United States Unemployment

The nation's economy generated 210,000 new jobs during October, keeping the unemployment rate at 5.2%, the Labor Department reported Friday, offering good news for President Clinton in the final stage of the election campaign. The jobless rate is close to the seven-year low of 5.1% reached in August. In October four years ago, the rate stood at 7.3%.

The nation's economy generated 210,000 new jobs during October, keeping the unemployment rate at 5.2%, the Labor Department reported Friday, offering good news for President Clinton in the final stage of the election campaign. The jobless rate is close to the seven-year low of 5.1% reached in August. In October four years ago, the rate stood at 7.3%.

MEXICAN STOCKS * The Bolsa index has continued to rise steadily every day since May 16, when it closed at 2,239.84. On Tuesday the index rose 3.64 points, or 0.16%, over the previous day. The market has been following the New York trading of American depository receipts, or ADRs, of many Mexican blue chips, especially Telefonos de Mexico, also known as Telmex. * Among widely held issues, Telmex Series L shares were up 0.59% at 10.24, Televisa CPO shares were up 1.21% at 91.

Growers and their advocates in Congress are drafting a new guest-worker program that would allow hundreds of thousands of Mexican farm workers into the country, despite double-digit unemployment in most agricultural communities. Bob L. Vice, former California Farm Bureau Federation chief, recently told a California newspaper that he and others are working to revive a farm-labor bill defeated last year.

The Spanish Civil War killed and maimed hundreds of thousands and left much of Spain in ruins. But for one disabled group, the war's legacy has been the touch of Midas. No one knows how many people were blinded in the 1936-39 conflict, but, eager to rid himself of the problem, dictator Francisco Franco ordered them to form a national organization and take care of themselves. To encourage them, he granted the right to create a national lottery.

Despite optimistic talk by a Bush Administration official in Washington that a recovery is under way, two reports issued Thursday indicated that the economy continues to struggle, with widespread layoffs and a sluggish housing market. Sales of existing homes fell 1.5% in January to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 3.22 million, the National Assn. of Realtors reported. It was the first decline in four months.

Mexico's economy slowed in the last three months of 2006, and that could have consequences in the United States: Tough times in Mexico typically fuel immigration north of the border. Mexico's gross domestic product expanded 4.3% in the October-to-December period from the final quarter of 2005, according to figures released Friday by the finance ministry. It was the third consecutive period of slower growth in the nation's economic output and a sharp decline from the 5.

U.S. stocks are on track to post their biggest monthly gains in decades as investors cheered an agreement to tackle the crippling European debt crisis and new optimism about the American economy. The burst of encouragement Thursday put investors in a bullish mood. They piled cash back into stocks and away from safe investments like Treasury bonds. The Dow Jones industrial average closed with a gain of 339.51 points, or 2.9%, to 12,208.55, jumping above the 12,000 level for the first time since August.

As U.S. communications giant AT&T sets the American economic tone for 1996 by laying off 40,000 people, German unions, managers and politicians are groping toward an alternative, worker-friendly economic arrangement--something to bolster this ailing giant through the hard times of the late 20th century. The bedrock problem here is jobs.

More women than ever before now are holding jobs around the world, latest U.N. labor statistics show, and ironically more are also unemployed. In fact, in many countries unemployment grows faster among women than among men and decreases in women's unemployment are smaller than in men's. The proportion of women in the work force has increased in 21 industrialized and 13 developing nations, according to the new Yearbook of Labor Statistics issued by the International Labor Organization.

ABINGDON, Va. - After a new jobs report bolstering President Obama's case that the U.S. job market is moving toward a recovery, Mitt Romney urged Virginia voters not to forget the anxiety and economic struggle that they have felt over the past four years - arguing that the country would fare better under his policies. The morning report from the Labor Department - showing the unemployment rate dipping to 7.8% in September -- punctured Romney's buoyant ascent after his crisp performance in the debate that, at least for a moment, knocked Obama off stride.  Forced to abandon his line that unemployment has been above 8% throughout the president's tenure in the White House, Romney noted that the unemployment rate had “come down very, very slowly” and spoke selectively about the jobs report - noting for example that fewer new jobs were created in September than in August.