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President Trump has promised to create 25 million new jobs over the next decade, but the jobs numbers for the month of March suggest it’s not going to be easy.
Indeed, the numbers reported by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) last Friday were … well … quite disappointing.
According to the BLS, our economy created 98,000 new jobs in March, well below the 180,000 that Wall Street was expecting and the 219,000 created in February.
That is a pretty dismal number, but the unemployment rate did drop to only 4.5%, a 10-year low. Ironically, the number of newly unemployed surged by 472,000, which makes me wonder what kind of statistical magic BLS used to come up with that 4.5% number.
What was the weakest part of the jobs market? The retail sector, which lost 35,000 jobs in March.
By the way, that is on top of the 26,000 retail jobs that disappeared in February. Moreover, the job situation is going to get worse.
“We know that job cut announcements were the top category in the first quarter. That just means there’s more pain to come,” said Mark Hamrick of Bankrate Monitor.
In fact, the number of retail store closures in the first three months of 2017 is already higher than ALL of 2008, the start of the painful Financial Crisis. So far, almost 2,800 retail stores have announced that they will shut their doors for good.
- J.C. Penney: closing 138 stores
- Kmart: closing 108 stores
- Sears: closing 42 stores
- H.H. Gregg: closing 88 stores
- Macy’s: closing 68 stores
- MC Sports: closing 68 stores
- Gander Mountain: closing 32 stores
- Radio Shack: closing 187 stores
- Payless Shoe Source: closing up to 500 stores
Maybe you’re thinking: “Ah, who cares? Retail jobs barely pay above minimum wage so the job losses really don’t matter.”
Wrong! The National Retail Federation claims that one out of every four jobs in the U.S. is retail related, so we’re talking about one of the most important job markets.
Moreover, since approximately two-thirds of the U.S. economy is consumer spending, you have to wonder if these retail job losses are a canary in the bigger economic-picture coal mine.
According to the Atlanta Federal Reserve Bank — which just lowered its first-quarter GDP-growth forecast to a pathetic +0.6% — the combination of weak auto sales and ongoing decline in consumer activity is slowing the economy down to a crawl.
The next economic release that you need to pay attention to will be on Friday, April 28, when the Bureau of Economic Analysis will release its first official GDP number.
You can bet that whatever the Q1 GDP number is — good or bad — it will be market moving. MAJOR market moving.
Based on the above numbers, you should be able to connect the dots and be prepared for what’s coming. These are dangerous, but exciting times. and there are a couple little-known, specialty ETFs that I expect will take off like a rocket.
Best wishes,
Tony Sagami
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{ 24 comments }
These job numbers are smoke and mirrors all lies,they are not making any jobs the GDP real number is -2% below 0 and the real job number is 23% unemployment go to shadow stats.com for the real numbers, this is only the beginning do not listen to these fake numbers
The kind of numbers that can only “Magically” appear in Washington!!!…
Give it some time. My goodness the corporate tax cuts have not even been implemented yet. Stick with what is today. It took Obama 8 very get long years to get us here. Can we get at least a year?
Well said Jim, the downward turn in the economy is like a tidal wave at this point. It’s out of control and was put into motion be that big eared traitor that was in the WH for eight years and previous leaders. It’s not going to turn around in 100 days or 365 days. Trump not only inherited a f..in economic mess but a corrupt and treasonous government system.
God be with you Mr. Trump….
why aren’t we hiring our well-trained, college educated work force instead of offshoring the services that we have been trained to perform? it couldn’t be about increased corporate profit margins, now could it?
BTW, Sears started as a mail order catalog and then grew up to become a big box retailer. I wonder if the sears marquee will come down and be replaced by Amazon. we know the only thing that doesn’t change is change itself, correct?
Actually Amazon is the problem. If you buy amything or most of your regualar purchases from Amazon instead of getting into stores and dealing with real people, you are hurting your own people and causing the unemployment to rise, as Amazon usues robots and is destroying the people based economy.. If you now see that your Amazon purchasing is the real cause of the unemployment problem, then be prepared to suffer the consequences of angry unemployed people.
We should get rid of all automation. This will create lots of lost jobs like more shoe cobblers, tailors, black smiths, etc. No more big machinery in construction jobs. We can put 100 men to work with shovels instead of one in a front end loader. Better yet get rid of shovels and dig by hand to create 1,000 jobs. No more computers. Let’s hire more mathematicians and accountants and calculate everything with our fingers. Automation kills jobs! Robots will have us all out of work and then there will be no one with money to buy the stuff robots make.
Yes, I totally agree. People do not understand that when you take your shopping cart back in the store for Wal-Mart then you are putting the shopping cart guy out of a job. When you check out your groceries and other items at Wal-Mart you are PUTTING PEOPLE OUT OF A JOB!!!!!! This is not rocket science!!! Stop working for Wal-Mart for free!!! People need jobs.
When I get offers in the mailbox. If they have the postage paid envelope with them, I stuff all of the offer papers and any other junk mail that will fit back in the envelope and mail it all back to the company. They have to pay the postage and it keeps people at the United States Postal Service employed. They have mail to sort and deliver.
Technology needs to be kept in check or many MANY people are going to become unemployed. It’s like the frog in the boiling water thing; we are not seeing the bigger picture here.
Creative destruction. The problem is technological advances will make tens of millions of people around the world obsolete as they don’t have the skills necessary to compete for the jobs that will be available. This is a problem that governments are going to have to deal with, and I really don’t know what the solution will be. You just can’t keep printing up money like we do here in the U.S. and other places forever to pass out as entitlements without dire consequences economically.
the gov’t is a liar….they say that employment is up…they manipulate the numbers. I was on un employment and I was asked to come to the local unemployment office. We were told that we were all going to be let off of unemployment insurance after we reached one year. Fortunately, I found a job prior to my one years anniversary on un enmployment. I think all gov’t offices are required to read a book I read in college…” how to lie with statistics”…the gov;t is quite good at manipulating numbers any which way they seek. If you think people can live working retail you are sadly mistaken. I worked for Sears for two years. My last year I was working a 35 hour week and earned the staggering sum of $19000. Can you live on that?…no, neither could I.. I quit when I could collect Social Security. I now earn $25000 but at least I don;t have to go to Sears and put up with their —-..!!.I will dance in the streets when Sears and the other rotten retailers close. They are all greedy …SOBs……ripping off their employees and the customers….Good riddance to bad business…..What are the workers going to do with out jobs???…Ask your local politician!!….LOL….!!!..
I look at all the stores that are closing a lot of their stores which in turn creates unemployment. President trump appears to be hellbent on reducing or eliminating some of the Government thus creating possibly some thousands of jobs. So I say, how, just how does the president expect to create new jobs with all this distressful bad news constantly banging you in the face daily.
Hyman Slavin
what etfs stocksare going up-down
I suspect that many retail losses are due to the preferred online shopping phenomenon. The article doesn’t mention if that online uptake makes up, or is included in retail sales. Also, job cuts would be expected as the transition to online sales occurs. A better measure may be FedEx or UPS business increase,decrease, etc.
I was on a sears store in Escondido over the weekend , the tools were allmost empty, shelving is from the 70s and the terminals were also from a.few decade’s ago. They dont want to compete . Sad experience
good job look forward to more
Retailers overbuild stores like developers overbuild real estate, especially with today’s cheap money. They never seem to learn and deserve the consequences.
“President Trump has promised to create 25 million new jobs over the next decade…”
I don’t believe anything tRump promises, except his inevitable removal from office
JOE THE PLUMBER
Funny how nobody seems to see this correction coming at us. Professional or institutional managers are still fully-invested. They can not afford not to be. In fact, a stock market correction may already have started earlier this year just before Trump actually became President. We still are hearing about the “Trump-Bump”, even as the 10-year Treasury rate is headed lower again. Pretty soon, the Media will switch to the Trump-Dump after the correction becomes obvious to the Average Joe on the Street.
Hey Frank:
You said “I don’t believe anything tRump promises except his … removal from office”.
He has been President for less than 3 months. What is your analysis of what Obama had to say over 8 years? Please fill us in.
Couldn’t agree more Floyd. Stop blaming Trump for Obama’s pathetic policies that put us in this position.
No, blame Reagan for slashing corporate taxes and blowing up the national debt and robbing 6 trillion from the social security fund to hide the deficit as long as he could. Thank all the Presidents after him who refused to bring back the old tax rates and allowed our debt to reach 19 trillion now. Trickle down economics does not work. High progressive corporate tax rates work because it creates incentive for corporations to retain employees, pay higher wages, and reinvest in their companies to avoid giving away their profits in the form of taxes to the government. Stop believing the lies that corporations need more tax breaks in order to compete globally. Their profits are the greatest ever. Most large corporations like Apple have hoards of cash. We now officially live under a fascist government and they have everyone convinced it’s liberals vs conservatives. They are neither. They get us blaming the other side and divert our attention to social issues rather than the economy. Our government and corporations are working together to keep the greatest Ponzi scheme ever going. It does not matter if a Republican or Democrat is President. The debt will continue to rise because not enough taxes are collected yet we have fixed obligations to make social security and Medicare payments along with military spending. No President can simply slash spending on those things which are the bulk of our budget.
At least somebody is using their brain Como651.
The get rich quick scheme (tax policies) of Reagan, stripping of regulations, and combined with opening our markets for the Japanese to plunder – is what started our downfall.
The damage was well in place by early 1990’s – that’s why I was a Perot / independent supporter.
Well said Mike!…. Looks like there are a few people here that have studied history…. That said there are many articles out there that have noted how much better the economy (ans the Stock Market) does when the Progressive Liberals (who look out for the Average American) when in charge, rather than the Pro big Business and Pro Billionaire Republicans…..
Hi Tony:
What are those little-known, specialty ETFs that you mentioned?