Letter: Labor numbers don’t bode well

Many will agree that our country is facing two primary challenges: the economy and terrorism (domestic and foreign).

On the economic front, the news for May was far from encouraging. The unemployment rate dropped from 5 percent to 4.7 percent, but for the wrong reason. Labor participation declined .02 percentage points to 62.6 percent, representing a plunge in the workforce of 458,000. This artificially depressed the unemployment rate due to shrinking the number of individuals counted in the active labor force.

The Labor Department also reported only 38,000 new payroll jobs were created in May when economists estimated the total would be 158,000, the weakest number since September 2010. The April figures were slashed from the previously reported 160,000 to 123,000. Job losses were across the board with manufacturing losing 18,000 jobs, mining 10,000, construction 15,000, and temporary help 21,000.

None of the above bodes well for an economy that must create more than 200,000 jobs monthly or face a continuing decline that could possibly lead to a recession.

Areas of concern that require immediate attention by the administration and Congress include the burdensome business tax structure; excessive demand for paperwork, as demonstrated by record-keeping and filing of voluminous reports; and over-regulation by the EPA and other government agencies.

This story was originally published June 7, 2016 at 1:53 PM with the headline "Letter: Labor numbers don’t bode well."