Job numbers point to an economic slog

Not a recession, just super-slow growth that's likely to be around well into next year and probably beyond. Daniel Gross has a good take:

We've been banging this drum about the "conservative recovery" for several months, and this report shows it in very plain and stark relief. In this expansion, companies are increasing their payrolls while state, local and federal governments are trimming theirs. This trend would be much more pronounced if not for the tens of billions of dollars in stimulus funds given to states to patch up budgets. So, in September, the private sector added 137,000 jobs -- decent but nothing to write home about -- while the government sector cut 34,000 jobs. Since January 2010, the private sector has added 2.556 million jobs while government has cut 503,000. In January 2010, 82.6 percent of payroll jobs were in the private sector; today, the total is 83.2 percent. Declining government spending has been, and continues to be, a contractionary economic force.

Gross points out that there are 1.8 million more private sector payroll jobs than a year ago. Problem is there are still 14 million people out of work, 6.2 million of whom have been on the job hunt for six months or more. One economist says, "We are treading water (which I suppose is better than drowning!)."