Jobs and houses............................

From Calculated Risk comes this interesting chart comparing the unemployment rate and housing starts.  One interpretation would be that the bursting of the housing bubble and the collapse of  home building in mid-2006 caused the extremely rapid disappearance of over two million jobs.  While the home building industry is no longer comatose, it is not  back on its feet yet either.  Ergo, sluggish re-employment.  Bill McBride opines on the data here.