Economy Added 288,000 Jobs in June
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I've got him. He's at our 1130 --</s>BLACKWELL: This is incredible video of rescue of a stranded hiker. This guy got stuck high on a cliff in Washington state. Now, the Snohomish County helicopter rescue team, they swooped in literally here and saved this person.</s>KOSIK: A rescuer was lowered down by cable, attached the hiker to it and both got back up to the chopper safely. The sheriff's office says the hiker has called 911 for help. The helicopter rescue team, by the way, is made up of volunteers.</s>BLACKWELL: Good job there.</s>KOSIK: Yes. Our heroes. All right. Now, a lot of people have been waiting for this -- the economy added 288,000 jobs in June.</s>BLACKWELL: Yes, but that's not all. Employers added 1.4 million jobs in the first six months of the year. That's the strongest six months of job growth in eight years. CNN chief business correspondent Christine Romans breaks down the numbers for us. Christine, good morning.</s>CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN CHIEF BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: Alison and Victor, let's look within the numbers. By now, you've seen the headline: 288,000 jobs created. It's the trend that's really important here, because the trend is telling us that there is some momentum gathering on the jobs front. The best first six months of the year as the White House likes to point out, since 1999, the best six months overall for jobs creation since 2006. So, you're seeing a trend of companies more confident, they have been kept hiring to the bone for so long, as demand starts to pick up, they're having to add workers. I like to look within these numbers of different sectors. Professional and business services, for the past few months, you've seen these jobs starting to gain strength. These tend to be higher paid jobs. They help alleviate concerns about the quality of the jobs we've been seeing, but you still have leisure and hospitality, big gainer in job creation and retail jobs driving job creation as well. That's probably why you will still see the debate over the minimum wage and raise the minimum wage that is likely still to be an economic conversation of the year, because over the past six years, you know, preponderance of the jobs created have been lower quality jobs than the jobs lost in the recession. Here's the asterisk in all this, a strong jobs report, but 12.1 percent is still out of work or working part-time, would like to be working full-time. That number is still too high. Still have an important debate here about has been left behind in the economic recovery. Overall, though, what this is telling us is the labor market recovery is gaining speed.</s>KOSIK: Which is good news. Christine Romans, thank you.</s>BLACKWELL: So, we've got to talk about what's happening overseas. Palestinians gathered to bury the teenager murdered by unknown abductors. Fears of more revenge killings of both Israel and Hamas, they flare. Could this be the start of the third intifada?</s>KOSIK: And a teacher stabbed in front of her class? New details on the suspect's connection to the school.</s>KOSIK: Mortgage rates picked up this week. Have a look.