According to the March jobs report released by the U.S. Department of Labor, the economy added more jobs (162,000) in March than in any other month for the past three years. This is only small progress since the economy needs to add 70 times that many jobs just to get back to where we were in 2007, but it is a huge step in the right direction. If this continues for a few more months, I will be prepared to say that the recession is over (even though a lot of folks will still be out of work for a while).

According to CNN, the number was inflated somewhat by temporary job losses in February due to bad weather in much of the country. Even so, the number of jobs added is large enough that hope is not misplaced.

In the past three years, only three months have shown any kind of job growth, and the other two were anemic. This is great news. Let's not forget the reality of the situation, though:

• There are still (officially) 15 million people counted as unemployed and one million more counted as discouraged.
• 9 million people (officially) are still underemployed
• We need to create about 20 million jobs to get back to full employment.

Anyway, a journey of thousand miles starts with a single step and all that. This report is great news.