Jobs: Wow, Wow, Wow -- Exceeds Expectations -- Not Stagflation, Yet -- July 8, 2022

Jobs report: expectations and analysis. The WSJ. Before the numbers are reported.

Jobs, actual: 372,000! Wow, wow, wow.

• Link here.
• Market will collapse. Put more pressure on Fed to keep raising rates.
• Participation rate: pretty much unchanged, around 62%.
• Interest rate has moved up. Ten-year treasury at 3.07% yield.  
• Unemployment rate stays unchanged at 3.6%. 
• Steve Liesman does not see report at inflationary.
• "some recession that we're having" (agree completely)
• a recession with 3.6% unemployment and 372,000 jobs added? 
• certainly not stagflation yet
• suddenly not worried about recession 

Re-posting from July 6, 2022: 

US recession: unfortunately for most, this article is behind a paywall.

• it's a very, very long article
• written by one of the better WSJ analysts; generally doesn't write but rather edits
• "If the US is in a recession, it's a very strange one."

The U.S. economy has experienced 12 recessions since World War II, and each one included two features: Economic output contracted and unemployment rose.

Today, something highly unusual is happening. Economic output fell in the first quarter and signs suggest it did so again in the second. Yet the job market showed little sign of faltering during the first half of the year. The jobless rate fell from 4% last December to 3.6% in May.

It is the latest strange twist in the odd trajectory of the pandemic economy, and a riddle for those contemplating a recession. If the U.S. is in or near one, it doesn’t yet look like any other on record.

Analysts sometimes talked about “jobless recoveries” after past recessions, in which economic output rose but employers kept shedding workers. The first half of 2022 was the mirror image—a “jobful” downturn, in which output fell and companies kept hiring. Whether it will spiral into a fuller and deeper recession isn’t known, though a growing number of economists believe it will.

Krugman: Paul -- also doesn't see definition of stagflation holding up which requires a high unemployment rate, and the 10-year Treasury yield is falling. Fast. Today: the yield is below 2.8% -- at 2.794% -- recall: 3% yield for the TYT is the threshold for disaster -- CNBC talking heads.

Krugman posted a FRED graph to support his case. I won't post the link; not worth the time. But six months to a year from now economists will declare a recession or not.