Why the July Jobs Report Signals Hope

Finally, some good news for the nation's long-suffering job seekers: Employers cut just 247,000 jobs last month, the smallest payroll slice since last August, the Labor Department reported today. The unemployment rate slipped back a tenth of a percentage point, to 9.4 percent. There were 14.5 million Americans out of work and searching for jobs in July, a number mostly unchanged from June.