Beneath the Headline

You might have seen the headline news on Friday that the United States added over 300,000 new jobs in March beating all Wall Street forecasts.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2024/04/05/economy/us-jobs-report-march-final/index.html

Of course, Joe Biden was quick to claim credit for the positive news.

He claimed he "inherited an economy on the brink" and the jobs report is a sign that his administration's plans are working.

Of course, the reason that the economy was on the brink was due to the Covid pandemic and the shutdown  recommendations that were pushed incessantly by a bunch of unelected public health bureaucrats such as Tony Fauci, Deborah Birx and others.

Those that had a different view, such as Dr. Scott Atlas or Dr. Martin Kuldrorff, were targeted in the media as spreading misinformation and wanting to kill people.

Biden claims he has added 15 million jobs since he took office.

However, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) data shows that there were 158.7 million jobs at the end of February, 2020 right before the Covid lockdowns. There were 161.5 million jobs in the March, 2024 BLS report released on Friday.

That is an increase of 2.8 million jobs over four years.

You can be the judge of what is the more appropriate measure of jobs created.

However, what is more telling in looking at the BLS data is taking a look at what jobs we are actually talking about.

Are we talking about full-time jobs?

You would think that would be the case.

However, the data actually shows that the number of full-time jobs dropped by 6,000 in the last month while the number of part-time jobs increased by 692,000.

Over the last 12 months the numbers paint an even bleaker situation for full-time jobs in the economy.

Full-time employment has actually decreased by 1,347,000 jobs over the last year while part-time employment has increased by 1,888,000.

How can this be portrayed at as an economic success story if workers are giving up full-time jobs and taking part-time jobs in return?

The data also indicates that the increase in part-time jobs we are seeing may be due to more and more people taking on multiple jobs.

In the last month, the number of those working multiple jobs increased by 217,000 workers according to the BLS data. Over the last year the number of those working multiple jobs has increased by 492,000.

The unemployment rate in March was 3.8%. However, it was 3.5% a year ago.

Beneath the headline numbers are some other troubling signs.

Black unemployment was 6.1% in the BLS March report. A year ago it was 5.1%.

The unemployment rate among those 16-19 years of age was 12.6% A year ago it was 9.9%.

It is not completely clear what is happening here but this could be the result of immigrants (including illegals) putting pressure on the job prospects of Blacks and younger workers.

For example, the BLS data shows that in the last year the number of foreign born workers grew by 1,266,000. On the other hand, workers who were native born declined by 651,000.

If we go back to December, 2019 (right before the pandemic), there were 131,281,000 native born employed workers in the United States and 27,223,000 foreign born workers.

In March, 2024, the number of native born workers had fallen to 130,242,000 ( a decrease of over 1 million jobs held by native born Americans) while foreign born workers had risen to 31,114,000 ( an increase of 3,891,000 jobs).

You can see that trend in this chart from Zero Hedge that measures the change from October, 2019 (rather than December, 2019 as I did in the numbers above).

Credit: https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/behind-todays-stellar-jobs-print-it-was-literally-all-part-time-jobs-and-illegals

In effect, all of the net new jobs created in the last five years have gone to foreign born workers.

Finally, let's consider Biden's claim that his policies are ushering in a revival in manufacturing jobs in the United States.

This is a headline from an AP story last August.

Source: https://apnews.com/article/biden-factory-jobs-new-mexico-manufacturing-renaissance-95700c62f45c3a69b03e550ebdcfa01bpn

President Joe Biden declared Wednesday that his economic policies are reviving U.S. manufacturing as he toured the West to drum up support for his efforts on jobs and inflation in the face of voters’ doubts.

“Hundreds of actions coordinated through his entire government are sparking a manufacturing renaissance across the United States,” White House climate adviser Ali Zaidi told reporters ahead of Biden’s New Mexico speech.

Here's what the BLS report shows for Manufacturing job changes for the first three months of 2024 compared to the job changes for Government jobs.

Manufacturing lost 4,000 jobs between January and March while Government added 194,000 jobs.

If there is any "revival" going on it appears to be in Government jobs.

Wouldn't it be nice to be creating a few taxpayers in the private sector who could pay these salaries rather than borrowing more and more money to do so?

Everything above is in the BLS report beneath the headlines that the U.S. economy is "hot", we are in the midst of a "comeback" and seeing a "revival in manufacturing".

You can be that sure there will be hundreds of similar headlines over the next six months claiming many other things to convince you that all is well with Joe Biden and the country.

My advice...

Look beneath the headline.

And continue to read BeeLine.