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According to the Labor Department this morning, the U.S. unemployment rate held steady at 9.7 percent and payrolls fell less than forecast.
Per the report, payrolls fell by 36,000 last month indicating—to some at least—that the labor market has strengthened even as East Coast snowstorms forced some employers to temporarily close.
Even still, that is only a small consolation to the 8.4 million people that have their lost jobs since December 2007.
Of course, it goes without saying that for baby boomers...the Great Recession couldn't have come at a worse time.
From CNBC entitled: Aging boomers face stark economics
"Not so long ago, Michael Blattman lived in the upscale Washington, D.C., suburb of Potomac, Md., earning $225,000 a year as senior vice president for a student loan company. As he reached his 50s, it never really occurred to him that his job wouldn't last forever.
"To be perfectly honest, I didn't really go there," he said. "Yeah, there was always a risk. Everything in business is a risk."
In January 2008, Blattman, along with 500 other employees, was laid off by his company. With an $188,000 severance, he wasn't worried at first.
"The barometer was always something like five or six months until you landed something comparable," he said. "So I figured, ‘Oh, OK, six months?' OK, I could do this for six months. And find the next one. Well, there was no next one."
As his generation confronted an economic storm of historic proportions, Blattman found himself humbled - and living in a one-room apartment. After applying for 600 openings and getting only three interviews, he was still looking after two years.
His old boss recently gave him a stark assessment of his prospects.
"He said, ‘How's it going?'" Blattman recalled. "I said, ‘Nobody's talking to me.' And he says ‘That's because you're an old white guy.' And that stopped me in my tracks."
Blattman gets some solace from the knowledge that he's far from alone. More than 4 million baby boomers are unemployed, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. For many, retirement at 65 is no longer an option.
Facing shrinking nest eggs and mounting bills, they need to work, but they wonder if anyone will hire them again.
"The hardest thing each day is to get up and say, ‘OK, what am I going to do today?' It's a constant cheerleading effort every day. The thing is, I'm the cheerleader. And I am the team. So I'm all in one."
It's a double whammy: no job and no health insurance. Many boomers are in far worse shape than Blattman. Some have turned to free clinics. It's just one indication that the health care crisis is really an economic crisis. And for the boomers it's only going to get tougher, according to Harvard financial historian Niall Ferguson.
"If they've done their homework, then they'll be afraid," he said. "Very afraid."
Ferguson says it won't be easy to care for a generation with ailing bodies and many more years to live.
"The baby boomers have set us on a path towards a massive fiscal crisis," he said. "Which is going to hit as the baby boomers retire."
Ouch.
By the way, according to a new survey by CareerBuilder, 72 percent of workers over the age of 60 who are considering retirement are putting it off because they can't afford to retire financially.
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