Rep. Jim Moran, D-Va., recently told Chris Matthews that “the economy has recovered” and that “in the last six months more jobs were created than Bush was able to generate in eight years.” If Moran’s claims don’t jive with the experience of American workers, maybe that’s because they are factually inaccurate, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Employment figures for the last 6 months show that a net 982,000 jobs were created between December 2009 and May 2o1o, as net employment numbers jumped from 129,588,000 to 130,570,000. (June numbers are not yet available.) Note that 411,000 of those jobs are temporary hires of Census workers during the month of May. Assuming that those 411,000 are released before the next Census, the real numbers for jobs created in the last 6 months is closer to 571,000.
Compare that to jobs numbers under the Bush Administration: in January of 2000, when Bush was sworn in, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported 130,781,000. When he left office, national jobs numbers were at 134,328,000. For those of us keeping track, that’s a gain of 3,547,000 jobs during the Bush Administration.
