The unemployment rate dropped to 7.9% in September, but job creation slowed to 661,000, compared with the 1.5 million jobs created in August. WSJ’s Sarah Chaney explains the significance of the latest jobs report ahead of the presidential election. Photo: Rogelio V. Solis/AP More workers identified themselves as permanently laid off and unemployed for the long term in September, a sign the labor market’s recovery from the coronavirus pandemic is likely to be slow and protracted. While millions of workers have returned to jobs that were suspended this spring due to the virus, those that weren’t called back face the rising prospect of prolonged joblessness and income loss. Those same challenges were a feature of the slow economic recovery from the 2007-09 recession. In…