Recovery has been uneven for both jobs and housing. The latest unemployment report from the U.S. Department of Labor Statistics reveals this trend continued in the month of April.

They report, "Nonfarm payroll employment rose by 244,000 in April, and the unemployment rate edged up to 9.0 percent. ... Job gains occurred in several service-providing industries, manufacturing, and mining." In comparison, unemployment was 8.8 percent in March.

Long-term unemployment, those without a job for 27 weeks or more, was on the decline, however. This welcome news includes 5.8 million, or 43.4 percent, unemployed.

Last year, the average unemployment rate was 9.6 percent. These small rises or declines in percent may not seem like much at first glance, however, the real number of unemployed carries a harder hit. Last year this represented 14,825,000 people in the United States. At a 0.6 percent smaller unemployment rate, this means "only" 13.7 million people are jobless. That is a million more people with jobs.

These numbers clearly show how far we've come from the peak of recession unemployment during October of 2009, which was at 10.2 percent.

There are still struggles, though. The hardest hit demographics have been teenagers and blacks, with unemployment rates at 24.9 and 16.1 percent.

According to the Bureau, "Among the major worker groups, the unemployment rates for adult men (8.8 percent), adult women (7.9 percent), teenagers (24.9 percent), whites (8.0 percent), blacks (16.1 percent), and Hispanics (11.8 percent) showed little change in April. The jobless rate for Asians was 6.4 percent, not seasonally adjusted."

Our economy is growing, but slowly. Recent GDP reports indicate that a 1.8 percent gain (advance estimate) in the 1st quarter 2011 means a modest recovery. The Bureau of Economic Analysis also reports that "deceleration in real GDP in the first quarter (Ed. note: down from 3.1 percent in 4Q 2010) primarily reflected a sharp upturn in imports, a deceleration in PCE, a larger decrease in federal government spending, and decelerations in nonresidential fixed investment and in exports that were partly offset by a sharp upturn in private inventory investment."

Construction employment, always on the minds of those in real estate, was unchanged in April. This industry has shown little movement since early 2010, after having declined during the previous 3 years.

Published: May 10, 2011

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Carla Hill, M.A., works on the Realty Times staff as Managing Editor for our online publication. She also is Producer for the real estate news channel, seen daily on RealtyTimes.com and on video newsletters nationwide.