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The Labor Department released Friday its official figures on employment and unemployment for September, thus providing the latest insight into the US economy.
Numbers
■ 134,000 jobs were added last month. Wall Street economists expected an increase of about 168,000 people, according to MarketWatch.
■ The unemployment rate was 3.7%. The August unemployment rate was 3.9%.
■ Average earnings increased 8 cents per hour and rose 2.8% over the previous year.
An eight-year recovery makes the labor market tense.
The month of September marked the 10th anniversary of the collapse of Lehman Brothers and the beginning of the financial crisis. This also marked an important milestone in the remarkable rebound that followed: eight consecutive months of employment growth, double the previous record.
In almost every respect, today's labor market is the largest since the cyber-business boom of the late 1990s and early 2000s. The unemployment rate is almost the lowest of the two. past decades. Job growth has consistently challenged economists' expectations of slowing down. African-Americans, Latinos and other groups who are often discriminated against have one of the lowest unemployment rates ever recorded.
"I consider it to be the most powerful job market in a generation," said Andrew Chamberlain, chief economist of the Glassdoor career site. "These are really good times."
Where is the growth of wages?
These good times, however, have not yet translated into strong wage gains for many workers. Slow wage growth has been a persistent source of disappointment in the recovery, and economists have long sought evidence that the tight labor market is finally forcing firms to pay increases.
"We are seeing an acceleration of average hourly earnings, perhaps not as much as we thought given the tightness of the labor market," said Ben Herzon, an economist at Macroeconomic Advisers.
The long-awaited pickup may have already begun. Amazon announced this week that it would increase the wages of all its employees in the United States to at least $ 15 at the hour.
But if faster wage growth would be good news for workers, it could however worry Federal Reserve policymakers, who watch for signs of an "overheating" of the economy faster inflation on the labor market. road. If these worries rise, the Fed could raise interest rates faster than expected, which could put an end to the recovery.
So far, there is no indication that this is happening. Fed As expected, interest rates rose last month, but so far are only slowly moving forward. Jerome Powell, Fed chairman, said this week that the economy was good but "not too good to be true".
Hurricane Florence may have caused distortions.
Be very careful when interpreting the September figures on jobs because of Hurricane Florence, which hit the Carolinas in the middle of the month. Natural disasters can affect the number of jobs in different ways: interfering in data collection, disrupting hiring and putting people temporarily out of business when businesses block and residents evacuate.
Last year, storms in Florida and Texas devastated September's employment data. The initial government report showed an unexpected net loss of jobs for the month; this figure was then revised to show a small gain. About 1.5 million people reported not being able to work due to weather conditions.
This year, the impact was probably more modest. Florence hit a smaller part of the country than last year's storms and hit a point in the month when it was less likely to disrupt data collection or measurement. Nevertheless, the storm may have blurred the measures of earnings and hours of work.
Mid-term elections are approaching.
Friday's report is one of the last major economic releases ahead of the November mid-term elections. The next round of job data will be four days before polling day, when most voters will be able to get an idea.
Republicans rely on the strength of the economy to avoid a "blue wave" of democratic victories in the House and Senate. President Trump has repeatedly stressed the low unemployment rate as proof of the effectiveness of his policy. However, it is not certain that economic data will have much impact on polling stations. Surveys show that views on the economy are shared among supporters, Democrats and even many independents expressing less optimism than Republicans.
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