So far, the lower paid are seeing the biggest gains…
Category Archives: employment
Parsing the September Employment Release
Overall and private nonfarm payroll (NFP) employment surprised on the downside — but the fact that private missed by a smaller amount suggests that the slowdown is a little less pronounced than indicated by the headline number.
The August Employment Situation
The undershoot in nonfarm payroll employment is noticeable, with a flattening in high contact services employment growth.
Business Cycle Indicators as of Early September
With the August employment situation release, we have the following picture of the macroeconomy.
The Wisconsin Employment Situation in July
Employment numbers for July were released for today.
Yet More Alternative Real Wage Series, through Time
From FRED: Employed full time: Median usual weekly real earnings: Wage and salary workers: 16 years and over (LES1252881600Q), graphed along the familiar average hourly earnings per hour, total private industry, ex-nonproduction and supervisory workers, deflated by CPI:
Average and Median Wages through Time
Reader JohnH criticizes the use of average wages as indicators of the representative compensation, and suggests use of Social Security Administration data. Here are several measures taken from SSA, deflated by the CPI.
Real Wages through July
Reader JohnH notes that real wages year-on-year have fallen in July, as reported in the real earnings report. In times of big movements in variables, I find it useful to look at the actual time series.
Perspective on the Employment Release
Some observations: (1) The blockbuster number (943 K vs 870K fm Bloomberg consensus) has to be kept in perspective, as NFP employment is far below trend, (2) high contact intensive services employment was recovering quickly through the reference period before the delta variant surge, (3) both average nominal wages and aggregate hours continued to rise, and (4) average real wages likely stabilized in July, at about 1.5% above 2016-19 trend.
The Pace of Employment Growth in States Cutting UI Benefits
Is slower than for those that didn’t. From Steve Englander/Standard Charter Bank: