The American economy is still in dire straits

There is a normal recession gathering strength under the pandemic shock

Signs hanging from windows.
(Image credit: Illustrated | Getty Images, iStock)

The August jobs report was published Friday morning, and the news is both good and bad. On the plus side, the headline unemployment rate fell to 8.4 percent. Something like half of the job losses created by the coronavirus pandemic have been recovered. On the negative side, just 1.4 million jobs were created, and a big chunk of them were temporary census work. The number of permanent job losses jumped sharply, and for odd reasons the stock market is falling. More broadly, it has been a month since most of the coronavirus rescue measures expired, putting an extra drag on recovery.

There has been considerable economic improvement since April. But the American people will need a great deal more help if the economy is to actually recover to full strength. Republicans have apparently given up on fixing the economy, but Joe Biden and Democrats should keep this fact at the top of their minds.

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Ryan Cooper

Ryan Cooper is a national correspondent at TheWeek.com. His work has appeared in the Washington Monthly, The New Republic, and the Washington Post.