Popular Economics Weekly
This was another very strong unemployment report by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) with 943,000 new nonfarm payroll jobs added in July and most of it in the service industries. Leisure/Hospitality, Government, Education/Health, and Professional/Business added 767,000 of those jobs.
“The unemployment rate declined by 0.5 percentage point to 5.4 percent in July, and the number of unemployed persons fell by 782,000 to 8.7 million,” said the BLS Household Survey. “These measures are down considerably from their highs at the end of the February-April 2020 recession. However, they remain well above their levels prior to the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic (3.5 percent and 5.7 million, respectively, in February 2020.”
This is why consumers remain so optimistic, even with alarm bells ringing that economic activity may slow due to the pandemic’s latest surge, as I said last week. Because July’s unemployment report confirms it’s not hurting the jobs market with the 6 million plus job vacancies and employers practically begging their employees to return to work.
Another reason for consumers’ optimism is that average hourly pay rose 4.0 percent and is now above the pre-pandemic level. No wonder, with the 8.7 million still unemployed, many of which may be holding out for better pay and working conditions!
“At the current rate of hiring, the U.S. won’t regain all the lost jobs at least until early 2021 — and it could even take a lot longer than that,” says MarketWatch’s Jeffry Bartash.
How much longer it will take might depend on COVID-19, and the Delta Variant, which is causing a fourth surge in infections, overwhelming some hospitals in Texas, Florida, and other red states that aren’t enforcing a mask mandate.
“The current 7-day moving average of daily new cases (66,606) increased 64.1% compared with the previous 7-day moving average (40,597),” reports the CDC. “The current 7-day moving average is 73.8% lower than the peak observed on January 10, 2021 (254,063) and is 480.1% higher than the lowest value observed on June 19, 2021 (11,483). A total of 34,722,631 COVID-19 cases have been reported as of July 28.”
That is huge, folks, and even throws into doubt just when and how schools will open this fall. To see the level of community transmission in your county, visit COVID Data Tracker.
Harlan Green © 2021
Follow Harlan Green on Twitter: https://twitter.com/HarlanGreen
1 comment:
This is cool I need a job!
Siulau Darba
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