The U.S. economy created only 38,000 jobs in May, the lowest total in almost six years. The private sector hired only 25,000, and government entities added 11,000.
Adding insult to injury, Dent Research found that within the private sector, the U.S. economy shed 10,000 jobs above the median pay level, and added 34,000 below the dividing line. 38,000 private jobs, or more than 150% of the total new hires, were in the lowest income bucket.
The numbers are skewed by the Verizon strike, which cut 37,000 jobs from the total, all of which were above the median. But even adding those back, it would have brought the total for the private sector up to a modest 62,000 for the month, and meant 27,000 jobs created above the median, instead of a loss of 10,000.