July jobs report: school’s out for summer! Plus many other indicators take a sabbatical as well

 

 - by New Deal democrat

My Big Theme for the past few months has been that the AI Boom (or possibly bubble) is counterbalancing a stagnant or even shallowly recessionary rest of the economy. After three good reports in a row, the June employment report had been very weak, and July was even worse - but with a MAJOR caveat. Take out the -49,600 loss in local government education jobs, and we eked out a +27,000 gain for the month — still pretty poor. But the goods production portion of the economy continues to be a bright spot.

Below is my in depth synopsis.

HEADLINES:

• -23,000 jobs lost. Private sector jobs increased 30,000, while government jobs subtracted -53,000. As per the above, almost all of those government losses were in local education, and almost certainly because of the difficulty with seasonal adjustments as there are always big layoffs in this sector for the summer months. The three month average rose declined to a meager 20,000.
• The pattern of downward revisions to previous months once again occurred this month. May was revised lower by -66,000, and June was revised lower by -37,000, for a total decline of -103,000.
• The alternate, and more volatile measure in the household report, declined once again, by -87000 jobs. On a YoY basis, this series was negative for the sixth month in a row, now sharply down by -963,000 jobs, or over -80,000 per month
• The U3 unemployment rate declined another -0.1% to 4.1%. 
• The U6 underemployment rate declined -0.1% to 7.9%.
• Further out on the spectrum, those who are not in the labor force but want a job now declined -125,000 to 5.920 million, the 2nd lowest number in the past 12 months..

Leading employment indicators of a slowdown or recession

These are leading sectors for the economy overall, and help us gauge how much the post-pandemic employment boom is shading towards a downturn vs. rebounding. These were almost entirely positive.

• The average manufacturing workweek, one of the 10 components of the Index of Leading Indicators, was unchanged at 41.7 hours, the highest number in 5 years, just surpassing its 2021 peak.

• Manufacturing jobs rose 5,000, the 4th increase in the last 12 months.
• Truck driving reversed its decline ever so slightly, by +100.
• Construction jobs rose +22,000.
• But Residential construction jobs, which are even more leading, declined -500, taking out their interim low from last April, and setting a new 3 year low.
• Goods producing jobs as a whole rose +25,000. 

• Temporary jobs, which had declined by over -650,000 since late 2022, rose by +3,400, continuing to improve from their post-pandemic low set last October.
• The number of people unemployed for 5 weeks or less declined -222,000 to 1.960 million, the lowest number in over 3 years.

Wages of non-managerial workers 

• Average Hourly Earnings for Production and Nonsupervisory Personnel increased $.04, or +0.1%, to $32.40, for a YoY gain of +3.2%, except for one month the lowest since December 2019. This is also lower than the 3.5% YoY inflation rate as of May.

Aggregate hours and wages: 

• The index of aggregate hours worked for non-managerial workers *declined* another -0.1%, and is up 0.8% YoY, about average for the past 12 months.

• The index of aggregate payrolls for non-managerial workers rose only +0.1%, and is up 4.1% YoY, tied for the second-lowest comparison for the past 5 years, and only 0.6% above the YoY inflation rate through June.

Other significant data:

• Professional and business employment rose for the fourth month in a row, by +18,000. These tend to be well-paying jobs. This remains above its low from last October, and has turned higher YoY as well.
• The employment population ratio declined another -0.1% to 58.9%, vs. 61.1% in February 2020, and its lowest since October 2021.
• The Labor Force Participation Rate declined -0.1% to 61.4% , vs. 63.4% in February 2020, and the lowest since February 2021. IMPORTANT: both the EPOP and LFPR are greatly affected by the retiring Boomer population. In the prime age 25-54 demographic, they are virtually unchanged.

SUMMARY

Lat month I described June’s report a “a big stumble.” If so, on the surface at least, this month was a faceplant. It was the 5th absolute decline in the past 12 months. Only 316,000 jobs, or an average of 26,000 per month, have been added in that time. This is just barely holding its head above water, even with the net loss in immigration.

That being said, the report was not nearly as bad as the headline. As indicated above, almost -50,000 of the -53,000 decline was accounted for by local government education jobs. Big layoffs in this sector happen every summer, and are notoriously difficult to seasonally adjust for, and thus there are often one or more outliers during those months. But as per the discussion above,  almost all of the leading indicators in the report increased in manufacturing, construction, truck transportation, and goods production in general. Further, as per my weekly discussion about jobless claims, the unemployment rate did decline another -0.1% to a 12 month low.

But there were other negatives as well, with very weak average and aggregate wage growth, and another actual decline in hours worked. It is possible that, once we have the July CPI number, that real aggregate payrolls will have turned negative YoY, which would be a powerful recession warning signal.

Leaving aside the education jobs issue, I would describe this report as being just on the plus side of being dead in the water.

Very positive “superlow” new jobless claims forecast an unemployment rate under 4% in the next few months

 

 - by New Deal democrat

The superlow number of job losses in the country continues to be one of the two most powerfully positive signals for the entire economy.

Last week only 199,000 people filed for new jobless benefits, the third week in a row that the number was fewer than 200,000. The four week moving average declined -4,500 to 198,750, the first time that number has been below 200,000 since briefly in 2022. With the typical one week delay, continuing claims rose 24,000 to 1.801 million:

Aside from those several weeks in 2022, the only other time in the entire 60 year history of this data series that this number has been under 200,000 was during 1968 and 1969, when the US population was only about 1/2 of what it is today:

These are just extremely powerful positive numbers.

As per usual, for forecasting purposes, the YoY% changes are more important; and here, initial claims were down -11.9%, the four week moving average down -10.1%, and continuing claims down -8.3%:

This is about the very best comparison in the entire post-pandemic period.

Unsurprisingly, when we put this together with stock prices for the “quick and dirty” forecasting method, we also see that this is about the most positive the two have been in tandem:

Finally, with the July jobs report due tomorrow, here is our final look at what initial and continuing claims suggest about the direction of the unemployment rate over the next several months:

Earlier this week I read that Goldman is forecasting a 0.1% increase in the unemployment rate in tomorrow’s report. I suppose that is possible, given the upward blip in new claims in June. But the last time new and continuing unemployment claims were at this level in 2023 and early 2024, the unemployment rate was 3.7%-3.9%. And that is the direction the unemployment rate is likely to take in the next few months.

The economically weighted ISM indexes for July show a reasonably strong but stagflationary expansion

 

 - by New Deal democrat

The economically weighted ISM manufacturing + services indexes continue to be the best timely snapshot of the US economy. With this morning’s update of the services index through July, let’s see what they say. As a quick refresher, I particularly look at the three month average to smooth out noise, and weigh manufacturing at 25% and services at 75%. 

The headline services index, as well as its more leading new orders component, have been consistently positive with the exception of several months last summer. That continued in July. [Note: in all graphs below, the manufacturing component is in blue, with services in gray.]

The headline services index came in at 54.1 [recall that any reading over 50 means expansion]. The three month average was 54.2. Since the three month average for manufacturing was 54.3, the economically weighted average was also 54.2:

New orders came in at 57.2, among its strongest readings of the past three years. The three month average was 56.5, which as it happens was the exact same average for manufacturing, meaning - naturally! - that the economically weighted average was also 56.5:

But if the headline and leading new orders components were very positive, the same could not be said of employment, which in the services index slid back into contractionary territory at 47.4. The three month average was 48.8. The manufacturing employment subindex averaged a very slightly positive 50.4, meaning the economically weighted average was 49.2:

The monthly average of the two employment subindexes has diverged from the official jobs report this year, which has been positive for 5 of 6 months, and showing a gain of over 100,000 jobs in 4 of them. By contrast, the ISM weighted average has only shown expansion in two of them: February and June. Possibly the two metrics will be more aligned once the gold standard for employment QCEW is released for Q1 at the end of this month.

Finally, widespread price increases continue to be a problem, with the prices paid index for services coming in at 70.3, with the three month average at 68.8. The three month average for manufacturing showed even more widespread pricing pressure at 75.4, meaning the economically weighted average was 71.2:

This is a “less worse” result than during spring, but is otherwise the worst since late 2022 (note that unlike the other three graphs, this one shows the last five years for better comparison).

To sum up, as of July the economically weighted ISM averages show an economy in reasonably strong expansion, but characterized by strong inflationary pressures and weak employment; i.e., a positive but stagflationary environment.

My updated “consumer nowcast” is up at Seeking Alpha; plus, more confirmation in the June JOLTS report

 

  - by New Deal democrat

Yesterday I posted the update of my “consumer nowcast” over at Seeking Alpha.  

As a refresher, this system looks at the various sources that can power increased consumer spending, which is 70% of the economy. When all of those sources are shut down, a recession almost invariably occurs. Unsurprisingly, the only significant source of such an increase this year has been appreciation in stock market portfolios among the upper income segment. 

This is fundamental evidence for my current view of the economy, which is that despite the chaos emanating from 1600 Pennsylvania Ave., the economy has been resilient, as manufacturers have found a modus vivendi with the tariff situation, and the big tax windfalls to the wealthiest of the wealthy have found their way into AI data center construction, which has been expansionary and lucrative for everything downstream. That being said, if the AI construction Boom proves to be a bubble (spoiler: I think it is), then the economy is open to a self-reinforcing negative cycle of stock market losses and pullbacks in consumer spending.

The JOLTS report for June was also released yesterday. This added very little to what we already knew about the employment situation: there is very little hiring, and even less firing, which nets out to slight improvement compared with last year. Here’s the situtation with the “soft data” of job openings postings (blue), actual hires (red), and voluntary quits (gold) normed to 100 as of just before the pandemic:

The small upturn since last autumn is apparent, and the slight improvement also shows up in the YoY comparisons of the same data, with both hires and quits being up less than 1% YoY, with openings up over 2%. I’ve also included layoffs and discharges (inverted, purple), which are down over -4% YoY):

To reiterate: hiring up slightly, firing down more. Here’s the firing data in absolute terms shown by itself:

Note the slight but apparent downturn beginning last November, which is also when jobless claims manifested a significant decline as well.

So my headline take on the economy remains the same: make no mistake, it is growing. But that growth is led by a narrow sector, and a narrow source of consumer spending. Pending more Administration-induced chaos.

August starts with a great ISM manufacturing report, but a dismal construction spending one

 

 - by New Deal democrat

As per usual, we start out the month with the ISM manufacturing report (for July) and the construction report (for June). The first was strong; the second was dismal.

Let’s start with the (mainly) good news first. The headline number for the ISM manufacturing report was 55.6 (any number above 50 signifying expansion), the highest since 2022. For forecasting purposes, I average the last three months, which comes out to 54.3:

The more leading new orders subindex rose to 56.7, and the three month average was 56.5:

Both the headline and new orders numbers indicate a strong expansion, which can be expected to continue at least a few more months.

The good news didn’t stop there, because employment rose into positive territory at 52.8. The three month average also crossed into expansion at 50.4:

The only aspect of the data which was negative was the prices paid subindex, which while it declined to 71.1, still indicated very widespread price increases upstream. The three month average was 75.4. These are readings very close to the post-pandemic inflationary peak:

This is of a piece with the regional Fed reports and other manufacturing and production reports, which have shown a surprising rebound this year, but a strongly inflationary one. For forecasting purposes, I weigh manufacturing at 25%, and the other 75% from the ISM services report, which will be updated Wednesday. But that has been consistently positive all year. So again, the message is: positive, but with a strong inflationary current.

But if manufacturing was good, the construction spending report was if anything recessionary. Total construction (blue in the graph below) declined -0.1% for the month, and is down -3.2% YoY. The more leading residential construction sector (red) declined -0.3% for the month, and is down -4.7% YoY. What makes these numbers worse is that they are nominal. The price of construction materials (gold) rose 1.4% in July and was up 9.0% YoY. The below graph norms all three to 100 just before the pandemic for easy comparison:

And here is a look at the YoY% change in both total and residential construction spending:

Quite simply, both are recessionary, especially when coupled with rising materials prices as was the case in 2006 but not in 2019. Of course, housing has been in recessionary territory for over a year - without a recession having occurred.

The dismal news continued in manufacturing construction spending as well, down -1.2% for the month and down -31% from its September 2024 peak:

The only reason this isn’t recessionary is that the building of factories isn’t a big enough part of the economy any more to be crucial.

Finally, here is an update on spending on power construction (blue, left scale) and water supply (orange, right scale), the two sectors most closely aligned with the AI data center Boom:

The former rose 0.6% for the month, and is up 3.5% YoY, while the latter declined -0.3% and is up only 0.9% YoY at this point. Keep in mind once again that these are nominal figures and don’t take into account the 9.0% increase in construction materials YoY.

These were two very dissimilar reports to start the month. The manufacturing sector is doing quite well, but the construction sector is doing quite poorly. That’s one positive leading indicator, and one negative. 

Weekly Indicators for July 27 - 31 at Seeking Alpha

 

 - by New Deal democrat

My “Weekly Indicators” post is up at Seeking Alpha.

Unsurprisingly, the big move this week was in interest rates, which reacted very poorly to the Fed’s decision to keep rates steady, and especially to new Chairman Warsh’s comments essentially abdicating the Fed’s proactive role to the markets, and also a suggestion that the Board’s meetings would take place less frequencly.. In fact, since then it appears that several other members of the Board are in open rebellion, particularly against the latter suggestion.

In any event, as usual clicking over and reading will bring you up to the virtual moment as to the state of the data, and bring me a penny or two in lunch money.