Jobs Picture Worse

Oops

Data Revision Confirms Weak Jobs Picture
Sun Oct 5, 7:33 AM ET Add Business - Reuters to My Yahoo!

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A warning by the U.S. Labor Department (news - web sites) that it expects to revise down past employment data pours cold water on the view of some economists who believed the jobs market had been improving for some time, analysts said on Friday.

Statisticians at the Labor Department said they expect to revise down U.S. payroll employment by about 145,000 for the March 2003 reference month -- effectively showing even greater weakness in the sluggish labor market than previously thought.

The downward adjustment surprised Wall Street, which had been rife with speculation this week that Labor would adjust the figures up, bringing payrolls more in line with another survey which has shown a recent improvement in the job market.