‘08 Job Loss Rate Worst Since ‘45

Payrolls fell 500,000 in December, bringing last year’s decline to 2.4 million, the most since 1945, according to the median estimate of economists surveyed by Bloomberg News.

The jobless rate climbed to around 7% in December, from 6.7% the prior month, according to the survey median. Manufacturers cut approxiamtely103,000 workers from payrolls, the report may also show. Factories, which make up 12% of the economy, shrank in December at the fastest pace in 28 years as new orders for products from cars to furniture reached the lowest level since records began in 1948, the Institute for Supply Management reported.

The Bush administration agreed last month to give General Motors Corp. and Chrysler LLC $13.4 billion in federal loans to avert bankruptcy. GM, whose shares slid 87% in 2008, the most among the 30 companies in the Dow Jones Industrial Average, and Chrysler led a 53% drop in December U.S. auto sales that capped the industry’s worst year since 1992.