Job Creation: Reality v. Politics

A nice chart for those who live in a fact-based world.

Job creation in the first 32 payroll reports in the Trump administration is significantly lagging the prior 32 months before President Trump took office.

Employment Situation – September

On Friday,  the BLS reported a total nonfarm payroll monthly increase of 136k, including 114k private-sector jobs;  an unemployment rate falling to 3.5 percent, the lowest rate since December 1969, and average hourly earnings falling by 1 cent.

The BLS notes a big downshift in job creation from last year,

Total nonfarm payroll employment increased by 136,000 in September. Job growth has averaged  161,000 per month thus far in 2019, compared with an average monthly gain of 223,000 in 2018.  – BLS

Private Sector NFPs

September’s 114k monthly increase in private sector payrolls was the fifth-lowest of the Trump administration and, more disturbing, the 3-month moving average of private-sector job growth is now at its lowest level since July 2012.

To be fair, robust job creation is a difficult proposition when labor supply is so scarce as measured by a 3.5 percent unemployment (UR), though we believe the UR is a flawed measurement.  See here. 

The New Political Spectrum 

We are starting to wonder if facts matter anymore.

The post-modern nightmare now seems fully realized in today’s culture, where there is no reality only constructions of reality.  There is no truth, there are no facts.  It’s true only if you believe it’s true.

We reject this nonsense and are becoming convinced the new political spectrum is not about the left and the right anymore but it is bookended by a fact-based reality versus the conspiracy dominant, or, what we call the National Enquirer based.

Many from the traditional left and right live together, though not in agreement, on both extremes of the spectrum.   Our preference is for a fact-based lefty or righty over the alternative any day.

It is a much easier reality and a better world when the facts are established and the conclusions are debated rather than arguing over two or many different realities.  Unfortunately, we are seeing this now play out in real-time in the U.S,, which is very destructive and, if not checked, will end up in an economic disaster.

Lincoln And The Facts 

President Lincoln,  a great storyteller, had something to say about drawing different conclusions from the same established or, what economists like to call “stylized facts,”

During his days as an Illinois circuit court lawyer,  legend has it Lincoln would persuade juries with the use of his funny but truth piercing stories,

The story goes that Lawyer Lincoln was worried he had not convinced the jury during the closing argument of a civil case against a railroad.   The jurors had gone to lunch to deliberate.  Lincoln followed them and interrupted their dessert with a story about a farmer’s son gripped by panic,

“Pa, Pa, the hired man and sis are in the hay mow and she’s lifting up her skirt and he’s letting down his pants and they’re afixin’ to pee on the hay.” “Son, you got your facts absolutely right, but you’re drawing the wrong conclusion.”

The jury ruled in Lincoln’s favor.

Just the facts, ma’am!