An Incredibly Great Jobs Report -- 83 Straight Weeks Of Great Labor Reports -- Unprecedented -- Bloomberg -- October 6, 2016

Wow, wow, wow. Starbucks is incredibly busy at 8:03 a.m. Central Time here in north Texas, Grapevine. I haven't been in a Starbucks in ages. I vowed never to go again when they announced price increases some months ago, but then visited once in awhile, and then quit altogether. Until today. But that's because this Starbucks is about a block down the street from Firestone where the Honda Civic is getting an oil change and an inspection after the 3,000-mile road trip to the Bakken and back. The only place I have our cars serviced any more is Firestone. Their prices are actually competitive with Jiffy Lube. Their service centers are "connected" nationwide so they have all maintenance data on all our vehicles. Perhaps the most important piece of data, for those owning automobiles "forever," is a documented history of transmission fluid changes. Without documentatin, most automobile service centers are hesitant to change the transmission fluid when the odometer shows greater than 100,000 miles.

By the way, speaking of Starbucks. Does anyone know Starbucks' policy on bathrooms? Has anyone read an article laying out the CEO's thoughts on Starbucks' bathrooms. I assume the articles and the policy is out there but I have not seen it. But Starbucks solved the problem, quietly and efficiently. Every Starbucks has two bathrooms. One used to be labeled "women" or something to that effect, and the other was labeled "men" or something to that effect. But at this Starbucks, and I assume all Starbucks, they simply removed those signs and put up two identical signs, one for each bathroom: wheelchair, women, men, LGBT, and BLT. 

The weeks "jobs" report is out, or will be out shortly. Dow futures are down a bit (- 21 points) and WTI starts the day at $50.20. And some said, as recently as three days ago, that we wouldn't see $50-oil until next year (2017).

Bloomberg's headline: "US oil rises above $50 a barrel for first time since June." I assume we will see another story before the week is out from Goldman Sachs telling us that this is temporary, and once Iran, Libya, Iran, and Switzerland start ramping up oil production, the price of oil will trend toward $20 again.

I haven't read the story yet, but the headline is interesting. Over at Oilprice: the OPEC "deal" represents a permanent shift in oil markets. I don't think anything is permanent but I do think there has been a huge shift in oil markets. But that shift came in 2010 when the Bakken was reaching its stride. Folks who were paying attention knew that the shift was real by 2014 just before the Saudi Surge. The only difference now is that "everyone" agrees there has been a shift. It took several years for it to sink in for some folks, I assume. Regardless of what governments, regulators, and Native Americans do to stop the oil industry, the good news is that the oil isn't going anywhere, and our grandchildren will always have access to affordable, plentiful, dependable energy if enough people want that.

From the Oilprice article:

None of that matters much though. The more significant point about the OPEC agreement that investors may be missing is the sign of shifting attitudes that it portends. An agreement between two foes as intractable as the Saudis and Iran suggests that OPEC has finally accepted an important reality – they cannot turn back time. While U.S. unconventional production has been curtailed, only a fool would believe it has been hobbled permanently. As oil prices start to rise, U.S. production will likely rise as well.

OPEC seems to have finally accepted the fact that they are not as strong as they once were, and that the market forces behind unconventional production in the U.S., Canada, and abroad are not as weak as OPEC had supposed. While a few U.S. firms have been bankrupted by the last few years, those bankruptcies have only served to strengthen top tier players in the space like Devon and Continental.

The Fiscal Times on Obama's attitude toward Americans and health care: "let them eat bread." This is the actual headline over at Yahoo!Finance: White House to Americans: pay astronomical deductibles -- or else. Yup.

I see GE has won a huge data contract with the largest public US energy utility. This may be a great example of the internet of things.

Okay, here's the jobs report: filings for US unemployment benefits fell last week to the second-lowest level since 1973. First time jobless claims dropped by 5,000 to 249,000. The forecast was 256,000. Filings were "just a hair" above the four-decade low of 248,000 from April, "a sign of minimal layoffs ahead of Friday's monthly employment report." It will be interesting to see the analysis of the most recent data. Four-week moving average: 253,500, the lowest since December 1973, from 256,000 in the prior week. This report is chock full (chockful?) of great news: "filings have been below 300,000 for 83 straight weeks -- the longest streak since 1970 and a level economists say is typical of a healthy labor market." No wonder Hillary asks why she isn't 50 points ahead of Trump, which, of course, makes no sense.