilian labor force. This...