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Expectations heading into this morning showed projections of about 200,000 new jobs having been added in the United States in July. As it turns out, according to the new report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the job market didn’t quite reach that level. CNBC reported this morning:
Nonfarm payrolls expanded by 187,000 for the month, slightly below the Dow Jones estimate for 200,000. ... The unemployment rate was 3.5%, against a consensus estimate that the jobless level would hold steady at 3.6%.
With revisions from May and June factored in, we’ve now seen roughly 1.8 million jobs created so far this year — and that’s after just seven months, not the entire calendar year.
What’s more, today’s report pointed to solid wage growth and an unemployment rate that’s been below 4% for a year and a half. In fact, it's worth emphasizing that the United States did not reach 3.5% unemployment — the current jobless rate — at any point throughout the 1970s, 1980s, or 1990s.
The preliminary total for the month might appear underwhelming, but it appears the job market is starting to return to a pre-pandemic normal amidst steady growth and low unemployment.
As for the politics, let’s circle back to previous coverage to put the data in perspective. Over the course of the first three years of Donald Trump’s presidency — when the Republican said the United States’ economy was the greatest in the history of the planet — the economy created roughly 6.35 million jobs, spanning all of 2017, 2018 and 2019.
According to the latest tally, the U.S. economy has created roughly 13.8 million jobs since January 2021 — more than double the combined total of Trump’s first three years.
In recent months, Republicans have responded to developments like these by pretending not to notice them. I have a hunch GOP officials will keep the trend going today.
This post updates our related earlier coverage.