Employment Breakdown... Are We There Yet Edition?

The Washington Post details:

U.S. employers added 227,000 jobs in February to complete three of the best months of hiring since the recession began. The unemployment rate was unchanged, largely because more people streamed into the work force. The Labor Department said Friday that the unemployment rate stayed at 8.3 percent last month, the lowest in three years.

 And hiring in January and December was better than first thought. The government revised those figures to show 61,000 an additional jobs.

The headline unemployment rate was unchanged (below we show why this figure is largely irrelevant), but the broader measure showed improvement.

The household survey shows the large increase in people returning to the workforce. Note that this survey does not feed into the headline figure, but the rationale for why the headline number stayed flat is the same. Basically, the BLS wants us to believe certain individuals no longer wanted jobs and now (with improved prospects of finding a job), they do. Whatever.... the details are quite strong, especially for women.

And a measure I've been following for some time. The number of actual hours worked per person shows continued improvement (albeit off a very low figure).

Ladies and gentlemen.... we may FINALLY be at a tipping point.

Source: BLS