The jobs report for the month of July comes out at 8:30 a.m. eastern on Friday.
Most news agencies are mentioning that economists expect the unemployment rate to hit 9.6 percent.
Today Robert Gibbs said in his daily press availability, “You are going to have several hundred thousand jobs lost” in Friday July unemployment report.
A short while ago, Joe Mathieu of XM POTUS’ press pool program said there was “buzz” that this month’s report might be the one that shows the national unemployment rate at 10 percent or more. He suggested that Obama’s and Biden’s trips this week, spotlighting successful stimulus projects, could be aiming to blunt the psychological impact of hitting double digits. (Biden is going to Detroit; residents of Michigan, seek economic shelter immediately.)
If Friday’s number is 9.6 percent, it will be grim, but somewhat mitigated news, as it would be the second straight month unemployment had increased “only” one tenth of one percent. But if it’s 10 percent, look out.
UPDATE: Notice that to tout the success of the stimulus, Biden is traveling to a city with a 17.1 percent unemployment rate.