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Bill Knudson

New Jobs and Unemployment: August 2024

Updated: Sep 9

Observations:


The new jobs for July 2024 came in at 114,000 down from June's prior month total of 206,000.  114,000 while being lower is a moderate total and was somewhat below the 1977-2016 average.  The lower total will further reinforce the anticipation that the Fed will decrease rates at its next meeting on September 18 meeting. 

Compared to 1977-2020 July's 114,000 was in the third highest quartile.


There are 11 job sectors used by the Dept of Labor, they are listed below as columns and are arranged in order of largest percent of total jobs in the economy---see green bars.  The first 4 sectors account for nearly 67% of ALL JOBS.   

 

New jobs in July are the percent is the red bars.  If the green and red bars are about equal, that means that sector produced a new jobs that in proportion to that sector's overall employment.

 

The red bars exceed the green bars for: Private Ed & Health represents 15% of all jobs but yet accounted for 50% of the new jobs in July. 

 

Red bars that are much lower than the green bars include: Trade and Manufacturing. Note manufacturing has been under performing relative to its size in the economy for months now.  Three sectors that account for 30% of all jobs did not have any job growth in June nor July. Those sectors being Professional, Manufacturing and Financial.


Historically, most job categories growth between 2% to 3%.  Below are July's new jobs rate annualized, growth rates of  4%+ are seldom maintained. 


It was noted the Contract Jobs category continued to decrease in July but at a smaller rate than in June.  Usually, this category will indicate if the job market is expanding.


May's total was adjusted down by a small 2,000.  June's initial total of 206,000 was adjusted down by a relatively large 27,000.  June total will be subject to one more adjustment come September 6 when it will be finalized.




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