After the Shutdown: December Jobs Report Good, AJSN Shows Latent Demand Down 300,000 to 16.7 Million

This morning’s Bureau of Labor Statistics Employment Situation Summary was supposed to be the truest recent one, distorted the least by the government shutdown and the problems it caused for reporting as well as the data itself.  So how did it turn out?

Nonfarm payroll employment (aka “jobs”) increased 50,000, close to the 65,000 average of estimates I saw.  Seasonally adjusted and unadjusted unemployment each dropped 0.2% to reach 4.4% and 4.1%.  The adjusted jobless number fell 300,000 to 7.5 million.  There were still 1.9 million long-term unemployed, out for 27 weeks or longer.  Although the count of those working part-time for economic reasons, or maintaining such propositions while so far unsuccessfully seeking full-time ones, lost 200,000, it kept the rest of last time’s disturbing 900,000 gain, and is still way high at 5.3 million.  The labor force participation rate and the employment-population ratio were split, with the former off 0.1% to 62.4% but the latter up the same amount to 59.7%.  Average hourly private nonfarm payroll earnings gained 16 cents, slightly more than inflation this time, to $37.02. 

The American Job Shortage Number or AJSN, the metric showing how many additional positions could be quickly filled if all knew that getting one would be only another errand, declined to the following:

Compared with a year before, the AJSN is up about 550,000, over 90% of that from higher official unemployment.  The share of the AJSN from that component was 37.7%, down 1.4%. 

How did the month look in general?  Joblessness, supported by additional data as well, stopped gaining and fell significantly, even after factoring in the December effect of relatively-high-employment.  The downside, if it is valid to call it that, was the number of people out of the labor force and saying they did not want jobs, up 929,000 and 724,000.  If those gains are genuine, they will follow through to this month now that the holidays have ended.  Overall, though, I liked this edition.  The turtle took a smallish, but clear, step forward.