No BLS jobs report -- pinch hitters report

Investment Analysis Clubs Macro Economic Trends and Risks
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https://www.wsj.com/economy/jobs/adp-jobs-report-bls-data-42362dae?mod=hp_lead_pos6

It’s Jobs Friday Without a Jobs Number: Here’s Where to Look for Alternatives

Monthly government jobs numbers didn’t arrive on time but private firms helping fill the gap

By Justin Lahart and Konrad Putzier, The Wall Street Journal

A federal government shutdown has halted official jobs reports, prompting economists and investors to seek alternative data sources.

There is payroll processor ADP, which uses data from more than 26 million workers at ADP customer firms to gauge employment. Job-posting site Indeed produces an alternative to the BLS’s job-openings report. And newcomer Revelio Labs uses figures from networking platforms to get readings on measures including employment, salaries, hiring and attrition.

Alternate sources also help as the BLS is grappling with falling survey response rates that have made the counts less accurate and, recently, allegations from President Trump that the numbers are goosed….

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Railcar loadings, business surveys and cardboard-box demand are just some of the things that can offer clues. As a Wall Street economist, former Fed Chair Alan Greenspan developed a lifelong fondness for watching scrap-metal prices.

More recently, Vanguard has tapped 401(k) plans that it manages for signals. For example, someone getting added to a corporate retirement plan can be an indicator that they started a new job.

Bank of America tracks its customers’ card use for insight…

The problem of falling survey response rates is particularly acute in the BLS’s monthly report on job openings and labor turnover. The latest available data show that in March only 35% of employers responded to the survey that underlies it, down from 66% at the end of 2015…. [end quote]

The Federal Reserve relies on the data from the BLS to make decisions about interest rates. This is an especially important time because the ratio of Unemployment Level/Job Openings has been creeping up and has recently been above 1 for the first time since 2022. That’s why the Fed cut the fed funds rate in September even though inflation is still too high.

The Fed (and investors and many others) will need accurate data from the BLS for inflation as well as employment numbers.

Meanwhile, the pinch hitters give different perspectives which don’t always agree. The BLS, which actually phones households, can capture many working people that do not interact with the pinch hitters (such as gig workers).

The pinch hitters are better than nothing but we really need the BLS.

Wendy

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That’s nice.

Market go up.

/s

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The shutdown may last a very long time. We will lose either way. By we I mean America.

We won’t have this data. This is central to all of it. We won’t have the inflation soon to be deflation number. Jerry just posted chocolate bars at Walmart are now 60 or whatever cents less for the same sized bar. I see prices notching down a bit. We will have stark deflation.

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Another guy who is against people getting jobs if his corporation has to pay more in taxes. The rest of this is an excuse.

He will never get in front for our country. We need a higher corporate tax rate.

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I’ve always wondered why they really need the survey in the first place. Don’t all employers have to file payroll tax forms (and make payments) in a timely manner? Why not just use that data instead?

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I think part of the problem is that the payroll tax forms go to the IRS and the Social Security Administration, not to the BLS. The right hand doesn’t know what the left hand is doing.

Also, the household survey from the BLS finds gig workers and others who don’t necessarily file payroll tax forms.

Wendy

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This is true! But gig workers and other independents still have to file their payroll taxes at some point. And the common problem of gig/independent workers not wanting to respond to any government surveys due to suspicion of being “checked up on” has always existed. There’s not even a small chance that my neighbor growing up who was on permanent disability from the NYC Sanitation Department would ever even consider answering a survey about his roof repair business (summer) and snow plow business (winter).