Unemployment went down in August, but job growth slowed down as well last month. The U.S added 96,000 jobs in the month of August, with employment dropping down to 8.1% from 8.3% the month before. But the statistics are misleading. The U.S government does not count working Americans who stop actively looking for jobs, meaning the unemployment rate can go down without any real job growth being created.
There are different reasons why Americans stop looking for employment. Some give up, others stop working to work on their families, and others retire. The increase in baby boomers retiring makes it a large contributing factor in the unemployment rate going down. Hourly pay also fell in August, and the number of total people looking for work dropped to the lowest point in 31 years.
