- Friday’s April nonfarm payroll report from the Labor Department was dismal — the US economy lost a record 20.5 million jobs, and the unemployment rate surged to 14.7%.
- “The size of the devastation is incredible, then you have to consider the speed of it as well,” Nick Bunker, an economist at Indeed, told Business Insider.
- Here’s what four economists said about the April jobs report.
- Visit Business Insider’s homepage for more stories.
Friday’s April jobs report was bad on pretty much every front — the US economy shed 20.5 million jobs in one month, the largest drop on record, erasing nearly a decade of gains.
In addition, the unemployment rate spiked to 14.7%, the highest seen since the Great Depression. Just two months ago, in the February jobs report, the unemployment rate was 3.5%, a 50-year low.
“The size of the devastation is incredible, then you have to consider the speed of it as well,” Nick Bunker, an economist at Indeed, told Business Insider, adding that the current shock to the US rivals that of the Great Recession.
“The fact that we’re seeing magnitudes of devastation that big, but in two months, it’s hard to wrap your mind around,” he said.
A dive into the data beyond the headline number showed further signs of deterioration. Almost every industry shed jobs in April, led by 7.7 million lost payrolls in leisure and hospitality.
Women bore most of the job losses, and the unemployment rates for black and Hispanic workers fell to 16.7% and 18.9%, respectively. Hourly wages rose, but the measure reflects that lower income workers have been hit hardest by coronavirus-induced layoffs.
People dropped out of the labor force en masse, and only about half of workers currently have a job. A broader measure of unemployment, which includes workers who have stopped looking for a job and those working part-time who would like full-time employment, rocketed to nearly 23%, also a record high.
There was one potential bright spot in the report — 18.1 million workers were classified as temporarily unemployed, suggesting that they may be able to quickly re-enter the workforce when lockdowns are lifted. Recently, some states have begun to slowly reopen parts of their economy, sending people back to work.
But the fear is that some businesses won’t survive the pandemic, meaning that these workers will become permanently unemployed. This doesn’t bode well for any future economic recovery, and means that a swift rebound is becoming increasingly unlikely.
Here’s what four economists had to say about the dismal April jobs report:
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