U.S. employers added 528k jobs in July

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2022/08/05/jobs-report-july-2022/

by MilnerRoute • 4 years ago

49 121 4 years ago

jdhn2• 4 years ago

This is an absurd amount of new jobs. By absurd, I mean that this is leaps and bounds beyond what was predicted. It also means that the Fed isn't going to taper off rate hikes anytime soon. I know that there were some who were predicting that rate hikes were going to stop in 2023, but I'm doubting that if we keep getting numbers like this.

spywaregorilla• 4 years ago

Agreed, and good thing too. Regardless of what you want to say about recession or not, the US is really well positioned for the next decade relative to other countries.

mywittyname3• 4 years ago

This is a sentiment that I'm happy to hear others share. If cards are played right, the USA could experience growth not seen since post-WWII.

Inflation is high, but the USD is crushing every other currency. American businesses are fed up with shutdowns and shipping delays from Asia, and are willing to pay the price premium for domestic goods. And the federal government is doing (I think) a good job at pushing industries to capitalize on the global weakness.

spaceman_20206• 4 years ago

America’s problems seem entirely self-inflicted.

Its still blessed land - wildly fertile and rich with resources. Any real security threat is an ocean away. It doesn’t even need to venture out much now to secure energy.

People talk about moving to New Zealand in an apocalypse, but honestly you’d do very well in the US if the rest of the world was going to hell.

Balgair• 4 years ago

It's going to be a critical one too. Not that any really haven't been.

International-Relations-wise the US is positioned to retain her monopolar status and then cement it for the century by 2030. The two greatest competitors to her rule were Russia and China. All other powers are strong allies of the US and have no reason to change that.

As we've seen, McCain's quip turned out to be true, the bear is nothing but a mafia in a run-down gas-station. The only other real competitor is China, and without Taiwan's fabs, China can't compete this century. Whole new fields of industry must be created for the dragon to take a shot for a bipolar world.

That the US managed to convince Taiwan to lessen it's grip on that security guarantee (with the Texas fabs okayed recently) shows how much Taiwan thinks the US can win any conflict with the mainland. They aren't scared in the least.

Russia's ongoing disaster only strengthens that feeling, as any invasion, already an operation on never heard of scale, would involve the actual US military. That Russia somehow allows NATO to fight openly against her with the airgap of a Ukrainian finger on the trigger shows how outmatched the bear is. It's basically a weapons test for NATO at this point, much to Ukraine's detriment. China can only guess at how poorly the invasion would go and how bungled it would be. Combined with crushing blockades and sanctions, and she knows any move would kill her economy for decades. Their clock is not ticking, it ran out. The only question is if Beijing knows it.

So yes, I think it is good to be in the US or allied with her.

HarryHirsch• 4 years ago

But - do the jobs pay the man that does it? Remember than someone who works an hour in a month counts as employed in the statistics.

jdhn2• 4 years ago

Hourly earning wages rose 5.2% year over year, and increased .5% month over month, beating expectations of 4.9% and .3%, respectively.

baron816• 4 years ago

Do keep in mind that it is just an initial estimate. These numbers get revised, occasionally dramatically.

dominotw3• 4 years ago

tech market seems to be cooling down. Mostly due to fears and copycating FAANGs on their hiring freezes.

lamontcg4• 4 years ago

That isn't the reality for 95% of the workers in the economy though.

dragonwriter4• 4 years ago

By absurd, I mean that this is leaps and bounds beyond what was predicted.

More than double, yes.

It also means that the Fed isn't going to taper off rate hikes anytime soon.

Well, maybe. But there's at least one more jobs report before the late September FOMC meeting, and it could be just as far off expectations in the other direction. Economic indicators have generally been wonky recently.

And jobs aren't the only factor in monetary policy. Strong jobs but monthly inflation tapering faster than expected could still lead to the Fed easing up on the brakes.

lamontcg4• 4 years ago

The Fed won't stop until they break the back of the labor market and unionization movements. The only lever they really have to pull to get wages until control is driving the economy into an iceberg. An actual NBER-approved recession is coming fairly soon (2023/2024) and something will blow up in the broader economy (CMBS?) and will be much worse than current economic conditions.

dragonwriter4• 4 years ago

The Fed won't stop until they break the back of the labor market and unionization movements

That's not the Fed’s goal. Yes, tight monetary policy generally weakens labor leverage, but the target is inflation. If inflation comes down and unionization continues (which is not implausible, if non-labor price drivers like oil keep dropping), the Fed will almost certainly back of the brake lever notwithstanding the continued labor organizing drives.

derbOac• 4 years ago

This is why there are debates about whether we're in a recession.

Loughla2• 4 years ago

I work at a college; more students than ever are working while going to school. They have jobs, but need something else because they can't afford the life they had just three or four years ago.

It's really a weird time.

ianai2• 4 years ago

It is weird. Probably too weird for one word like recession to really convey much meaning.

There certainly are assets/markets out there that feel/seem over valued. While the globe is still reacting to the pandemic. Stuff was weird after 1918, too. I actually think the changes seen in 1918 were far greater than anything we’ve seen thus far. So maybe the modern economy is a little more stiff with waves (disruptions) taking much longer to cool. Thinking of all the supply chain messiness.

ssully• 4 years ago

I would be interested in actual data on if this is an increasing trend or not. When I was in college (graduated in 2015) most of my friends still had a job; be it to pay for school or to fund their weekend drinking activities.

spaceman_20206• 4 years ago

The data shows this as well. Lots of people are working multiple jobs now

spaceman_20206• 4 years ago

Part of me thinks that people are wishing for a recession because they can’t really understand the economy anymore. It has edged past rationality. There seems to be a yearning for a reset where traditional metrics make sense again.

tboyd47• 4 years ago

Are these new jobs or recently vacant ones?

bombcar3• 4 years ago

From what I've seen, many many companies are still suffering from post-Covid rehiring problems. Airports, restaurants, almost all service industries are severely understaffed and continue to be so.

I wonder how many people have decided to permanently leave the workforce - I know a number of families where one parent stopped working during covid and has no plans to return.

radpanda• 4 years ago

This feels like it matches my anecdata as well. Some folks in positions where they have the choice to work or not work are staying on the sidelines. I know a school administrator who retired earlier than planned rather than deal with the madness, I know a college kid who just took the summer off rather than get a summer job, I know a speech therapist turned stay-at-home mom, etc.

Rather than a few years ago when people's decision calculus was "do I want to trade my time for $X/hr to do some work?" it feels like it's become "do I want to trade my time for $X/hr AND risk getting myself or family members seriously sick AND deal with unhinged people at a time of political strife?" And sure, the X in $X/hr has gone up, but apparently not enough to convince as many people to wait tables as in 2019.

localhost• 4 years ago

My anecdata: the McDonald's in my area still hasn't opened up its in-restaurant seating because they can't staff it. Drive-through only.

Consultant324522• 4 years ago

As the other poster said, this matches my anecdata also. I will also add that I know multiple families who have decided to home school permanently, and that added extra incentive for the family to stay in the single income status.

salawat• 4 years ago

Rehiring I'll bet.

bandyaboot4• 4 years ago

Can we put to bed this belief that the Biden administration is simply gaslighting us when they push back against the utility of the "2 consecutive quarters of negative growth" benchmark for our current economic environment? Seems fairly obvious that we should be questioning how useful that metric is right now.

thesis• 4 years ago

So you’re advocating that negative gdp growth is the same as positive gdp growth?

It’s seems quite advantageous to suddenly change the definition when it slaps you in the face.

bandyaboot4• 4 years ago

So you’re advocating that negative gdp growth is the same as positive gdp growth?

I can only assume you must have responded to the wrong comment.

orwin• 4 years ago

One interesting fact is that while GDP/Capita decline, median GDP/Capita doesn't.

Maybe our indicator should be median rather than average, if we are really worried about the middle class.

xbar2• 4 years ago

We should question that metric. Also, a little gaslighting.

What I mean: if an administration doesn't like a given metric, it should get its replacement metric identified and publicized in advance.

It sure looks a lot like gaslighting when the world has an agreed upon metric and you say "just ignore that; look over here."

bandyaboot4• 4 years ago

What I mean: if an administration doesn't like a given metric, it should get its replacement metric identified and publicized in advance.

That's assuming that they had a previously existing problem with the metric. But why would they, it's always been a fairly reliable rubber stamp. Economic indicators give consistent bad news for an extended period of time, then months later 2 quarters of GDP numbers have been released and the metric says "yep, that was/this is a recession". But the metric now kind of falls on its face in this strange situation of quite a lot of bad economic indicators paired with a strong jobs market.

If we want to rigidly hold to the 2 quarters metric, then we're going to have to accept that "recession" means nothing larger about the economy than "2 consecutive quarters of negative GDP growth". It just becomes a short way of saying simply that.

shapefrog3• 4 years ago

What I mean: if an administration doesn't like a given metric, it should get its replacement metric identified and publicized in advance.

The US definition of a recession was identified and publicized a very long time ago. The National Bureau of Economic Research has been putting dates on downturns since 1929 before there was such a thing as gross domestic product.

PuppyTailWags• 4 years ago

My understanding is that the world has two different agreed upon metrics. We have one definition that was a effectively a rule of thumb for the uneducated, unwashed masses. Then we have one that actual experts use when investigating actual policy that would affect those masses.

SuoDuanDao• 4 years ago

There are less silly ways to push back against the utility of established terminology. I enjoy Sean O'Malley as a combat athlete, but his insistence that he has an unblemished record is, at best, an amusing quirk of his public persona. Nobody but him takes that claim seriously, and I'd respect him more if I learned he doesn't either.

What is happening now looks like a reversal of the trend that saw a growing average GDP per Capita coupled with a shrinking median GDP per Capita. The economy is contacting, but the man on the street is seeing a bigger piece of it. Most would agree that's on balance good thing. But calling it not a recession avoids the awkward conversation of how we hid the opposite trend with an over reliance on GDP size.

bandyaboot4• 4 years ago

No disagreement here. Certainly if I were a political advisor in the room where people were suggesting getting in the weeds with the press about the definition of a recession, I would have set my hair on fire. Whether there are valid points to be made or not, they're losing politically the moment the conversation begins.

spaceman_20206• 4 years ago

Personally, I disregard any economic data from the last two years. Growth was so uneven from month to month because of lockdowns and covid waves that there’s no consistency at all.

I compare to 2019 numbers. Everything else is just noise honestly.

bern4444• 4 years ago

Perhaps this will give the FED the courage to push a full percentage rise in the next meeting instead of 75 bps.

Either way, this gives the FED the cover to continue raising rates through next year.

Anyone who thinks the FED will lower rates next year is delusional.

ramesh31• 4 years ago

Anyone who thinks the FED will lower rates next year is delusional.

Literally nobody thinks that.

amock• 4 years ago

https://www.morningstar.com/articles/1106505/why-we-expect-t...

raesene9• 4 years ago

https://www.morningstar.co.uk/uk/news/225468/federal-reserve... - no quite no-one...

mywittyname3• 4 years ago

Maybe I'm delusional, but I think the Fed is raising rates just so they can lower them again.

Look at what happened to rates between 16-19. They slowly raised rates in little baby steps, but the moment the 2019 economy started to weeble-wobble, they cut rates almost in half. And when the economy fell over in 2020, they cut rates back down immediately.

It took them 3 years to raise rates from 0.13% to 1.70%, but less than a month to go from 1.60% to 0.05%

https://www.macrotrends.net/2015/fed-funds-rate-historical-c...

tmn• 4 years ago

A lot of people think that. I’m not saying I agree, but it’s a pretty popular take in macro circles on YouTube.

ac29• 4 years ago

The yield on a 1yr treasury was higher yesterday than on a 2yr, which suggests that the market certainly thinks cuts next year are more likely than not.

edit: link to data: https://home.treasury.gov/resource-center/data-chart-center/...

edit2: for the visidata users: vd 'https://home.treasury.gov/resource-center/data-chart-center/...'

shapefrog3• 4 years ago

The market is pricing this outcome. May 2023 onwards fed funds are expecing cuts not hikes.

ryanSrich• 4 years ago

Just rip the bandaid and get rates up to 10-12% where they can effectively combat inflation. These half measures have done nothing to “shock” the magnet.

TheSleeprAwakns• 4 years ago

100% correct. J Pow has done a terrible job. How is a lawyer in charge of the fed?

baobob2• 4 years ago

In case there was any doubt, the parent comment was advocating most readers here find themselves unemployed in time for Christmas.

baobob2• 4 years ago

Anyone who thinks the FED will lower rates next year is delusional.

That's quite a take based on a single lagged data point. Does this NFP number even fully capture the effect of their last 75bps hike?

wincy• 4 years ago

Curious, because I often see Fed capitalized as FED as if it’s an acronym, is there an acronym I’m unaware of?

mister_tee• 4 years ago

I believe you're up to speed and when talking about the US Federal Reserve, it's colloquially "The Fed" and not "The FED"

But the fully-capitalized version does show up a lot.

neonate• 4 years ago

https://archive.ph/F7GC2

TheRealPomax• 4 years ago

Fairly paid ones? Or just "jobs" that won't let folks actually afford living in the US?

sircastor• 4 years ago

The jobs are going to be all over the map, literally. Some will pay well, others won’t.

I don’t know what is like where you are, but I see ads for entry level jobs at $15-$19/hour everywhere around me. That seems very good.

I’ll also note that it seems to me like those jobs aren’t being filled. There still seems to be some power in the worker’s position, though this is all anecdotal.

BlargMcLarg2• 4 years ago

Without knowing where you are, 15 ranges from 'virtual poverty' to 'ok'. 19 isn't much better. 'Very good' sounds like an immense overstatement.

For reference, you'd earn the same in most of Europe and have far more security nets.

MisterBastahrd• 4 years ago

Why should we suddenly make a distinction when we haven't for literally the entire run of the statistic?

All I know is that minimum wage was $4.25 an hour when I started working and the best I was able to do in a full time job with no experience was $4.60, in the mid 90s. Compare that to today where minimum wage is $7.25 (lower than it should be, I know) but most places are having trouble filling entry-level, unskilled positions for under $13.

confidantlake• 4 years ago

You have to take into account inflation. A dollar today is not worth the same as a dollar in 1995.

lowkey2• 4 years ago

The devil is in the details. The 528k headline number is misleading, unless you consider part-time/seasonal McJobs equivalent to full-time jobs.

Household Survey Full Time -71,000 Part Time +384,000 Multiple Jobs +92,000

source: https://twitter.com/RobertLutherFL/status/155555070208416973...

legitster2• 4 years ago

The fed is using the exact same metric to count jobs as they were a year ago, 10 years ago, etc.

You can nitpick it all you want but it's a consistent datapoint.

lowkey2• 4 years ago

The fact is that full-time permanent jobs declined by 77k. The bulk of new job creation was in part-time, transient positions that for the most part don't pay enough to sustain people - especially with inflation rampant. The numbers look good, as long as you don't look too closely into the numbers - my point stands.

Don't you find it curious that the article fails to mention these details? I do.

mint2• 4 years ago

384+92 is 476. 384 + 92 - 172 is 304. How does that add up to 528 or are apples and oranges being compared?

whatinthenote• 4 years ago

The source being a tweet from clear right wing nutcase. Not gonna waste my time looking through his tweets to learn that he thinks there are "election fraud" in AZ.

I'm not a labor economist and know nothing about job reports. A quick read into the technical notes mentions that there are two separate surveys and the 528k number comes from the second establishment numbers (https://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.b.htm).

icedistilled• 4 years ago

apparently the lesson the french researcher tweeting chorizo and calling it a star to raise awareness of appeal to experts is pretty well needed. Like in this thread, a random person on twitter with numbers and a likely bias is cited presumably just because the tweet happens to what the poster here wants to be true, not because the numbers are well explained.

legitster2• 4 years ago

I'm out of the loop. Why are so many people obsessed with trying to prove we're in a recession?

b0sk• 4 years ago

Midterm elections. If we are in a recession it’s easy for the Republican party to take the house.

cyberge99• 4 years ago

Historically. This year they’re facing multiple headwinds with a twice impeached albatross and the lunatic fringe cannibalizing their own.

A recession would certainly give them a “look at that other mess” diversion that all too many loudmouths would gleefully parrot.

Server6• 4 years ago

Not really. Normal people don't care if we're in a recession or not. They care if they're employed, and maybe to a lesser extent if their purchasing power is decreasing. If I'm working and getting a big raise things are fine. If I'm unemployed or not getting a big raise then something needs to change.

RappingBoomer2• 4 years ago

the prices of stocks go up when interest rates go down...wall st controls the media, so the media is trying to persuade us that there is a recession so that the Fed will ease further

throwaway5959• 4 years ago

Because rich people can’t handle middle class people having the upper hand when it comes to employment and wages for even six months.

lotsofpulp8• 4 years ago

It is funny that we can have years and years of crazy increases in prices of land, healthcare, education, etc, but the minute wages at the bottom start going up faster than asset prices, the Fed is concerned about wage inflation and the government is getting ready to pass an "Inflation Reduction Act".

oramit• 4 years ago

This is definitely something I have noticed of late. A lot of people are convinced, or at least in their public persona are constantly saying that nothing positive can happen.

I don't think it's any one thing but here are a few ideas I've come up with:

Politics is a big one that can't be ignored. The numbers about the incredibly high levels of political polarization speak for themselves. People have convinced themselves that nothing good can happen when the other party is in power. Post Trump I think that has gotten even worse and people are now openly wishing ill on the whole country so that their party may benefit in the next election.

Related to politics is that a lot of pundits have become very wedded to their positions. Maybe this is just an economics twitter thing but the amount of obsession over what the FED is doing and the dissection of every report isn't healthy. It's hard enough to change your mind (and your trading positions) when things go against you. It's even harder when you are doing it in public and have taken a public position that the sky is always falling.

Moralizing. This is a hard one to describe but basically a lot of the more hard money, milton friedman, perma-bear types, are obsessed with the bill coming due. We sent out a few thousand dollars in stimulus checks to individuals (true), the debt is historically high (true), and now we deserve to have a recession. We deserve the pain, and not only do we deserve it we should welcome it. There is no free lunch!

Finally, though not the last idea but this is already too long... The current situation in the employment market hurts employers the most. The taco bell right down the street from me has had a sign outside for a year advertising starting wages of $17.50 and they still are drive through only because there are not enough employees. The grocery store right across the street from me has been having "on the spot interview" events for more than a year and it is still notably understaffed. The car washing place down the street has had a sign advertising starting wages of $19 an hour for months now. We have had multiple developer and manager positions at my office open for more than a year, but few bites. Employers absolutely hate this and they have a huge pull in the media/government. They would love to undermine worker power in any way.

paulmd2• 4 years ago

Post Trump I think that has gotten even worse and people are now openly wishing ill on the whole country so that their party may benefit in the next election.

This has been a thing since Obama was elected. McConnell explicitly stated that the goal was to just block everything and make Obama a one-term president, and that's how they've played policy since then. Even things that would have been completely uncontroversial "routine business" even as recently as the bush years (just a few years prior) suddenly were dragged to a halt. Debt ceiling increases on money that had already been spent by prior bills (again, many passed during the Bush years), for example.

It all goes back to Gingrich and the Contract With America, and things have only gotten more polarized in the years since. They've been playing out the same script ever since. It just gets more and more polarized every time they lose an election... because it keeps working.

dominotw3• 4 years ago

something I have noticed of late.

This has been happening for a long time. theory seems to be based on recency bias.

dominotw3• 4 years ago

inflation is really high and hurting everyone. They want a name for it, only word people can reach for is recession.

naillo• 4 years ago

I'm just gonna stop paying attention to any fear predictions the hive mind makes at this point. Jobs getting cut, jobs increasing. No idea what's actually happening but I'm not gonna let myself get emotionally involved with whatever the current fears are.

rdtwo• 4 years ago

Real jobs or seasonally adjusted jobs? You need to throw out the headline adjusted numbers as they are mostly made up and manipulated

BenFranklin100• 4 years ago

This is good news and as others have noted, the United States could be in for a good decade of economic growth. To ensure progress however, we need to address two issues: immigration and housing.

Our immigration system needs to reformed to allow US college educated students the option to stay in the US. Current programs like the H1B are in need of serious reform and are too dominated by large firms gaming the system, rather than on individuals seeking a better life. Talented, young immigrants with ideas are the lifeblood and energy of US entrepreneurship and deserve a seat at the table.

Second, The US needs massive zoning reform. Local politicians representing the private interests of the property and home owner class should not have the power to ban new homes. These bans make it difficult if not impossible for younger people to live near well paying jobs. Zoning also sharply limits economic growth. Enrica Morettj estimated that zoning smothered US growth by 50% over 50 years:

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/06/opinion/housing-regulatio...

U.S. employers added 528k jobs in July

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