- The BLS reported that the economy had added 38,000 jobs, the lowest since September 2010. Furthermore, the April job gains of 160,000 were chopped down by 37,000 and the March job gains of 208,000 were chopped down by 22,000. Hence, with 59,000 jobs revised away, and with only 38,000 jobs “created” in May, the net total in today’s report was a net loss of 21,000 jobs. We haven’t seen that since the Financial Crisis.
I bet this is why Obama, Yellen, and Biden met in April. Still, I am expecting a June hike. It is the Fed's last chance. I think they will take it.
Maybe, but I think it's unlikely at this point. It seems like there's a growing consensus that one of the big factors in the slowing job growth is the incredible strength of the dollar. One of the reasons the dollar is soaring is because of the Fed's recent hike, making the US the only place you can even get a shitty interest rate. So everyone is pouring money in, causing lots of pain for manufacturing and other exporters. Another rate hike in the face of worldwide negative rates could greatly exacerbate this problem. The economic strength of the US says raise rates, but ECB's and BoJ's negative rates have the Fed painted into a corner. This is how trade wars and then real wars start.
Obligatory what-the-hell-should-one-do? I think it's a good thing that I'm about to resume college for two years. Maybe surface on the other side of this contraction. It's also really concerning that, unless we're growing at a decent clip (with all the demands that places on our already-strained planet), alarm bells start to sound. Only mad men and economists believe it a sound policy.
Don't worry about shit beyond your power and focus on the stuff you can control. Right now I'm firmly of the opinion that US Economy is Best Economy (although I'm starting to think about Indian ETFs). The fact that we're all wondering whether or not the Fed is going to raise rates while everyone else has been negative for a year or more says a lot about the comparative health of the economy. Comparative. I say focus on things that are fun and don't cost a lot as well as things that are fun that might make a little money on the side. In a land of people who have left the workforce, the underemployed man is king...
Hey, so i note in this article, the writer states: Can you either explain to me, or link me to something which would explain to me, why this would be bad for Dems? Just because I'm a Dem but think we vitally need an interest rate hike from the Fed (banking background). What am I missing?the weak report may have saved the Democrats from an even worse fate, that of a June interest rate increase by the Fed.
Conjecture: Many people believe that the economy in its current state is not unlike a game of Jenga. Those who follow feel that there aren't many tiles left to pull. The idea is that, much like a supersaturated fluid, we're one shock away from hellish crystallization: The idea is with a shit jobs report, the Fed won't risk even a 25 basis point rate hike because shit be precarious. Note that for bread'n'butter investors, a down economy means "Obama has failed" in some form or another. For people trying to make money, the bodies can't hit the floor soon enough - "recessions are when money returns to its rightful owners" as they say. So on the one hand you've got ma'n'pa Voter who want their IRA to keep making anemic returns of some form or another because then the media can convince them they're living in the longest bull market in history. On the other hand you've got Team BuyTheDip who are looking to pick up some bargains out of the carnage they've long been promised. Fans of carnage are generally Republicans.
My guess why he says it is that a rate hike will reveal how fragile and dependent on almost free money the economy really is. The pain of a hike in June would really be felt by election time. I don't know if that is true or what the author was considering. Any hike would be tiny and i don't know how widely it would hurt. I suspect that the market has high expectations of a rate hike in the short term and has mostly priced it in but anyone who is already operating on the margin is going to be in trouble.