This should not get the heart pumping fast as it is another oh hummmm.

'"Today's big news was that we saw fewer claims for unemployment benefits,' said Mike Stanfield, chief investment officer at VSR Financial Services, told CNNMoney.com. 'That suggests that the underlying economics are continuing to improve.' Ah, but of course we've been here before. The Dow has been wildly gyrating above and below 10,000 for much of the month. But there is some cause for sustained hope this time. According to the WSJ, the Labor Department reported on Thursday that US worker productivity improved at its most vigorous rate since the Kennedy administration "even as employers pushed forward with layoffs and cuts in working hours across a wide range of industries.'"

Maybe this http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_Zh1bveXc8rA/SvQ6C4r5uoI/AAAAAAAAA9M/02s3Bq1ic6g/s1600-h/Clipboard02.jpg will stir the blood when you reach for that morning cup of Starbucks or your own brew of black coffee tomorrow. Please note the total aggregate hours worked is still plummenting. Why would this happen? Well W$ Chief Investment Officer (dontcha love the titles?), fewer people are working in the Civilian Labor Force as taken from the NonInstitutional Civilian Population. What happened to them? Did we process them into "Soylent Green?" No, they dropped out of the Civilian Labor Force, gave up so to speak, and became a part of the "Not In Labor Force." Reflective of this is Particpation Rate which dropped to a 30-something low of 65.1% or 4 million people (on top of the unemployed) gave up rather than look for work in an economy unable to produce jobs.

The celebration of a slowing number of lost jobs is silly. It is akin to claiming I lost to the first knuckle of my finger rather than the entire finger. Another 12 months to go before we see job creation exceed lost jobs and look for 11% unemployment. When you see Household numbers stabilize, we have hit bottom. It hasn't happened yet. Geez, W$ . . . gamblers and junkies.