I see $2,000. Or maybe $200 Don't look surprised when U.S. unemployment is shown to have increased, later this week:

Bloomberg:

The jobless rate rose to 9.6 percent last month from 9.5 percent in June, according to the median estimate of 57 economists surveyed by Bloomberg News ahead of a Labor Department report Aug. 6. A drop in federal census workers as the population count wound down depressed payrolls by 60,000, the data may also show.

Census-related hiring, and now firing, will be a key driver of the upcoming report:

The Census Bureau said it let go about 144,000 of the people conducting the decennial population count from mid-June to mid-July. It still had about 200,000 temporary workers on staff as of July 17, indicating additional cuts to come that will keep distorting the payroll figures for months.

...

For that reason, economists say private employment, which excludes government jobs, will be a better gauge of the state of the labor market for much of 2010. Employment at companies rose by 90,000 after an 83,000 gain in June, according to the median forecast.

Thus the private employment figure will be the more relevant data point to watch. Hopefully private employment growth doesn't miss expectations.