I am off to the big lake to do some fishing, so I don’t have time to take the data apart.
While I am gone, use the comments to fill in the details of NFP . . .
NFP is . . . -51k; Unemployment 5.7%
August 1, 2008 8:35am by Barry Ritholtz
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Employment? Its Typical for a Recession…
The worst day fishing is better than the best day working…always. Enjoy.
U6 numbers: 10.8(NSA), 10.3(SA)
It’s official. The fix is in. At least the Unemployment Rate came in at 5.7% to offset the headline number.
For a full break down of the employment #’s, click on ‘Jake’:
Interesting #’s:
*16-19 year olds were especially hard hit (probably lots of cheap “experienced” labor / retail struggles
*Non-farm payroll #’s dipped negative marking the first period in that territory since the 2001 recession
*Finance / Leisure activities still post significant YoY increases (per the flawed Birth / Death model)
Jake:
No doubt the 16-19yr olds stats will be used to argue that raising the minimum wage causes them to be fired.
BTW, looks like CNBC is spinning the “beats expectations” aspect as hard as they can. It may, I hope, give an opportunity to load up on shorts.
http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t12.htm
U-6 is now 10.8
The number of people forced to go part-time is hitting hard. Ouch.
Futures are not really moving. Actually they are coming down before the open. Guess someone out there knows the shell game. I mean GM came in -487% yoy. Sheesh.
Lost more jobs, and the wait is ON until the -51,000 number is revised downward to -80,000 in 6 months!
Yay. Its always better to hear the truth 6 months later! What a world.
I cannot for the life of me find the B/D numbers in the report. I thought I saw the breakdown in last month’s report.
I used the search function for “birth” but only found an explanation of the model. Anyone got any ideas?
I almost feel sorry for Brian Wesbury at this point. He was the guy who was saying we’re not going to have negative growth for several months…and now all the data is showing him wrong….yet he continues to stick with his story. It’s sad. It’s almost like CNBC is being mean to bring the guy on at this point.
“If it weren’t for housing…and finanicals…and manufacturing…then we have good growth….”
“Well…the negative number in Q4 is not even statistically significant….”
It’s really pathetic.
– AT
Birth / Death Info:
http://www.bls.gov/web/cesbd.htm
In the last 6 years or so, IBM fired between 50,000 and 100,000 US workers and never replaced them in this country. So who is left to fire? HP did the same thing,
It is truly surprising that after another jobless recovery by another Bush presidency, that firings are so low?
BR, CNBC’s Squawk Box sure gave Steve Leisman a tough time this morning. 3 times they played “Dueling Banjos” for Leisman lead-ins.
Check the monster employment index.
It’s real ugly. A true recession signal.
http://suddendebt.blogspot.com/
With postings continue to shift from newspaper to online, the Monster index still show negative growth. This is real bad.
Is it time to start to completely ignore what ADP has to say. USELESS
All is not lost…Cramer called the bottom this week, and I spent last night dancing and celebrating…now, I did notice on his show yesterday, that he backed up half a step, but we true believers in Cramerica, having drunk the kool-aid, know that all we have to do is kick back, go long, and the ball will come to us.
Uh, this may or may not be the bottom, but I think this is what happens when you become more of an entertainer than a true investment advisor…my best advice, had I been Jimmy, would be to the average investor to buy a short term C.D. or two, wait out the first 10-15% increase in the new bull market, and then invest when I was sure the fire was out…I guess that may be the difference in investing vs. trading…
Bruce in Tennessee
Joe,
ADP is for private business jobs. I think the Employment Situation gets revised closer to the ADP number over time.
For a second there, I thought we had capitulation, Larry K just admitted a mild recession. Cited continuing job losses, etc. But then said it’s been priced in since last year.
Then, as expected, said loss among teens shows the effects of the minimum wage. Of, course, it couldn’t be that in recessions, temps and unskilled suffer the most.
Andy Tabbo @ 9:35:26 AM
I’m sure that Wesbury is a very smart economist, and well informed. But he has an agenda, and I can’t figure out what it is. Probably his employer (First Trust) put him up to this . . . maybe they think it’ll help keep clients. Or maybe the Republicans are paying him. Whatever it is, I don’t think that what he says necessarily reflects what he’s really thinking.
They made their August 1 annual adjustment, a loss of 1.45 million (previously reported)jobs, and only a net of minus 51K for July, the way I read the b/d.
Gordon-
The -1.45mm is the change in total Non-Farm Payroll #’s (137.2mm in July vs. 138.7mm in June). There is no adjustment in the Birth Death model typically until January. This January the adjustment was -378k. I figure this year it’ll be 1.5mm+ as there have already been 942k jobs added via the B/D model since February, while the real # is likely negative…
-Jake
Birth Death model was a pig, it failed to subtract at least 90,000 jobs in these 3 industries.
Sure over 650,000 private jobs have been terminated since November, but also 1.7 million full time jobs have disappeared. No wonder wage income stinks, we’ve got more people forced to work part time than any other time in our nation’s history.
Survey Responses dropped in July, just like they do in every recession.
From Paul Kasriel at Northern Trust:
“In the past 12 months, private nonfarm payrolls have declined by a net 535,000. In the past 12 months, the so-called birth/death adjustment has added a net 853,000 jobs. If the birth/death adjustment is excluded, private nonfarm payrolls declined by 1,388,000 in the 12 months ended July 2008 (see Chart 4). If the birth/death adjustment is inaccurately biasing upward private nonfarm employment, then all of the other government economic statistics that are derived from nonfarm payrolls also are inaccurately biased upward. Without the birth/death adjustment, perhaps the U.S. economy might not look quite as “resilient” as it allegedly is thought to be by The Wall Street Journal and its op-ed contributors.”
and
“Conclusion – After the November elections, the National Bureau of Economic Research will tell us what we and the Fed already know – the U.S. economy currently is in a recession. Industrial commodity prices appear to have peaked, which will begin to moderate the trend in headline U.S. inflation in a couple of months. Businesses have little pricing power at the consumer level. There is no evidence of a wage-price spiral. The inflation-expectations’ anchor does not appear to be dragging. The dollar appears to have stabilized, in large part because of economic growth in the rest of the world appears to be slowing significantly. Losses continue to mount on the books of financial institutions, which will inhibit credit creation. Is the Fed going to raise its funds rate target over the remainder of 2008? Not bloody likely!”
http://www.northerntrust.com/popups/popup_noprint.html?http://web-xp2a-pws.ntrs.com/content//media/attachment/data/econ_research/0808/document/dd080108.pdf
Re Kasriel’s comments: what are the other government statistics derived from NFP that he believes are biased upwards and what is the significance of that? (One thought I had was that if there are actually fewer people working, then for a given level of GDP the productivity data are actually biased downwards, i.e. understate the true level. But please correct me if I’m wrong on this)
“In the last 6 years or so, IBM fired between 50,000 and 100,000 US workers and never replaced them in this country. So who is left to fire? HP did the same thing,
It is truly surprising that after another jobless recovery by another Bush presidency, that firings are so low?”
Don’t worry too much about it. When the dollar continues to hit new lows, it will be cost effective enough to outsource those jobs from India back to the USA. Cycle of Life and all…
Posted by: me | Aug 1, 2008 9:45:59 AM
How is it that NFP is -25K than concensus and yet the unemployment rate goes up .2%?