Joint Economic Committee Chairman Dan Coats (R-Ind.) issued the following statement regarding today’s report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) that the U.S. economy added 280,000 nonfarm payroll jobs (262,000 in the private sector), and the unemployment rate increased to 5.5%. This follows last week’s release of revised GDP numbers showing the economy contracted by 0.7% in the first quarter.

 

“With this jobs report and the recent GDP revision showing negative growth, it is clear that the economy provided employment for only a fraction of the 397,000 new workers that entered the job market in May, leaving nearly a third looking for work,” said Coats. “Until the economy is strong enough to create enough jobs to hire all new workers in the job market, offer full-time work to the underemployed and bring discouraged workers and the long-term unemployed back to the workforce, we cannot consider this economic recovery a success. The president should continue working with Congress to find ways to further strengthen our economy through pro-growth policies such as reforming our broken tax code and expanding trade opportunities.”