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Hundreds of unemployed Kentucky residents wait outside the Kentucky Career Center in Frankfort for help with unemployment claims last month. (John Sommers II/Getty Images)
The U.S. economy added a record 4.8 million jobs in June, according to federal data released Thursday, but a surge in new infections and a spate of new closings threatens the nascent recovery.
Two key federal measurements showed the precarious place the economy finds itself in three and a half months into the pandemic as the country struggles to hire back the more than 20 million workers who lost their jobs in March and April.
While companies have continued to reopen, a large number of Americans are finding their jobs are no longer available. The unemployment rate in June was 11.1 percent, the Bureau of Labor Statistics said, down from a peak of 14.7 percent in April but still far above the 3.5 percent level notched in February.
And another 1.4 million Americans applied for unemployment insurance for the first time last week and more than 19 million people are still receiving unemployment benefits, stubbornly high levels that show how many people are struggling to find or keep work.
The Congressional Budget Office on Thursday said the coronavirus pandemic gave such a shock to the labor market that it would not fully recover for more than 10 years.
President Trump touted the jobs that were added at a news conference called shortly after they were released, saying they were a sign that “America’s economy is now roaring back to life like nobody has ever seen before.”
“All of this incredible news is the result of historic actions my administration has taken,” Trump said.
But his top aides acknowledged there was still a long way to go.
“There is still a lot of hardship, and a lot of heartbreak, in these numbers,” National Economic Council Director Larry Kudlow said. “I think we have a lot more work to do.”
The stock market initially rose on the news, with the Dow Jones industrial average rising 400 points, or 1.5 percent, before retreating. It closed up 92 points on the day.
Economists called the 4.8 million jobs added encouraging, saying they were a sign that the massive financial incentives that Congress passed appeared to have succeeded at stanching even greater job loss.
But the good news came with a couple of significant asterisks: It was gathered the week of June 12, when the country was reporting less than 25,000 new cases a day, not the current average of more than 40,000 that has sent new closures and shutdowns cascading across states and counties.
“The pandemic pushed us into a very deep economic hole,” said Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Analytics. “We can certainly fall back.”
The more than 14.7 million people who are still out of work have left the country with an unemployment rate higher than any point during the Great…
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Read More: June 2020 jobs report: The U.S. economy added 4.8 million jobs
