Trump promised we’d get tired of winning. I can’t say I’m there just yet, but month after month I see another booming jobs report keeping his promise. November was another stellar month for the U.S. economy, and it did so great despite a concentrated effort from the left to try and stifle success at every turn. We’re going to take a detailed look at the report and what it means for us, our country and the short-term future.
The Report
Before we dive into some of the deeper findings revealed by the report, let’s look at the raw numbers. November was expected to bring in 195,000 new jobs. The bulk of these were expected to be tied to Christmas season retail and a recovering food industry. While both of those sectors did well, they were the smallest part of the success story.
The U.S. actually added 228,000 new jobs, and one of the biggest chunks came from 32,000 new manufacturing jobs. This pushed manufacturing unemployment down to 2.6 percent: an all-time low. Comparatively, retail and food industries added 18,700 and 18,900 jobs respectively.
National unemployment dropped to 4.1 percent as a result of the massive job growth. Concurrently, wage growth barely accelerated to hit 2.5 percent over the same time last year. While this is still ahead of inflation, it falls short of the 3.0 percent or higher that economist still hope to see. Such wage growth could finally push inflation and herald the booming economy that Trump is working so hard to produce.
Impacts
Another positive jobs report comes with its fair share of repercussions, most of which will be positive. For starters, the good news helped the stock markets fully recover from their earlier dip this month. That was spurned by fake news proclaiming the end of Trump’s presidency. The truth, plus the assurance of stable job growth gave investors the confidence to push the Dow and S&P 500 back to new records.
The general good news will also weigh heavily on the minds running the Federal Reserve. The chances of a rate hike go up every time they read another big jobs gain. This is a mix of good and bad news, but in the short term, a rate hike will mean accelerating national debt, slightly higher housing costs and a push on inflation.
Lessons
Now, let’s get to the more important parts of the discussion. After a year of a Trump economy, we can draw a few important conclusions about jobs, the economy and politics.
Wage Growth
This is the one statistic Trump’s critics are going to attack. It’s the only part of the economy that isn’t positively surging, and they’ll claim it contradicts his success. They’re obviously wrong, but the real issue is what they’re avoiding. Stagnant wage growth actually tells us more about the economy than any other metric.
In short, it highlights the lies we were told by the Obama Administration. If employment had actually returned to pre-crisis levels, wage growth would have accelerated by now. It’s a simple principle.
When everyone who wants a job has one, then employers have to improve their benefit offers to fill employment gaps. That isn’t happening, and it’s mostly because the Obama Administration changed the way we look at unemployment in order to hide just how bad the economy was. Trump is moving to correct this, but stagnant wage growth shows you that it’s a long and difficult process.
Unemployment
I’ve said for years that the modern view of unemployment metrics is worthless, and that still holds true. If the rate was really 4.1 percent, then it would be impossible for the nation to add more than 200,000 new jobs without jumping wages. The largest reason unemployment doesn’t work is because it ignores the bulk of people without jobs, and it doesn’t count anyone who is employed at fewer than 40 hours a week.
The biggest difference between job growth under Trump as opposed to Obama is in the quality of those jobs. Obama said that manufacturing was forever dead. Trump has ushered in almost 200,000 new manufacturing jobs in less than a year. These are full-time positions at career-level pay. This and similar job sectors (such as those tied to infrastructure) are the real key to fixing wage growth and the economy as a whole. They all shrunk even while Obama said the economy was fixed. The real fix is only finally happening, and there will be a bit of lag time between quality job growth and a national acceleration in wages.
Fighting the Lies
At this point, it’s important to address the politics of it all. The left hasn’t slowed their attacks on Trump, and the numbers only show the danger of the situation more with each passing day. Trump’s economy is running circles around Obama’s. The only changes necessary were for Trump to overturn a few handfuls of executive action. Tax cuts and other bills from Congress haven’t taken effect yet.
The evidence is overwhelming and inarguable, and still almost half the country has their pitchforks and torches primed. They’re unwaiveringly determined to undermine Trump and his progress, and they genuinely don’t care about the cost. They would rather see the economy in ruins and Americans starving than admit that Trump is a better businessman than Obama, and it all boils down to identity politics.
Trump has relentlessly made statements countering the “moral” statements of the left. They need him to fail to prove their points, and he just won’t do it. It just so happens that you can be publicly insensitive, abandon all pretense of political correctness, and call a terrorist a terrorist and still be an effective president. We may not be tired of winning yet, but you can bet your bottom dollar that the fanatics on the left are.
Regards,
Mark Patricks
