Another summer-day heated attempt in October this near-noon Friday here in California’s Central Valley — a big difference in the warmth index, though, is simple: It’s autumn!
Add an index of simplicity, too, with great economic news this morning with a robust jobs report, giving a bounce to Kamala Harris and an elbow in the nuts to the asshole-lying T-Rump and MAGA-Republicans everywhere (NYT): ‘But it was Friday’s employment report — 254,000 jobs gained, with wages growing faster than prices — that appeared to give Harris boosters a particularly large dose of confidence. The report came less than a day after striking dockworkers agreed to return to work through the end of the year, avoiding what could have been a major economic disruption with a month to go before the election.‘
It leaves the right-wing media with no oxygen to mouth-breathe lies:
Fox guest on jobs report: "I thought there would be more red flags than a communist parade in this report, and there's not a single one. … There's not one data point in here that I can point to that is not good." pic.twitter.com/CVmMoleWuE
— Lis Power (@LisPower1) October 4, 2024
The basics via Kiplinger this morning:
U.S. nonfarm payrolls expanded by 254,000 last month, the Bureau of Labor Statistics said Friday, far higher than economists’ forecast for the creation of 150,000 jobs. Additionally, the soft July and August jobs reports were revised up by a combined 72,000 new hires.
The unemployment rate, which is derived from a separate survey, ticked down to 4.1% from 4.2% the prior month.
Signs of cooling in the labor market prompted the Federal Reserve’s rate-setting committee, the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC), to cut the short-term federal funds rate by 50 basis points (bps), or 0.5%, last month. But experts say the blowout September jobs report relieves pressure on the FOMC to deliver another jumbo-sized cut to interest rates at the next Fed meeting.
“Shocking strength and resilience,” wrote Scott Anderson, chief U.S. economist at BMO Capital Markets. “I am almost at a loss for words or adjectives to describe what we are seeing in today’s report. Nonfarm payroll growth came roaring back in September, easily surpassing all analysts’ forecasts and beating the consensus estimate by over 100,000 jobs. The September employment report is a potential game changer for the Fed and market expectations on the size and pace of future rate cuts.”
As of October 4, futures traders assigned a 95% probability to the FOMC enacting a quarter-point cut at the next Fed meeting, up from 68% a day ago, according to CME Group’s FedWatch Tool. Odds of the Fed enacting a half-point cut dropped to 0% from 32% a day ago.
Steve Benen puts it in political perspective at MSNBC, also this morning:
This is not the final jobs report before Election Day — that will be released the morning of Nov. 1, five days before voters go to the polls — but the new data will help drive the public conversation about the economy in the race’s final weeks.
The encouraging job numbers also come the week after a surprisingly good report on U.S. economic growth, which led White House National Economic Advisor Lael Brainard to note in a written statement, “We learned this morning that the economy has grown by 3.2% per year during Biden-Harris Administration — even stronger than previously estimated — and better than the first three years of the previous administration.”
As the 2024 election cycle nears its end, Republicans desperately want voters to believe the economy is terrible. Reality, however, keeps getting in the way of GOP talking points.
Let’s also circle back to previous coverage to put the data in perspective. Over the course of the first three years of Donald Trump’s presidency — when the Republican said the U.S. economy was the greatest in the history of the planet — the economy created roughly 6.38 million jobs, spanning all of 2017, 2018 and 2019.
According to the latest tally, the U.S. economy has created over 16.5 million jobs since January 2021 — more than double the combined total of Trump’s first three years. (If we include the fourth year of the Republican’s term, the data looks even worse for him.)
Suck it T-Rump!
Close with “Blowout” details per Schwab:
Employment uptick, or not, yet once again here we are…
(Image out front: ‘Art Critic’ by Norman Rockwell, found here.)