Economists don't often agree on much - except today's jobs report

It's been a while since an economic report generated so much gloom - not helped by the fact that it comes on the heels of a lousy report in May and so the idea of this being some sort of aberration is pretty much out the window. The WSJ's Phil Izzo collected a sample of reaction:

--Overall the June Employment Report was quite disappointing , with basically no positive offsets to the poor headline results. The best we can say is that other data have shown better signs in recent weeks, including jobless claims, chain-store sales, gasoline prices, and auto production. Nevertheless, the weak trend in payroll employment indicates some downside risk to our second half growth views. -Goldman Sachs

- Ugly. I mean really ugly., The June employment data were stunningly weak. Job gains were the lowest since last September when payrolls declined. Given the measurement error, you cannot even say that any new hiring occurred in June. Worse, the April and May gains were revised downward indicating that smaller businesses are not out there hiring either. That is consistent with the surveys coming out of the National Federation of Independent Business and is a discouraging trend since that is where most of the hiring occurs. Interestingly, there were almost no sectors that showed any strong gains but only a few industries cut sharply. -Naroff Economic Advisors

-Even taking a rosy view of employment gains over the past 6 or 12 months, it will be many years before the nation eliminates the current shortfall in jobs. To bring the adult employment rate back to its pre-recession level, we would need to add about 11 million new jobs. At the pace of job growth we have seen since the start of the year, that task may take decades. -Gary Burtless, Brookings Institution

-We can see no silver lining in this employment report, which is weak, weak, weak. The three-month growth in employment is now in line with the last 12 months and the last two months have been significantly weaker. The unemployment rate edged up in June but the broader rate (including discouraged job seekers and forced part-time) surged to 16.2% from 15.8%. Total hours worked slowed and fell in manufacturing over the last three months. It is hard to excuse this report on supply-chain disruptions and it suggests that growth momentum evaporated as the second quarter drew to a close. -RDQ Economics

-The economy still faces significant headwinds. The turbulence in the Middle East could cause gasoline prices to shoot up again. The housing is in a double-dip. The Euro zone is not stable affecting U.S. financial markets and exports. The developing real estate bubble in China, the primary locomotive of the world economy, is another worry. The recovery path for the economy will be volatile and rocky. -Sung Won Sohn, Smith School of Business and Economics

Here's one of the few hopeful readings:

- If the May employment report was "alarmingly weak," as I described it a month ago, then the June release is an unmitigated disaster. Every facet of the data is sharply worse than anticipated... And yet, while I was quite concerned about the economy after the May release, I am less worried today. Perhaps I have lost my marbles, but I look at this report and simply conclude that it is not to be taken at face value. To be absolutely clear, I have no doubt that the labor market softened over the last two months relative to the healthy readings seen earlier in the year. And, as I discussed in my preview of today's report, it will undoubtedly take several months to get back to a happy place, as businesses, once they move into "caution mode," take a little bit of time to regain their confidence. Having said all of that, there is too much statistical and anecdotal evidence to the contrary to believe, as these data suggest, that the labor market has essentially ground to a halt. A frustratingly slow recovery to be sure, but I do not believe that conditions are as bad as these data would indicate. -Stephen Stanley, Pierpoint Securities