Tag Archive: job openings

How Many More Americans Might Have Quit Their Jobs Than The Huge Number Already Estimated, And What Might This Mean For FOMC Taper

2022-01-07

by

2022-01-07

There were a few surprises included in the BLS JOLTS data just released today for the month of November (note: the government has changed its release schedule so that JOLTS, already one month further in arrears than the payroll report, CES & CPS, will now come out earlier so that its numbers are publicly available for the same monthly payrolls before the next CES & CPS get released).

Read More »

Weekly Market Pulse: Has Inflation Peaked?

2021-12-13

by

2021-12-13

The headlines last Friday were ominous: Inflation Hits Highest Level in Nearly 40 Years. Inflation is Painfully High… Groceries and Christmas Presents Are Going To Cost More. Inflation is Soaring..

Read More »

A Global JOLT(s) In July

2021-12-09

by

2021-12-09

The Bureau Labor Statistics reported today another huge month for Job Openings (JO). According to their methodology (which I still believe is flawed, but that’s not our focus this time), the level for October 2021 (JOLTS updates are for one month further back than payrolls) was a blistering 11.03 million.

Read More »

Weekly Market Pulse: Is It Time To Panic Yet?

2021-07-12

by

2021-07-12

TNX Daily, Dec 2020 - Jul 2021
Until last week you hadn’t heard much about the bond market rally. I told you we were probably near a rally way back in early April when the 10 year was yielding around 1.7%. And I told you in mid-April that the 10 year yield could fall all the way back to the 1.2 to 1.3% range.

Read More »

JOLTS Revisions: Much Better Reopening, But Why Didn’t It Last?

2021-03-12

by

2021-03-12

JOLTS - Job Openings, SA 2017-2021
According to newly revised BLS benchmarks, the labor market might have been a little bit worse than previously thought during the worst of last year’s contraction. Coming out of it, the initial rebound, at least, seems to have been substantially better – either due to government checks or, more likely, American businesses in the initial reopening phase eager to get back up and running on a paying basis again.

Read More »

Inflation Hysteria #2 (WTI)

2020-12-12

by

2020-12-12

Sticking with our recent theme, a big part of what Inflation Hysteria #1 (2017-18) also had going for it was loosened restrictions for US oil producers. Seriously.

Read More »

A Second JOLTS

2020-08-11

by

2020-08-11

What happens when we are stunned and dazed? We filter out the noise to focus on the bare basics by getting back to our instincts, acting reflexively based upon our deeply held beliefs and especially training. When faced with a crisis and there’s no time to really think, shorthand will have to suffice.

Read More »

Consistent Trade War Inconsistency Hides The Consistent Trend

2019-12-05

by

2019-12-05

Private Non Residential Construction Spending, 2011-2019
You can see the pattern, a weathervane of sorts in its own right. Not for how the economy is actually going, mind you, more along the lines of how it is being perceived from the high-level perspective. The green light for “trade wars” in the first place was what Janet Yellen and Jay Powell had said about the economy.

Read More »

From Friends to Nemeses: JO and Jay

2019-11-08

by

2019-11-08

JOLTS - Job Openings, SA 2017-2019
It was one of the first major speeches of his tenure. Speaking to the Economic Club of Chicago in April 2018, newly crowned Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell was full of optimism. At that time, however, optimism was being framed as some sort of bad thing. This was the height of inflation hysteria, where any sort of official upgrade to the economic condition was taken as further “hawkishness.”

Read More »

Monthly Macro Monitor: Doom & Gloom, Good Grief

2019-10-12

by

2019-10-12

Economic Growth & Investment, October 2019
When I first got in this business oh so many years ago, my mentor told me that I shouldn’t waste my time worrying about the things everyone else was worrying about. As I’ve related in these missives before, he called those things “well worried”. His point was that once everyone was aware of something it was priced into the market and not worth your time.

Read More »

From JOLTS Series Shift To Series of Rate Cuts

2019-10-10

by

2019-10-10

Average Weekly Hours All Employees, 2007-2019
I’ve said all along that they would be dragged into them kicking and screaming. After all, the Federal Reserve undertook its last rate hike in December 2018 – just as the markets were making clear he was completely mistaken in his view of the economy. What followed was the ridiculous “Fed pause” which pretty much everyone outside of the central bank and the Economics profession knew wasn’t the end of it.

Read More »

Monthly Macro Monitor: Economic Reports

2019-06-04

by

2019-06-04

Is recession coming? Well, yeah, of course, it is but whether it is now, six months from now or 2 years from now or even longer is impossible to say right now. Our Jeff Snider has been dutifully documenting all the negativity reflected in the bond and money markets and he is certainly right that things are not moving in the right direction.

Read More »

No Surprise, Hysteria Wasn’t a Sound Basis For Interpretation

2019-02-28

by

2019-02-28

Labor Utilization Total Hours Worked 2008-2018
What gets them into trouble is how they just can’t help themselves. Go back one year, to early 2018. Last February it was all-but-assured (in mainstream coverage) that the US economy was going to take off. The bond market, meaning UST’s, was about to be massacred because the overheating boom would force a double shot down its throat.

Read More »

Another ‘Highest In Ten Years’

2018-11-01

by

2018-11-01

ECI, Jan 2001 - Oct 2018
Upon the precipice of the Great “Recession”, US workers were cushioned to some extent by what economists call sticky wages. Before the Great Depression, as well as during it, companies would attempt to deal with looming economic contraction by cutting pay rates before workers.

Read More »

The JOLTS of Drugs

2017-09-17

by

2017-09-17

US Overdose Deaths Involving Opioids, 2000 - 2015
Princeton University economist Alan Krueger recently published and presented his paper for Brookings on the opioid crisis and its genesis. Having been declared a national emergency, there are as many economic as well as health issues related to the tragedy. Economists especially those at the Federal Reserve are keen to see this drug abuse as socio-demographic in nature so as to be absolved from failing in their primary task should it be found...

Read More »

Forced Finally To A Binary Labor Interpretation

2017-06-13

by

2017-06-13

U.S. Job Openings, December 2000 - June 2017
JOLTS figures for the month of April 2017, released today, highlight what is in the end likely to be a more positive outcome for them. It has very little to do with the economy itself, as what we are witnessing is the culmination of extreme positions that have been made and estimated going all the way back to 2014.

Read More »

Defining Labor Economics

2017-05-02

by

2017-05-02

Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey, Dec 2000 - 2016
Economics is a pretty simple framework of understanding, at least in the small “e” sense. The big problem with Economics, capital “E”, is that the study is dedicated to other things beyond the economy. In the 21st century, it has become almost exclusive to those extraneous errands. It has morphed into a discipline dedicated to statistical regression of what relates to what, and the mathematical equations assigned to give those relationships some...

Read More »

Was There Ever A ‘Skills Mismatch’? Notable Differences In Job Openings Suggest No

2017-03-20

by

2017-03-20

JOLTS - Job Openings, Acceleration, Dec 2000 - 2016
Perhaps the most encouraging data produced by the BLS has been within its JOLTS figures, those of Job Openings. It is one data series that policymakers watch closely and one which they purportedly value more than most. While the unemployment and participation rates can be caught up in structural labor issues (heroin and retirees), Job Openings are related to the demand for labor rather than the complications on the labor supply side.

Read More »