On recent jobs numbers...

Macro and other Market Musings:

 A couple of things to note. First, it is interesting that the 162,000 jobs gained in March is equal to the total number of jobs gained during the past three months of January, February, and March. Second, it is encouraging to see the four industries hit hardest during the recession--construction, durable goods manufacturing, professional & business services, and retail trade--had jobs gains in March and all but one of them have had job gains over the past three months as well. Third, the financial activities sector (i.e. FIRE in NFP) continues to lose jobs and has done so over the past three months.

Dean Baker:

State and local governments shed 9,000 jobs, a loss that was more than offset by the federal government’s hiring of 48,000 workers for the Census.  State and local governments have shed 72,000 jobs since December, or 24,000 a month. This pace is likely to increase as the new fiscal year approaches. Other notable job losers include real estate, which lost 6,100 jobs. Remarkably, real estate employment is down by only 7.6 percent even though house sales and prices are both down by more than 30 percent. Information services lost 12,000 jobs; employment in this sector is down by 24.1 percent over the decade.

While the trend in overall employment has been positive in recent months, the situation appears to be worsening for African Americans. The unemployment rate for blacks rose to 16.5 percent, equaling its high for the recession reached in January. The unemployment rate for black men rose to 19.0 percent, a new peak. This is a common pattern with the unemployment rate for African Americans peaking after the overall unemployment rate peaks.

The job gains continue to go disproportionately to older workers, with people over age 55 accounting for 208,000 of the 264,000 increase in employment reported for March. Employment for older workers has increased 722,000 over the last year even as it had fallen by 2,671,000 for everyone else.

There was an increase of 295,000 in the number of people involuntarily working part-time, pushing this measure near its recession peak. The duration measures all hit new highs in March. There has been considerable confusion on this issue. The average duration of unemployment spells is undoubtedly longer than ever, in large part because of the extension of benefits. However, this does not mean that extended benefits have increased the unemployment rate. The long-term unemployed would feel more pressure to find jobs if the benefit period was shorter, but in a period of inadequate aggregate demand, this just means that they would displace other workers. This would not increase total employment.

Nominal wages fell in March for the sixth time since 1964. This is not a good sign for future income growth.

The overall picture here is not very positive. While we are seeing job growth, it is at a very slow pace. The average in the private sector over the last two months was just 66,000 jobs. With the public sector shedding jobs, we will need more rapid job growth just to stay even with the growth in the labor force.

Posted via email from Jim Nichols for GA State House