by: Carole Fleck
The U.S. employment picture worsened slightly in August as the jobless rate edged higher and 54,000 jobs were lost overall, the government reported Friday.
The unemployment rate rose to 9.6 percent last month after holding steady at 9.5 percent in June and July. The number of people out of work climbed to 14.9 million in August, up from 14.6 million in the previous two months.
Private employers added a modest 67,000 jobs in August, with most of the hires in the health care, mining and temporary services industries. But this gain was more than offset by the government shedding 121,000 jobs from its payrolls, including 114,000 temporary census workers, according to the report by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
For men age 55 and older seeking work, the labor market was especially difficult. Their unemployment rate rose from 7.7 percent in July to 8.4 percent in August, the highest for that demographic since the government began tracking data in 1948, says Sara Rix, a senior strategic policy adviser at AARP.
The jobless rate for women in that age group remained at 6.9 percent last month, the same as in July.
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