November 10, 2003 -- Employment rose in October, and the unemployment rate, at 6.0 percent, was essentially unchanged, the Bureau of Labor Statistics of the U.S. Department of Labor reported Friday. Nonfarm payroll employment rose by 126,000 in October, following a similar increase (as revised) in September. Job gains occurred in several service industries in October. Manufacturing employment continued to decline, but the rate of job loss has moderated in recent months. See the complete data here: http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.nr0.htm Comments from Dr. Joe Webb: “As suspected, today's great employment news indicated strong growth in the services sector, with October yielding 126,000 new jobs, and September's data being revised by more than a factor of two, to 144,000 jobs. In separate data, the Bureau of Labor Statistics estimates that 189,000 new businesses have been formed in just the last quarter, a total of 588,000 year to date. This is turning into a "bottom up" recovery, where CEOs of big corporations are the most skeptical and the most pessimistic. Sounds like the 1980s all over again, doesn’t it? The Fed will move carefully here. If strong employment increases keep piling up, they will raise interest rates early next year. Remember that they said they would be very accommodating; they didn’t say they would never raise rates again.” Premium Access Members at WhatTheyThink.com can view more analysis in Dr. Joe Webb’s weekly column on Friday, appropriately called “Fridays with Dr. Joe”.