According to newly revised BLS benchmarks, the labor market might have been a little bit worse than previously thought during the worst of last year’s contraction. Coming out of it, the initial rebound, at least, seems to have been substantially better – either due to government checks or, more likely, American businesses in the initial reopening phase eager to get [...]
Confident consumers are risk takers. Not only do they spend freely, they freely borrow in order to spend. Jay Powell has done his absolute best (I know) to convince Americans they have nothing to fear insofar as any economic fallout from COVID might be concerned. The Federal Reserve working in combination with the federal government has got every conceivable angle [...]
The unemployment rate has been maybe the loneliest of numbers. That didn’t quite mean it was entirely alone. Of the major economic accounts, only the JOLTS series and only one part of that series suggested the big mainstream employment indicator was anywhere close to accurate. Job Openings (JO) have been surging as if companies are in high demand for new [...]
JOLTS is at it again. The most-watched piece, Job Openings, has been surging. Ostensibly an attempt to measure the demand for labor in the private economy, the BLS figures that US businesses are in the market for whole lot of new workers. Given rising worries throughout the uncertainty of 2018, JOLTS JO has been used as a steady counterpoint. This [...]
Last month it was Job Openings that soared to a new record high of more than 6 million (for April 2017), while the pace of hiring slammed lower to just more than 5 million. This month (May 2017), the opposite. Hires surged to nearly 5.5 million, while Job Openings fell sharply (and were revised lower for April). The large variations [...]
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