US unemployment fell to 11.1% in June as the economy added a solid 4.8 million jobs.
But the job market recovery may already be faltering because of a new round of closures and job losses triggered by a resurgence of coronavirus.
While the jobless rate was down from 13.3% in May, the data was gathered during the second week of June, just before a number of states began to reverse or suspend the reopenings of their economies to try to beat back the virus.
READ MORE: Donald Trump says he has 'tested positively toward negative' for coronavirus
The news came as the number of confirmed infections per day in the US soared to an all-time high of 50,700, more than doubling over the past month, according to the count kept by Johns Hopkins University.
The spike, centred primarily in the south and west of the country, has led states such as California, Texas, Arizona and Florida to re-close or otherwise clamp down again on bars, restaurants, cinemas, beaches and swimming pools, throwing some workers out of a job for a second time.
President Donald Trump said the jobs report shows the economy is “roaring back”, though he acknowledged there are still areas where “we’re putting out the flames” of the virus.
Economists expect the recovery to take longer than Mr Trump’s optimistic projections, with the unemployment rate likely to be near double-digit levels by the end of the year.
The shutdowns over the past two weeks will be reflected in the July unemployment report, to be released in early August.
While the job market improved for a second straight month, the government report showed that the US remains far short of regaining the colossal losses it suffered this spring. It has recouped roughly one-third of the 22 million jobs lost.
The re-closings are keeping job losses elevated. The number of Americans who sought unemployment benefits fell only slightly last week to 1.47 million, according to another report. Though the weekly figure has declined steadily since peaking in March, it is still extraordinarily high by historic standards.
And the total number of people who are drawing unemployment benefits remains at a sizeable 19 million.
READ MORE: Donald Trump tweets bizarre edited clip of himself giving Independence Day speech
US job growth in June was driven mainly by companies recalling workers who had been laid off during the widespread business shutdowns across the country in the spring.
In an ominous trend contained in the government report, the number of Americans who said they had lost their jobs permanently rose by 600,000 last month to nearly 2.9 million.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article