The narraitive in the media maybe evertythings ok…..
But it isn’t….
There has been less hiring in the last few months….
Everyday we have a story on thosands being laid of from large companies….
And?
There are still signs in store windows looking for help….
Gas prices around my way have creeped up .20 a gallon in the last few days…..
The report brought job creation for the year to 4.5 million, pending revisions, as the economy continued to recover from its plunge in 2020. Still, total employment is still millions short of where it was headed before the pandemic, with job losses predicted in the year ahead.
The Biden administration trumpeted the report, calling it evidence that its economic agenda has been working. “For the last two months, we’ve seen good job growth, we’ve seen wage rates go up, and we’ve seen inflation pressures come down,” Labor Secretary Martin J. Walsh said in an interview. “I think it’s a slow and steady approach to bring down inflation and not worry about going into a recession.”
Avoiding a recession, of course, is far from guaranteed. That will depend on the Fed’s ability to edge interest rates just high enough to contain inflation but not so much that the economy enters a downward spiral — a balancing act that the Fed itself isn’t sure is possible.
The slowdown in hiring in recent months is a sign that the Fed’s strategy may finally be constraining the labor market, which remained a standout even as some drivers of economic activity started to sputter. Wage growth eased to 4.6 percent over a year ago, as the frenzy of people reshuffling into new jobs — and demanding better pay — has faded…..