[Excerpt] America’s Dynamic Workforce: 2008 presents an overview of current conditions and notable trends affecting the American labor market and economic activity. Primary emphasis is on measures of labor market performance – employment, labor force participation, unemployment, and compensation. General measures of economic performance such as gross domestic product (GDP) and productivity growth are also described as they relate to labor market conditions and trends. Throughout this report the focus is on the data—what the numbers actually say about the American labor market—and on how individual data items fit together to present an overall portrait of the health and dynamism of the labor market. Data are current through July 31, 2008.