Joining us now.
I am thrilled to say we have acting Labor Secretary Julie Sue along with our own Ann Mary Hordern, and it's great to have you with us.
Obviously a big reaction to this job's report.
So we had a one hundred and fourteen thousand increase in payrolls. You actually spoke to us back in June and said that we were looking at the definition of a soft landing as you parsed through these numbers, would you still say that today.
Hi, thank you.
It's so good to be here. I mean, we you know, look at the three month average. The three month average in growth is still one hundred and seventy thousand jobs. Remember, you know, we spent a year talking about how the numbers were too high and too hot, and we had always planned for a transition to a more sustainable, steady level of growth. This number did come in below expectations. It's still over one hundred thousand jobs. It's still broad based.
We saw growth in multiple industries. We saw it in construction, we saw it in in healthcare, we saw it in leisure and hospitality. There was a dramatic drop in one industry information, but generally you know, this is an indicator of continued strength in the economy, and when you look at other things, including labor force participation, which is at an all time high for prime age workers. And we continue, you know, know that there's continued work left to do
to make sure that we maintain a strong economy. But we're still at a three month average of above the number that President Biden said a year ago we need to be to have a sustainable, strong labor market in a strong economy.
The unemployment rate came in at four point thirty percent, and Claudia Sam has already said that this has now triggered. There's some rule which basically means a potentially around the cusp of a recession. How concerned are you and the White House about that?
Well, we're not concerned about that specifically in heart because the unemployment rate that it grew from has been so historically low and has been so historically low for such a long time. I believe even Claudia Sam herself expressed some questions about whether the rule applies when you start at a at four percent or just above four percent
unemployment rates. So again we have to keep in mind, you know, these numbers come in not in a vacuum, but as part of a overall picture of an economy that we've been talking about for some time that did not happen by accident, that was not inevitable, in which there's been tremendous growth and an economic recovery that is frankly the envy of the world. And so we know that the work is not finished. We know that, you know, you don't get you know, we don't stop doing the
work that we've been doing. But one example of the effectiveness of the President's economic policies is that some of the growth is being driven by private investment into areas in which the President's Investing in America agenda has brought in public and that and so those investments continue to hit the street, will continue to keep delivering them in different communities, and we'll continue to watch the numbers.
And of course we're continuing to watch the numbers. We're also watching the sotock market reaction right now because we're seeing a big wipeout in futures, and the conversation that's happening among investors, among market participants is this concern that the Federal Reserve is behind the curve that they waited too long to.
Cut interest rates. Is that the view of the White House as well?
I mean, we don't comment on Fed policy. I know they have they've indicated plans and what they are likely to do. You know, we still believe that this is an economy that again did not recover by accident, but also is one that reflects, you know, the Biden Harris commitment to working people. The real wages remain up over the year, They're still higher than the rate of inflation. This, as I've said over and over again, means more money
in the pockets of working people. And some of the story that's not part of the labor market data is that we continue to see more workers join unions, more workers reach first union contracts, more contracts result in record wage increases. Those are all further indicators of what we believe is part essential to a strong economy, which is that working people do well, working people share in the profits that they help create, and working people get a voice at the table.
We had Governor J. B. Pertzger though, yesterday, talking about the loss of manufacturing jobs in Illinois, calling on the Federal Reserve to move if.
The White House is not going to take a stance.
I imagine more Democratic leaders are going to come out and also say that this partially may blame the FED because it is an election year and they don't want themselves to be blamed. How concerned are you that FED potentially acted in a way that means that more Americans would be losing their job.
I mean, you know, manufacturing is a good example, right of something President Biden has said from the very beginning that we need to bring manufacturing jobs back to the United States. We need to make sure that the iconic industries like the auto industry that have powered this country's
middle class continue to do so. You know, Illinois is a place where, due to the uaw's historic contract, the President I travel to Belvedere, Illinois, talking about factories that are going to open that have been closed for a really long time. These reversals of decades long trends that were not good for workers, that were not good for unions due to failed policy of the past, cannot be reversed overnight. But we are seeing movement, and so that progress.
But Julie, many industries barely grew. Manufacturing retail information all negative over the last two months.
If you look at manufacturing since President Biden came into office, those numbers are up, and there's continued investments that making. If you look at construction jobs, those are also up. Those are two areas in which, again federal investments are helping to drive that change, helping to drive that growth. And so we don't make too much of any one month, but when you look at the trend, those are both
sectors that are up. Doesn't mean we don't have more work to do, doesn't mean there aren't communities that remain devastated from failed economic policies in the past that have failed working people, that have left working people behind. We remain committed to doing that work, and the overall numbers still demonstrate growth there, and we'll continue to put dollars into communities to rebuild them and bring jobs back.
And parsing through these numbers, it did seem that manufacturing payrolls did add a thousand jobs last months, but to Amory's point, that comes after two straight months of declients. I want to talk about revisions here because on the top headline number, there was another revision to last month's number, and we've seen that increasingly over the past several months that the prior month's numbers are revised down.
And I'm curious what your thoughts are is to why.
That dynamic is unfolding, because again the question among investors is how do I trust these numbers?
Well, you not at the top that the this month's revisions were fairly minor revisions. I always say this too, are a feature of the numbers, not a bug. It's not a it's a it's not an error. It's basically continuously these numbers get revised because it's the trade off between getting in out numbers quickly and UH and getting complete numbers. So to get the numbers out every single month as we do it requires a certain amount of of projection and then once the real data comes in
because these are these aren't just numbers. These are actual people, right, They're people who respond to surveys, They're people who answer questions. They don't always answer them at the time that I come here to talk about it. And that's why we revise when we get the more accurate numbers. That has always been the case, and that is why the BLS data is the gold standard when it comes to labor marketing information.
If we have four point three percent today, where do you see the unemployment rate year end.
Well, I'm not going to make a prediction about that, but i will say again we look at everything in the context of the whole and so GDP remains very strong, layoffs remain relatively low, the labor force participation rate remains high. All of these are counter indicators, they're not indicators of recession,
and so of course we keep an eye out. Of course, we have to keep on doing the work that we are doing, and you know, we do want the economy to reach a state in which there's more steady, stable growth and the you know, one hundred and fourteen thousand a month. You know, there were in the last administration seven months of numbers that were less than one hundred thousand, and so again we are we're in a transition period. We've always said there would be, that was part of
the plan. This number is cooler than expected, and so we have continued work that we need to do, and the investments in the presence of Investing in America agenda are going to be really key to continue to power our strong economy.
Well, we have to leave it there.
Really appreciate your time on this busy morning. Our thanks of course to Acting Labor Secretary Julie Sue, and of course Bloomberg's and Marie Hordern