President Obama said the jobs number for August is "not good enough" during a campaign stop Friday.
Obama's comments came a few hours after the government reported a net gain of 96,000 jobs last month, a number that fell below expectations. Economists thought the economy would add 150,000 jobs. The unemployment rate fell from 8.3 percent to 8.1 percent, mainly due to people dropping out of the labor market.
Obama sought to put a positive spin on the jobs numbers, saying it was still the 30th month of consecutive growth.
"Today we learned that after learned that after losing about 800,000 jobs when I took office, business once again added jobs for the 30th month in a row — a total of more than 4.6 billion jobs," Obama said in Portsmouth, N.H. "But that's not good enough. We know it's not good enough. We need to create more jobs faster. We need to fill the hole left by this recession faster. We need to come out of this crisis stronger than when we went in. And there's a lot more that we can do."
Mitt Romney was quick to criticize Obama for the jobs numbers, hoping to move the national conversation away from the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte, N.C., that wrapped up Thursday night..
"If last night was the party, this morning is the hangover. For every net new job created, nearly four Americans gave up looking for work entirely," Romney said in a statement in response to the jobs report. "This is more of the same for middle class families who are suffering through the worst economic recovery since the Great Depression. After 43 straight months of unemployment above 8%, it is clear that President Obama just hasn't lived up to his promises and his policies haven't worked."
