The May Jobs Report released on Friday by the U.S. Labor Dept. showed a 559,000 increase in non farm jobs, a plunge from the 671,000 that most economists had predicted. Still, it’s a good deal better than April’s disappointing plunge of the now revised 278,000 which sent shockwaves through Congress, the White House and academia.
Nevertheless a disappointment is still a disappointment, and when the economy is still mired in the midst of a global pandemic, the numbers released give a shaky report on the progress of progress for an American recovery.
Nick Bunker, economic research director for North America at the jobsite Indeed, described for The Wall Street Journal that, “It’s a bit like a rocket where takeoff has been slightly delayed, but takeoff will still happen.”
“It’s a middle-of-the-road report,” said Matthew Luzzetti, chief U.S. economist at Deutsche Bank, of the May numbers to The Wall Street Journal.
“It is disappointing relative to where we were a few months ago, where we were anticipating you could see a million-plus type prints over these coming months. We have had to ratchet down our expectations about what job gains are likely to be going forward,” he added.
The bright spot as many cities eased covid restrictions is that leisure and hospitality jobs shot up to the tune of 292,000 jobs. But, that is still an area that is desperately seeking new hires and is begging as many of the potential workers are women, and especially women of color, who are either still helping young children with remote schooling, and juggling housework along with meal preparations; while still others, maybe buoyed by the extended unemployment benefits of $300 per week, are weighing their options for higher wages and less physically demanding work.
Still others are afraid of contracting the virus and those without cars may not want to ride crowded busses and trains to jobs, where working elbow to elbow, they face the risk of the virus, or any of its mutations.
The rate of unemployment for women is 5.5 versus 6 percent for men, and an overall 5.8 percent for May.
What may occur in the Fall if the double dose shot of vaccination continues, and schools reopen, is that more women will return to those jobs, and ease the burden of child care, as well.
One significant factor is that the average leisure wage of $18.09 is well below that of private sector wages, reported the Journal.
There are some signs already as gains in restaurants, hotel, and school employment rises a bit. But the trend will have to continue to see real gains.
Black employment continues a high, this month of 9.1 percent unemployment, the highest of all groups with 7.3 percent for Hispanics making for a challenge that is historically unmet, often with the oft used phrase, “When whites sneeze, blacks get a cold.”
Most concerning is that the labor force participation rate is relatively unchanged from 63.3 to 61.6, and the gender and racial gap reflects much of that.
Adding to the mix, Julia Pollak, a labor economist at Ziprecruiter.com, to The New YorkTimes said “there was a mismatch between the type of jobs being offered and those being searched for. More than half of seekers want remote work, while only 10 percent of employers are offering that option.”
The good news is that much of the current wage increase is from a 15 cents wage increase bringing overall pay to $30.33 in May, but that it is due to an increase in younger workers, especially teens, willing to work at lower wages, as their share of the workforce increases.
While all of this is a complicated picture for most to process, it’s important to realize while the road ahead is guaranteed to be rocky, the U.S economy of unfilled jobs is lower than the 10 million previously reported, and those whose job loss was attributable to Covid is now 16 percent less that it was in the last two quarters.
Adding to the increase in average gains of employment for the second quarter of 540 positions, as cited by the Times, coupled with those long term unemployed people, (more than 26 weeks) the corresponding drop to 3.8 million, approximately 40 percent of the total, then there is indeed welcome news for May, albeit uneven.
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