Remember that the Preliminary Benchmark Revision is… Preliminary. While this is obvious, the implications are not necessarily so. In particular, if one is interested in measuring the actual number of jobs filled by both documented and undocumented workers, then one should understand that the preliminary revision will likely tend to undercount employment. That is because the main input into the preliminary revision is unemployment insurance data, which will tend to be lacking for undocumented workers.
Sound the Alarm: “White House Prepares Report Critical of Statistics Agency”
Be afraid, be very afraid. From the WSJ article:
“The Misuse of Statistics” Module in Stats Class [Extended]
Teaching statistics next semester, adding in this section, which I am tempted to name the “EJ Antoni Memorial Module”.
Clifford Winston: “Academic Toadies Impair Government Performance”
From The Regulatory Review, Clifford Winston:
The Trump Administration’s hiring of academics who compromise disciplinary standards threatens effective governance.
“Is the US already in recession?”
Tej Parikh in FT inquires.
Mid-Session Review Technical Supplement Is Out
As of yesterday, here.
How’s Manufacturing Doing?
Since “Liberation Day”, so-so:
Trouble in Estimating Seasonals As a Reason for the Low NFP Growth?
NEC Director Hassett makes reference to a GS note that indicates that August preliminary figures typically get revised up (NBCNews) The GS note (Walkers/Rindel, Sept 4) cites a 61K downward bias in preliminary vs. third release… so +22 becomes +83K.
“The data are pretty clear that we are not in a recession.”
If you think that’s Kevin Hassett opining, you’d be wrong. It’s actually CEA Chair Ed Lazear on May 8, 2008. NBER retrospectively determined that the business cycle peak was December 2007, so that a recession was underway for four months by that time. Today, NEC Chair Kevin Hassett stated “I don’t see any sign of recession”
Why Did Mr. Trump Say before the Employment Release “the real numbers”…”will be in a year from now on”?
[source] Answer: Because, by virtue of the Executive Office of the President getting the release numbers the night before, he knew the numbers were going to be pretty bad (+22K < +75K Bloomberg consensus). (By the way, if I as a EOP staff member gave away market moving news before the official release, I would’ve been fired, and prosecuted. Just sayin’).