{"id":1496,"date":"2019-04-05T09:42:36","date_gmt":"2019-04-05T13:42:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/naroffeconomics.com\/?p=1496"},"modified":"2019-04-05T09:42:36","modified_gmt":"2019-04-05T13:42:36","slug":"march-employment-report-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/naroffeconomics.com\/?p=1496","title":{"rendered":"March Employment Report"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

KEY DATA:<\/strong> Payrolls: +196,000;\nPrivate: +182,000; Manufacturing: -6,000; wages: +0.1%; Unemployment Rate: 3.8%\n(unchanged) <\/p>\n\n\n\n

IN A\nNUTSHELL:<\/strong>  \u201cJob gains are back on track, but the trend is\nstill down.\u201d\u201d<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

WHAT IT\nMEANS:<\/strong>  After the initial report that only 20,000 new\npositions were added, angst about the state of the economy took hold, at least\nwith those who actually think that a single month\u2019s number means something.  Today, those same worrywarts are probably\nsmiling.  Job gains came in above\nexpectations in March and there were some minor, but positive revisions to the\nJanuary and February numbers.<\/em><\/strong>  But\nthe details don\u2019t tell me that this was a great report.<\/em><\/strong>  As I have mentioned frequently, concentrate\non the three-month moving average.  That\nnumber decelerated again and will likely continue to do so<\/em><\/strong> as the\nJanuary number disappears when we get the April report.  Private sector job gains were solid but not\ngreat over the past three months, averaging 168,000<\/em><\/strong>.  As for March, there were really only two\nstrong sectors, health care and restaurants, while manufacturing and retail\nwere down.<\/em><\/strong>  A bounce in state and\nlocal government hiring, which I don\u2019t expect to continue, helped push up the\noverall gain.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But the real disappointment was in the household\nportion of the survey.<\/em><\/strong>  First, wages\nrose minimally and the increase over the year decelerated.<\/em><\/strong>  That was a real surprise<\/em><\/strong> given all\nthe stories of firms raising wages.  That\nmay just be a one-month wonder, but it is something to watch.  We need stronger, not weaker wage gains if\nthe economy is to growth faster.<\/em><\/strong> \nSecond, the labor force participation rate declined<\/em><\/strong> and looking over\nthe course of the year, it has wandered around in a relatively tight\nrange.  In March, it was only up 0.1\npercentage point over the March 2018 number. \nWhile the downward trend that we had seen since spring 2000 has been\narrested, there has been no sudden surge despite the labor shortages.  That does not bode well for the future when\njob gains are softer.  The unemployment\ndid remain at 3.8%,<\/em><\/strong> which is well below what most economists believe is\nthe long-term trend.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

MARKETS AND\nFED POLICY IMPLICATIONS:<\/strong>  Don\u2019t\nget me wrong, this was a very good report. \nBut given the wild swings in job gains – 312,000 in January, 33,000 in\nFebruary, 196,000 in March – it does not tell me the labor market is continuing\nto be a lean mean jobs<\/em><\/strong> machine.<\/em><\/strong>  Private sector hiring is decelerating and\nwage gains might be moderating as well. \nThe outsized increases in health care, restaurants and state and local\ngovernment are likely to unwind in April. \nInvestors will probably enjoy this report, but its impact should wear\noff pretty quickly:  It\u2019s just not as\nstrong as the headline number implies.<\/em><\/strong> \nThis is the last jobs report before the Fed meets at the end of the\nmonth, so the members will be able to say that job gains have stabilized.  That gives them the cover to keep doing what\nthey have been doing, which is nothing.  <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

KEY DATA: Payrolls: +196,000; Private: +182,000; Manufacturing: -6,000; wages: +0.1%; Unemployment Rate: 3.8% (unchanged) IN A NUTSHELL:  \u201cJob gains are back on track, but the trend is still down.\u201d\u201d WHAT IT MEANS:  After the initial report that only 20,000 new positions were added, angst about the state of the economy took hold, at least with … Continue reading March Employment Report<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1496","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-economic-indicators"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naroffeconomics.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1496","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naroffeconomics.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naroffeconomics.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naroffeconomics.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naroffeconomics.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1496"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/naroffeconomics.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1496\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1497,"href":"https:\/\/naroffeconomics.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1496\/revisions\/1497"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naroffeconomics.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1496"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naroffeconomics.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1496"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naroffeconomics.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1496"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}