February Job Losses Slam Economy, Unemployment Rate Hits 8.1%
March 09, 2009 at 10:45 AM EDT
The U.S. economy shed 651,000 jobs last month, the Labor Department reported Friday, the third-largest monthly total since the government began compiling data in 1939. It’s the first time since 1939 that job losses have exceeded 600,000 for three consecutive months, as revisions for December and January showed an additional loss…