fbpx

labor demand

More Questions Than Clarity On Labor Inflation Pressure As FOMC Seeks Justification For Taper/Rate Hikes

By |2022-02-01T17:31:16-05:00February 1st, 2022|Currencies, Economy, Federal Reserve/Monetary Policy, Markets|

The BLS released its labor turnover data, or JOLTS, earlier today. There have been two main issues with it, starting with Job Openings (JO) which is widely cited along with the unemployment rate to represent the widely reported labor shortage theory. More controversial has been Quits, lately dubbed in the media as the Great Resignation for a variety of presumed [...]

Taper Math, Lazy Labor Slander

By |2021-10-12T17:59:30-04:00October 12th, 2021|Currencies, Economy, Federal Reserve/Monetary Policy, Markets|

The number of Job Openings for the month of July were revised upward, the BLS now thinking there had been more than 11 million of them during that month. Companies seem to be desperate for workers, at least judging by this one measure. The latest estimate for August 2021 came in well short of either the revised figure (11.1 million) [...]

Turning The LABOR SHORTAGE Up to 11

By |2021-09-08T17:53:40-04:00September 8th, 2021|Currencies, Economy, Federal Reserve/Monetary Policy, Markets|

In Massachusetts, the Federal Reserve’s First District, restaurateurs have struggled mightily to find workers. As part of the central bank’s Beige Book, one contact of the Boston leadership said the industry was “facing the worst labor shortage he has seen in 35 years of experience.” In response to such a major threat, these firms become truly creative to try to [...]

JOLTS Revisions: Much Better Reopening, But Why Didn’t It Last?

By |2021-03-11T19:49:16-05:00March 11th, 2021|Currencies, Economy, Federal Reserve/Monetary Policy, Markets|

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 [...]

Inflation Conditions Absent: Someone Call Jay

By |2020-10-06T19:20:27-04:00October 6th, 2020|Bonds, Currencies, Economy, Federal Reserve/Monetary Policy, Markets|

I missed it: did anyone ask Chairman Jay Powell how in the world he’s going to be able to create this “hot” inflation he already needs to balance out a decade without it (meaning: recovery and growth) in order to satisfy this newfangled average inflation target? And though he makes it sound like it’s a new thing, especially adding the [...]

Even More Suggesting Something Did Happen In July

By |2020-09-09T17:26:39-04:00September 9th, 2020|Bonds, Commodities, Currencies, Economy, Federal Reserve/Monetary Policy, Markets, Stocks|

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 [...]

Less Shine In The Sentiment Formula

By |2020-01-21T17:47:21-05:00January 21st, 2020|Currencies, Economy, Federal Reserve/Monetary Policy, Markets|

The IMF yesterday downgraded its forecasts for global growth as well as its real GDP estimates for all the big economy regions. The organization now thinks GDP growth might have amounted to 2.9% last year. Not only the worst year since 2009, that was down from April 2019 approximations of 3.6% and the original forecasts which always start out near [...]

From Friends to Nemeses: JO and Jay

By |2019-11-06T22:33:59-05:00November 6th, 2019|Economy, Federal Reserve/Monetary Policy|

It was one of the first major speeches of his tenure. Speaking to the Economic Club of Chicago in April 2018, newly crowned Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell was full of optimism. At that time, however, optimism was being framed as some sort of bad thing. This was the height of inflation hysteria, where any sort of official upgrade to [...]

Weakening Labor Market Now In All The Data

By |2019-08-06T12:24:20-04:00August 6th, 2019|Bonds, Currencies, Economy, Federal Reserve/Monetary Policy, Markets|

The JOLTS series had always been a seemingly superfluous set of labor numbers for the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). The agency wanted to go deeper into employment when it originally presented these other series in 2002. The unemployment rate seemed accurate enough, but it came at the labor market solely from the view of labor supply. As the BLS [...]

The Unemployment Rate Has Been Left Even Lonelier

By |2019-06-10T17:59:23-04:00June 10th, 2019|Currencies, Economy, Federal Reserve/Monetary Policy, Markets|

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 [...]

Go to Top