All of the gain in the Household Survey was in farm workers and even with that, the broad U6 unemployment rate jumped to 16.8% from 16.5%. If it weren’t for the decline in the labour force participation rate in the past year, the headline unemployment rate would be well above 11% right now. Wage growth is slowing discernibly as seen by the near-stagnation in average hourly earnings. And with jobless claims trending around the 470k mark, how is it possible that employment is really turning the corner?

So if we had sun instead of snow, February would have been the best jobs month since May 2007, and the second time since the beginning of the recovery that we have had a positive jobs number. And if you believe my argument that snow only delays things, we have a 200,000 jobs head start. That almost guarantees us to have a positive jobs month in March, and our first back-to-back gain in monthly jobs.

He envisions 10 to 13 regional directors that will be responsible for supporting and coordinating already existing local and regional efforts, aligning resources and developing regionalized short‐term and long‐term plans for economic development. These regional directors would be tasked with giving weekly progress reports directly to the Governor and Commissioner of Economic and Community Development.

The 2000s featured a well-orchestrated war on workers. Recall that NABE prediction of employment growth that will soon hit 103,000 new jobs a month: Well, it will take an economy producing at least 100,000 jobs a month just to absorb new entrants to the workforce. While it sounds robust, that level of job creation won't even make a dent in the 15 million unemployed.

DoubleStar, a human resources firm based in West Chester, Penn., hired two temp workers recently to join its 60-person staff. CEO Harry Griendling says in normal times he would have hired two permanent employees. But Griendling has doubts about the strength of the recovery. He's not ready to absorb the risk and cost of adding permanent workers. "When I look ahead for the next three to four months, all I see is murkiness," Griendling says.

[I]n the absence of such innovation-led growth, America will be locked into an endless loop of borrowing more money to make up the difference between what American workers want and what their incomes -- or lack thereof -- make it possible for them to buy.

First, it was a $165 billion of tax rebates in the spring of 2008. What did that accomplish? Not much. Then we had a ballyhooed $862 billion fiscal stimulus plan unveiled a year ago. What do we have to show for it? Just a couple of quarters of positive GDP growth, which again will offer very little in the way of sustainable multiplier impacts. Now we have what can only be described as a tepid reaction to the jobs crisis with an $85 billion bill making its way through Congress with a most distinctly non-creative cornerstone of a $5,000 payroll tax credit that has shades of the Carter-era quick fixes written all over it.