In economic news, the unemployment rate rose in twenty-nine states last month. California, Delaware, South Carolina, Florida and the District of Columbia all registered record rates of unemployment in October. In California, the jobless rate has reached 12.5 percent; the state has lost nearly 700,000 jobs over the past year. Michigan still has the nation’s highest jobless rate at 15.1 percent. The president of the Chicago Federal Reserve, Charles Evans, said today he expects the national unemployment to peak at around 10.5 percent next spring and hopefully easing to about 9.5 percent by end of next year.