Friday, October 08, 2010

Gain of +863,000 Private Payroll Jobs This Year

Some highlights of today's employment report:

1. The September jobless rate remained unchanged at 9.6%.

2. Private-sector payroll employment increased in September for the ninth straight month (every month this year).  The increase of 64,000 jobs last month brings the total number of private-sector jobs added this year to 863,000, which is the largest 9-month gain in private payroll employment since the summer of 2007 (see top chart above).

3. Temporary employment increased in September by 16,900 jobs to a total of 2,128,600, the highest level for temporary employment since October 2008, almost two years ago (see bottom chart above). Except for a small decrease in July, temporary help services employment has increased in each of the last 12 months.

4. Average overtime hours for manufacturing rose slightly in September to 3.9 hours from 3.8 hours in August, matching the 3.9 hours in May and June, which is the highest level of overtime hours since 4.0 hours in April 2008. 

MP: Today's employment report suggests a weak, but ongoing, slow recovery in the labor market, with no indications that a double-dip recession is a real threat.

28 Comments:

At 10/08/2010 10:08 AM, Blogger morganovich said...

the current employment to population ratio has not improved in any meaningful way.

part time for economic reasons rose over 600k in sept. so u6 is up.

ADP showed a loss of 39k private sector jobs.

this seems more like the economy faltering because it cannot stand on its own to me.

(which is not a prescription for more counterproductive QE - the point of a recession is adjustment, you can put it off, but not eliminate the need)

 
At 10/08/2010 10:13 AM, Blogger morganovich said...

this continues to be the least "v" shaped post recession recovery in employment levels since ww2.

http://calculatedriskimages.blogspot.com/2010/10/job-losses-and-recessions-aligned-at.html

 
At 10/08/2010 10:50 AM, Blogger Tom said...

We gained 863,000 jobs, but we need at least twice that number to create recovery. We're importing 1.5 million new legal immigrants of working age annually.

We're still losing net jobs. This is not a recovery, it is a flat, declining spot at a low point in employment. We are now Europe:
1. Gigantic government - 63% of the economy; 44% of GDP in spending; 19% in regulation costs.
2. High unemployment
3. Slow growth

The only way out is to reduce government spending drastically. The gigantic deficit and debt are a major disease which will kill the economy if not cured. I think the happy talk should cease until the major disease is conquered. Cut government in half.

 
At 10/08/2010 11:50 AM, Blogger juandos said...

Ahhh, still quoting from the ever questionable (fraudulent?)) BLS, eh?

Thank you ZeroHedge:

BLS Issues Update On Perpetual Upward Data Bias: 366,000 Overestimate For Year Ended March 2010

Charting Statistical Fraud At The BLS: 22 Out Of 23 Consecutive Upward Revisions In Initial Jobless Claims

 
At 10/08/2010 12:14 PM, Blogger James said...

Last year we issued over a million new green cards to allow foreign workers to get American jobs plus more than 85,000 H-1B visas for temp workers and an unknown number of L-1 visas for foreign workers. Looks like the number of jobs created is large enough to accommodate new foreign workers.

 
At 10/08/2010 12:42 PM, Blogger Benjamin Cole said...

Jobs grwoth is glacial; bring on tax cuts, reg cuts, and QE2.

 
At 10/08/2010 1:45 PM, Blogger marmico said...

The (U-3) unemployment rate has been 9.5% or higher for 14 consecutive months. It takes out the prior 1982-83 record in the postwar era.

No flashing lights, Perry!

 
At 10/08/2010 2:39 PM, Blogger PeakTrader said...

Looks like the Fed will provide another round of quantitative easing to boost the stock market and put some lipstick on this pig before the election.

Less than 100,000 private payroll jobs per month this year is less than the 125,000 to 150,000 jobs per month needed just to keep up with population growth, and there's still 15 million people out of work.

There's not much the Obama Administration can do now after squandering trillions of dollars failing over and over to generate a virtuous cycle of consumption-employment. So, it has to rely on creating exports, and destroying imports, and press the Fed to print more money.

 
At 10/08/2010 5:11 PM, Blogger PeakTrader said...

Juandos, your link "Charting Statistical Fraud At The BLS: 22 Out Of 23 Consecutive Upward Revisions In Initial Jobless Claims" should say "BLS is over 99% Accurate Estimating Initial Jobless Claims."

Your link says "the BLS has underrepresented initial claims by roughly 80,000 year to date." That's less than 1%, since there have been over 450,000 claims each week.

 
At 10/08/2010 5:17 PM, Blogger juandos said...

"That's less than 1%, since there have been over 450,000 claims each week">..

O.K. PT, and your point? (making like the devil's advocate here)

 
At 10/08/2010 5:28 PM, Blogger PeakTrader said...

Juandos, the site could've used a moving average to fool people into believing there's a (very small) bias.

 
At 10/08/2010 6:02 PM, Blogger PeakTrader said...

Or, perhaps, the BLS collects up to 99% of the data initially, makes an estimate, and then collects the remaining data for the revision.

I doubt the BLS collects more than 100% of the data (like Chicago adding up votes).

 
At 10/09/2010 1:54 AM, Blogger PeakTrader said...

When you collect up to 99% of the data, you may be more likely to underestimate, and when you collect more than 100% of the data (like Chicago votes), you may be more likely to overestimate.

 
At 10/09/2010 10:30 AM, Blogger juandos said...

Hey PT:

"Juandos, the site could've used a moving average to fool people into believing there's a (very small) bias"...

As could be said of the BLS...

"I doubt the BLS collects more than 100% of the data (like Chicago adding up votes)"...

Hence this is where we part ways, I question that the BLS collects the data it uses...

No PT I've always been leary of what the BLS has to say about unemployment long, long before this present administration got into office...

I'll grant you much of my own leariness come from purely anecdotal experiences...

Rooms and rooms of statisticians working on some 'sort of data' doesn't a reality make...

My question to you PT is do you have a good guesstimate of what a 1/2 percent is in numbers of unemployed when one compares the BLS number to the Gallup number?

Maybe I'm being excessivly cynical here PT with regard to federal government product...

 
At 10/09/2010 12:59 PM, Blogger juandos said...

One more thing PT that I forgot to add from what I personally consider a questionable source, Reuters: Job losses in 2009 likely bigger than thought

This particular paragraph struck me as interesting and maybe just maybe why BLS numbers might possibly be questionable: 'The department blamed its 902,000 miss on faulty estimates of how many companies were created or destroyed, and it has not yet made any changes to the so-called birth-death model that produces this projection'...

 
At 10/09/2010 1:17 PM, Blogger PeakTrader said...

Juandos, I have more confidence in the BLS than in Gallup, in part, because the economists at the BLS are technocrats, and a minimum 3.5 GPA (in grad econ or statistics) is needed to be considered for an economist job at the BLS.

Also, I have no confidence in a fraudulant or incompetent site that claims fraud at the BLS.

Your Gallup chart uses a 30-day moving average not seasonally adjusted. So, the unemployment rate will be different than what the BLS reports.

Your chart shows the unemployment rate was below 9.5% seven months in a row this year and was below 9% one month. The BLS shows the unemployment rate hasn't fallen below 9.5% all year.

Seasonal Adjustment Wikipedia

"One famous example is the rate of unemployment which is also presented by a time series. Particularly this rate depends on seasonal influences. This is why it is important to free the unemployment rate of its seasonal component. As soon as the seasonal influence is removed from this time series the real trend of the unemployment rate is visible."

 
At 10/09/2010 1:28 PM, Blogger PeakTrader said...

Juandos, it seems, the BLS identified the problem.

It's a wonder the BLS can measure and keep up with such a large and dynamic economy.

 
At 10/09/2010 2:21 PM, Blogger juandos said...

PT you bring up some interesting points: "Juandos, I have more confidence in the BLS than in Gallup, in part, because the economists at the BLS are technocrats, and a minimum 3.5 GPA (in grad econ or statistics) is needed to be considered for an economist job at the BLS"...

Hmmm, again (making as the devil's advocate here while getting an education) what makes you think the 'technocrats' at Gallup are any different? Isn't possible that Gallup may actually demand more of their employees in the 'technocrat' position than the BLS?

I really don't know, hence the question...

"Also, I have no confidence in a fraudulant or incompetent site that claims fraud at the BLS"...

I'm making the assumption that you're talking about Reuters, correct?

I like you do have some problems with that outfit...

"It's a wonder the BLS can measure and keep up with such a large and dynamic economy"...

Not for the amount of tax dollars they get annually PT...:-)

Actually considering what must a never ending mountain of data coming at the BLS' collective way on a daily basis, your admiration for the BLS probably isn't misplaced...

 
At 10/09/2010 2:25 PM, Blogger juandos said...

Here's a couple more less than optimistic nuggets on employment...

From CNBC a slideshow: Disappearing Jobs
(11 slides)

From Investors Business Daily Capitol Hill blog: U.S. Won’t Recover Lost Jobs Until March 2020 At Current Pace

 
At 10/09/2010 7:15 PM, Blogger VangelV said...

Sorry Mark but if we count the unemployed as they were during the Carter Administration you would be looking at 20% or so, not exactly a cheery figure. And even if you do see some increases you still need a solid foundation for a sustainable recovery that does not exist.

 
At 10/09/2010 8:01 PM, Blogger Unknown said...

The annual BLS benchmark revision is likely going to erase more than 350,000 of those jobs. Those gains include the Census and most of them are temporary.

Most economists will tell you that recoveries from financial crises are not like other recoveries. It will take at least 2 years before financial markets are healthy again. The housing and CRE markets are still reeling.

These temp jobs won't become permanent unless and until political uncertainty is resolved. The health care law alone makes employment above 50 workers very expensive.

Now that the NBER has made the hasty, politically motivated decision to kill the recession, the chance of a double dip just went from zero to 60%.

We have to net 150,000 new jobs per month just to keep the unemployment rate steady.

 
At 10/13/2010 10:17 AM, Blogger sethstorm said...


Last year we issued over a million new green cards to allow foreign workers to get American jobs plus more than 85,000 H-1B visas for temp workers and an unknown number of L-1 visas for foreign workers. Looks like the number of jobs created is large enough to accommodate new foreign workers.

Halt those programs and have the unemployed fill them. No sense in perpetuating the problem.

 
At 10/13/2010 10:19 AM, Blogger sethstorm said...


These temp jobs won't become permanent unless and until political uncertainty is resolved. The health care law alone makes employment above 50 workers very expensive.

Easy. Don't hire the unemployed on a permanent basis, things get worse.

 
At 10/13/2010 1:00 PM, Blogger VangelV said...

Last year we issued over a million new green cards to allow foreign workers to get American jobs plus more than 85,000 H-1B visas for temp workers and an unknown number of L-1 visas for foreign workers. Looks like the number of jobs created is large enough to accommodate new foreign workers.

Halt those programs and have the unemployed fill them. No sense in perpetuating the problem.


I agree. Microsoft, Oracle, and other high tech companies should open software centers and design campuses in British Columbia, Alberta, or Ontario where they can get the foreign workers they need without the regulatory turmoil. In this world there is no need to physically locate facilities in the US when you can be more effective by doing work and making a profit where tax rates are lower and regulatory hurdles are not as much of a problem. Canada can certainly use the tax revenue from all those high skilled workers and their influx can help stabilize our housing markets and our service sectors.

 
At 10/13/2010 6:37 PM, Blogger James said...

“I would secure the American market to the American producer, and I would not hesitate to raise the duties whenever necessary to secure this patriotic end. I would not have an idle man or an idle mill or an idle spindle in this country if, by holding exclusively the American market, we could keep them employed and running. Every yard of cloth imported here makes a demand for one yard less of American fabrication.

William McKinley, Jr. 25th President of the United States

 
At 10/13/2010 8:10 PM, Blogger VangelV said...

“I would secure the American market to the American producer, and I would not hesitate to raise the duties whenever necessary to secure this patriotic end. I would not have an idle man or an idle mill or an idle spindle in this country if, by holding exclusively the American market, we could keep them employed and running. Every yard of cloth imported here makes a demand for one yard less of American fabrication.

William McKinley, Jr. 25th President of the United States


So? McKinely was a mediocre president who was a protectionist.


Agriculture, manufacturers, commerce, and navigation, the four pillars of our prosperity, are then most thriving when left most free to individual enterprise.

...Enlightened by a benign religion, professed, indeed, and practiced in various forms, yet all of them inculcating honesty, truth, temperance, gratitude, and the love of man, acknowledging and adoring an overruling Providence, which by all its dispensations proves that it delights in the happiness of man here and his greater happiness hereafter -- with all these blessings, what more is necessary to make us a happy and a prosperous people? Still one thing more.. .a wise and frugal Government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another, shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government, and this is necessary to close the circle of our felicities.

Thomas Jefferson, 3rd President of the United States

 
At 10/16/2010 2:29 PM, Blogger sethstorm said...


I agree. Microsoft, Oracle, and other high tech companies should open software centers and design campuses in British Columbia, Alberta, or Ontario where they can get the foreign workers they need without the regulatory turmoil. In this world there is no need to physically locate facilities in the US when you can be more effective by doing work and making a profit where tax rates are lower and regulatory hurdles are not as much of a problem. Canada can certainly use the tax revenue from all those high skilled workers and their influx can help stabilize our housing markets and our service sectors.

Not if doing so comes at great cost.

 
At 10/16/2010 10:29 PM, Blogger VangelV said...

Not if doing so comes at great cost.

You are making my point for me. The US is imposing great costs by meddling with companies that are trying to do the best that they can to service their customers. You make it harder for them to hire people they may move some of their operations to places where that is not a problem.

 

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