ROLL CALL: Jobless Numbers Add to Concern on Monetary Policy. “The debate on Capitol Hill over expired unemployment benefits is putting a spotlight on the still-rough labor market. The nation’s unemployment rate may be ticking closer to the Federal Reserve’s threshold of 6.5 percent, the point where the central bank will reassess its historically low interest rates. But even as the central bank has started to ease back ever so slightly on its economic stimulus program, economists from both sides of the political aisle say the jobs crisis sparked by the 2008 financial meltdown is far from over.”

Whatever “recovery” we’ve supposedly experienced, most Americans aren’t experiencing it in their personal lives.