President Trump's adhesion to Corona led to a drop of more than 2.2% in the Nasdaq index • Unemployment continues to fall for the fifth month in a row - and is below 8%
Works at the New York Stock Exchange, March
Photography:
AFP
Less than a month before the election, the U.S. economy continues its impressive recovery from the Corona.
Data released yesterday by the US Department of Labor on September show that for the first time since the crisis began, the unemployment rate in the country fell below 8% - now it is closer to the low unemployment rate last January (3.6%), compared to the peak in April (14.7%).
The figure in September was slightly lower than expected, with forecasts for an increase of about 800,000 jobs, but this is the fifth month in a row that there has been a decline in unemployment.
It should be noted that according to the broad definition of unemployment, this is a rate of 8.3% - including 700,000 people who are not working but are not defined as "unemployed".
Impressive recovery
In total, 661,000 new jobs were added in September, and since the recovery in May, the US economy has returned 11.4 million jobs, after losing about 23 million at the height of the crisis.
At the top of the recovering sectors is the restaurant and bar industry with an addition of 200,000 workers last month, with the retail industry catching up with 142,000 new jobs.
The government sector is the only one that has recorded a decrease in the number of jobs with a sharp cut of 216,000 people - mainly in the field of education as a result of a gradual transition to online classes instead of physically reaching classes.
The latest employment report was overshadowed by the dramatic news that the president and his wife were infected in Corona, so yesterday's trading week closed with price declines.
Despite this, the last two indices have been on a positive trend since the beginning of the year, before the corona spread.
Trump is good for the weak
In general, regardless of Corona, the main beneficiaries of Trump's economic policy are the weakest strata, who have narrowed the gaps from the upper strata.
"In the years 2019-2016, families from the upper deciles recorded a minor increase, if any, while families from the lower deciles recorded a significant increase," the Wall Street Journal editorial, citing one of the Federal Reserve's reports, said recently.
Trump entered the White House in January 2017, meaning it is a process that began in the late Obama administration.
Divided into ethnic groups, Hispanics recorded a 63% jump in capital during the Trump era, blacks 32% while whites who make up the bulk of the upper deciles enjoyed only a 4% increase.
In the first three years of Trump in the White House, the median income of an American family rose by an average of $ 6,000 - double the increase in income in the 16 years before the Trump administration, under Obama and Bush Jr..