>> back to the breaking news of the morning. today's september report shows a bunch of things. a dramatic drop of the unemployment rate from 8.1% to 7.8%, the first time it has fallen below 8% since the president took office. so how do we get there? the economy added 114,000 jobs last month but in addition the labor department revised july and august numbers to show that 86,000 more jobs were added than previously thought. total unemployment rose by 873,000 jobs last month. that's the biggest one-month increase in nearly 30 years. and today's report snapped a string of 43 straight months of unemployment over 8%. now there's just one more report, jobs report out before the election. mark zandi is the chief economist for moody's analytics. all right, mark. i want to go through. we know the monthly numbers. but these revisions that happen all the time, the dramatic change, almost 500,000 people no longer in the employment rolls. over 800,000 folks though added to the employment rolls. but we say only 114,000 jobs were added. please explain .
>> a lot of numbers.
>> yes it is.
>> bottom line if you add it all up, take a look at the data, it shows the job market is improving. it continues to improve. we're creating more jobs. more jobs across lots of different industries in parts of the country so we're making progress. you know, it is important to point out that these numbers are very volatile month to month based on small surveys and this over states the case. it's not as strong as the data suggests but it makes a strong case that the economy is improving.
>> when you have a 30-year -- the big gap, the big jump of 30 years and total number of people added to the employment rolls do you look at that and say, is that an outlier or do you think, this makes up for those weak jobs numbers over the last three or four months that you thought were under estimating what was out there?
>> yeah, well i'll give you an economist's answer. both. i mean, this -- right? this over states the case. you know, if you look at the details of the 800,000 job gain, a little over half of that was people who are working part-time because they can't find a full-time job. so that's not, you know, a particularly good thing and is probably related to seasonal adjustment issues and measurement issues and will fall out of the data. having said that you still have a big gain in looking over the past year, household employment is rising fairly steadily, solidly. i wouldn't say strongly but, you know, this isn't too bad. it shows the job market is steadily improving.
>> when you looked at the different sectors, 44,000 added in health care , 17,000 in transportation, the big one here, 16,000 added in manufacturing. i remember when you and i talked last month manufacturing was a negative and i remember you basically questioned that number. you were shocked by it.
>> chuck, i'm not sure. was it up or down?
>> this time it was up and i think it was last month we had the surprise where manufacturing was down.
>> you know, my view is manufacturing --
>> august versus september. my apologies.
>> right. my view is that manufacturing is weakened in the last few months largely because of europe and the fallout on our exports which drive manufacturing. but, you know, i think our manufacturing businesses and the industry itself is very competitive and we're going to see a lot more job growth in manufacturing. maybe not next month or the month after but over the next couple three or four years we'll get a boatload of jobs. they're high paying jobs and it's really important to middle america .
>> 8%. did you think it would take this long?
>> frankly no. as you know, i've been more optimistic about the economy's prospects but it feels, i have to tell you it feels really, really good that we're below 8% and headed in the right direction.
>> mark zandi, moody's analytics. the guy we love to turn to every month on these jobs fridays. thank you very much.
>> a lot of numbers.
>> yes it is.
>> bottom line if you add it all up, take a look at the data, it shows the job market is improving. it continues to improve. we're creating more jobs. more jobs across lots of different industries in parts of the country so we're making progress. you know, it is important to point out that these numbers are very volatile month to month based on small surveys and this over states the case. it's not as strong as the data suggests but it makes a strong case that the economy is improving.
>> when you have a 30-year -- the big gap, the big jump of 30 years and total number of people added to the employment rolls do you look at that and say, is that an outlier or do you think, this makes up for those weak jobs numbers over the last three or four months that you thought were under estimating what was out there?
>> yeah, well i'll give you an economist's answer. both. i mean, this -- right? this over states the case. you know, if you look at the details of the 800,000 job gain, a little over half of that was people who are working part-time because they can't find a full-time job. so that's not, you know, a particularly good thing and is probably related to seasonal adjustment issues and measurement issues and will fall out of the data. having said that you still have a big gain in looking over the past year, household employment is rising fairly steadily, solidly. i wouldn't say strongly but, you know, this isn't too bad. it shows the job market is steadily improving.
>> when you looked at the different sectors, 44,000 added in health care , 17,000 in transportation, the big one here, 16,000 added in manufacturing. i remember when you and i talked last month manufacturing was a negative and i remember you basically questioned that number. you were shocked by it.
>> chuck, i'm not sure. was it up or down?
>> this time it was up and i think it was last month we had the surprise where manufacturing was down.
>> you know, my view is manufacturing --
>> august versus september. my apologies.
>> right. my view is that manufacturing is weakened in the last few months largely because of europe and the fallout on our exports which drive manufacturing. but, you know, i think our manufacturing businesses and the industry itself is very competitive and we're going to see a lot more job growth in manufacturing. maybe not next month or the month after but over the next couple three or four years we'll get a boatload of jobs. they're high paying jobs and it's really important to middle america .
>> 8%. did you think it would take this long?
>> frankly no. as you know, i've been more optimistic about the economy's prospects but it feels, i have to tell you it feels really, really good that we're below 8% and headed in the right direction.
>> mark zandi, moody's analytics. the guy we love to turn to every month on these jobs fridays. thank you very much.