Media Incompetence and the State of Employment

Once again the media cannot get beyond the headline of “Jobs numbers disappoint”.  Now I expect politicians to stick to Twitter-like talking point political sound bites.  Pundits will dig slightly deeper.  But the fact that the print and broadcast media can’t even spend the time to understand why only 120k jobs were created versus the 200k forecasted is lame.  Instead, they focused on the impact on the president’s reelection chances.  So, if no one else will do it, I guess I will.

For starters, the February job gains totaled 240k, but the March gains dropped to 120k.  So the key questions are:

·         Were jobs lost in certain sectors in March that weren’t previously lost in February? and/or

·         Were gains in certain sectors in March lower than the February gains?

Of course there will always be ‘puts and takes’, that is some increases and some decreases, but it is important to look at the material or largest factors.  The most telling numbers I could see in the BLS report were:

·         In the Motion Picture and Sound Recording Industry Sector, 19k jobs were created in February, but 8k were lost in March for a net negative change of 27k jobs.

·         In Professional and Technical Services, 32k jobs were created in February, but only 14k were created in March for a net negative change of 18k jobs.

·         In Education and Health Services, 66k jobs were created in February, but only 37k were created in March for a net negative change of 29k jobs.

These three sectors account for a  reduction of 74k jobs created from February to March compared to January to February.  There was some scant media attention about increases in manufacturing (37k) and decreases in retail (-34k), but these relative increases and decreases were similar to the Jan-Feb changes.

Could the big change in the Motion Picture and Sound Recording Industry Sector be related to temporary hiring in February in relation to the Grammy and Oscar award shows?  These one off events could drive increased hiring followed by immediate reductions.  As for the slowdown in Professional and Technical Services, could this be attributed to tax and legal services hiring in February in preparation of April 15th Tax day and that the smaller increase in March was due to February’s saturation.  Will we expect to see a net LOSS of jobs in this sector come April and May?  As for Education and Health Services, the slowdown was in the Health Services where 27k fewer jobs were created in March versus February.  This slowdown in the rate of job increases may reflect the new month to month increase, nonetheless, most analysts expect steady job increases in the health services industry.

Was March an indication of economic slowdown?  A one off blip on the radar?  Or the true state of job creation that will average 120k-200k new jobs created?  I believe economic activity will continue to increase as many households have effectively repaired their balance sheets plus the demand for new vehicles will drive automobile sales and steady job creation.  As the calendar turns to spring construction and mining activity may also increase to offset slowdowns elsewhere. 

Until the housing market and construction recovers, month to month job gains will be limited as in all previous recoveries it was housing and construction that led the way.  Unfortunately, the real estate bubble and subsequent burst has made this recovery unlike other recoveries.

As for how this impacts the presidential election, I will leave that to the media.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

A Secular American Jew and a Love for Israel

As many of you know, I have dedicated many postings to the State of Israel on a range of topics including: it’s history, the present day government, the Jewish-Palestinian question, and the region in general.   Growing up in a liberal conservative Jewish household (the oxymoron is quite common as American Jews were almost exclusively political liberals and the conservative branch of Judaism the most common) and attending Hebrew school as a kid you obviously build an affinity for the State of Israel.   I do not remember the Six-Day War of 1967, but I have vivid memories of celebrating Israel’s 25 th anniversary in 1973 and the Yom Kippur War later that year.   As a ten year old attending Yom Kippur services I saw the worried looks on my parents and the other adults at the shul as members of the congregation would periodically step outside to get news reports from car radios and transistor radios (We still drove and used electrical appliances during the high holidays, though several fam
Read more

September 10, 2001 was a Monday

Where were you on September 10, 2001?   What were you worried about?   What occupied your thoughts, worries, hopes, and dreams?   What were you excited about?   What were you interested in? September 10, 2001 was a Monday. Cindy and I were still laughing about the recent visit from the Three Amigas: Leah, Roseanne, and Valerie, and the adventures of Sedona, a certain screen door, a forgotten carrot cake, and breakfast for champions.   We were also dealing with a 1995 Chevy Blazer that seemed to be on its last legs, surviving our first Arizona summer, thinking about what to remodel in the house, dealing with the concept of a Home Owners Association, thinking that my best shot at a World Series game maybe with the fledgling Arizona Diamondbacks, and looking forward to a visit from Scott, Lori, and the boys. But what about America?   We knew nothing about a tiny town in Pennsylvania called Shanksville; Guantanamo Bay was the setting for A Few Good Men, and we still taped shows and listene
Read more

Sunni and Shia: So who are the bad guys again?

Baby faces vs. heals?   Cowboys vs Indians?   Good guy always where the white hat.   “Dig is he a good guy or bad guy?”   Bad guys always, looked, well, bad. You’re either with us or you’re against us.   Iraq, Iran, and North Korea are the axis of evil. Americans, for the most part, have a pretty simple outlook on conflict: just tell us who the bad guys are and we’ll know who to root against.   We tend to lump similar races and peoples into larger buckets, mostly due to the media’s inclination to treat us like potential Jeff Foxworthy competitors.   But the world is anything but simple and as I have written previously, the Middle East is as confusing and confounding place as you can find.   During the Iran and Iraq war of the 1980’s most Americans took the position that “…as long as they kill each other, I’m good.”   When civil war ravaged Afghanistan, we joined the side of the Mujahedeen because they were fighting the Soviets and the Soviets were our archenemy, a position they occupie
Read more