Saturday, May 06, 2006
Take this economy and shove it!
Finally, the headline the Post has wanted to print for awhile: Job Report Suggests A Slowing Economy.
The teaser on the home page of the web site was even better:
• Jobs Growth Misses Forecasts
So here’s the bad news:
“Job growth slowed in April, suggesting that the U.S. economy may be cooling after roaring ahead at the start of the year.”
How serious a problem is this?
“Stock and bond prices soared as investors interpreted the weaker job growth to mean that the broader economy may be slowing to a more sustainable pace than that of recent months.” (emphasis added)
And what was up with those forecasts?
“Employers created 138,000 jobs in April, compared with an average of 185,000 a month from January to March. Analysts had expected around 200,000 new jobs,…”
The Post doesn’t say who these analysts are or why they expected growth of 200,000 jobs, particularly after average growth for the preceding months had been 185,000 during economic growth that many had deemed unsustainable. But the significance of these April numbers is best summed in the next-to-last paragraph:
“… economists will look particularly closely at data released in the next few weeks, and at the revision to April employment numbers that will be released in early June, to try to figure out whether the labor market and broader economy really are slowing.”
My prediction: if the job growth was better than first reported, it’ll be bad news because it’s inflationary; if the job growth comes in as first reported, it’ll be bad news because it means the economy is slowing. In other words: whatever…it’s a bad economy because George Bush is President.
The teaser on the home page of the web site was even better:
• Jobs Growth Misses Forecasts
So here’s the bad news:
“Job growth slowed in April, suggesting that the U.S. economy may be cooling after roaring ahead at the start of the year.”
How serious a problem is this?
“Stock and bond prices soared as investors interpreted the weaker job growth to mean that the broader economy may be slowing to a more sustainable pace than that of recent months.” (emphasis added)
And what was up with those forecasts?
“Employers created 138,000 jobs in April, compared with an average of 185,000 a month from January to March. Analysts had expected around 200,000 new jobs,…”
The Post doesn’t say who these analysts are or why they expected growth of 200,000 jobs, particularly after average growth for the preceding months had been 185,000 during economic growth that many had deemed unsustainable. But the significance of these April numbers is best summed in the next-to-last paragraph:
“… economists will look particularly closely at data released in the next few weeks, and at the revision to April employment numbers that will be released in early June, to try to figure out whether the labor market and broader economy really are slowing.”
My prediction: if the job growth was better than first reported, it’ll be bad news because it’s inflationary; if the job growth comes in as first reported, it’ll be bad news because it means the economy is slowing. In other words: whatever…it’s a bad economy because George Bush is President.
