[brid video=”40482″ player=”2077″ title=”Hillary Clinton Justifies Violent Protests Says Donald Trump Incited Protestors”]
In an interview with Jake Tapper, Hillary Clinton blamed protestor violence at rallies on Donald Trump, saying it is a result of the environment he created. Mrs. Clinton,, the likely Democratic nominee, said the presumptive Republican nominee “lowered the bar” on violence.
The former secretary of state, who used over the top rhetoric herself during what was billed as a foreign policy speech, said “the people who don’t like him are stepping over that low bar.” That was one day before violent protestors in San Jose, Calif., attacked Trump supporters as they exited an event and even cornered a woman, screamed profanities and egged her while police watched.
“I condemn all violence in our political arena,” Mrs. Clinton said. “I condemned it when Donald Trump was inciting it and congratulating people who were engaging it. I condemn it by those who are taking violent protests to physical assault against Donald Trump. This has to end. He set a very bad example.”
Of course, we and other news outlets have reported that these protests are not in fact organic, grassroots genuine protests. They are in fact organized by Mrs. Clinton’s and Sen. Sanders’s supporters.
“He created an environment in which it seemed to be acceptable for someone running for president to be inciting violence, to be encouraging his supporters. Now we’re seeing people who are against him responding in kind,” she added. “It should all stop. “It is not acceptable.”
[brid video=”40371″ player=”2077″ title=”Larry Kudlow Last Five Job Reports Say We Are In Mild Business Recession”]
With the Labor Department last week releasing the worst jobs numbers in five years, some economists are asking whether the U.S. economy in a recession. Larry Kudlow, senior contributor and host of “The Larry Kudlow Show” on CNBC, told Steve Malzberg the last five jobs reports from the Labor Department show the U.S. economy entered a “mild recession.”
The jobs reports are not the only sign whatever mild recovery the U.S. economy was experiencing is over. Consumer spending in May unexpectedly declined, the final reading of consumer sentiment showed a decline, service sector growth barely expanded and regional manufacturing in the Northeast, mid-Atlantic and Midwest are stuck in contraction. Regional manufacturing data has shown the sector as a whole either in contraction or hovering just above it for months.
By definition, a recession is a period of temporary economic decline when trade and industrial activity are reduced, which is generally marked by a fall in gross domestic (GDP) in two successive quarters. The Commerce Department reported the second reading on first-quarter GDP was revised higher to show the U.S. economy grew at an annualized pace of 0.8%, up from the 0.5% initially reported earlier this month.
There was no revision to the consumer spending component, which represents more than two-thirds of all U.S. economic activity. While the GDP numbers don’t match the textbook definition, it is also true that the government has adjusted its methodology for calculating the closely-watched gauge numerous times since the Great Recession. Those changes have been implemented twice after quarterly GDP was reported to have contracted and have had a positive or inflating impact on the final reading.
The one area of the U.S. economy showing promise is the housing sector, but analysts caution the situation isn’t what it seems.
The Commerce Department reported housing starts in the U.S. came in at an annual rate of 1.172 million in April, topping the estimate for 1.127 million. The agency also released a report showing sales of new single-family homes jumped 16.6% last month to an annualized rate of 619,000 units.
The National Association of Realtors (NAR) said the Pending Home Sales Index showed contracts to buy previously-owned homes rose 5.1% last month, higher than the median forecast. The NAR, which is essentially a representation of the housing lobby in D.C., said existing sales of single-family homes in the U.S. rose 1.7% in April to an annualized rate of 5.45 million units.
But the gains aren’t at all a natural result of market forces.
“Of the estimated 1.5 million first-time buyers in our data over the past year, more than a million bought homes with a downpayment of 5% of less,” said Stephen Oliner, co-director of AEI’s International Center on Housing Risk. “The sheer scale of this number shows that many, many households are buying their first homes with little money down.”
The National Mortgage Risk Index (NMRI), which is conducted monthly to measure how government-guaranteed loans with a first payment date in a given month would perform if subjected to the same stress as in the financial crisis that began in 2007, has increased year-over-year in every month since January 2014.
In other words, Mr. Oliner and his colleagues argue, the government hasn’t yet learned the lesson of the subprime mortgage crisis.
The NMRI last month found purchase loan volume surged 16% in April from a year earlier, fueled by an 18% jump for first-time buyers. The NMRI for Agency purchase loans came in at 12.59% in April, up 0.56% on a year-over-year basis and 1.27% from April 2014. An NMRI value of 10% for a given set of loans indicates that 10% of those loans would be expected to default in a severe stress event, based on the actual performance of loans with the same risk characteristics after the financial crisis.
“April 2016 was another exceptionally strong month for home buyers, as volume hit a series high for the month of April,” said Edward Pinto, co-director at International Center on Housing Risk and former executive vice president and chief credit officer for Fannie Mae. “With leverage continuing to increase and given that April represents the lower volume portion of the home buying season, we expect the remainder of the 2016 spring buying season to be exceptionally strong.”
An increasing number of analysts are starting to agree with those like Mr. Kudlow, who argue the government’s numbers can’t be fully trusted and aren’t telling the entire story. Even during months of stronger than anticipated job creation, those jobs have been low-paying and largely part-time positions, which is keeping wages stagnant and at lower-than-historical levels.
Analysts will be watching the numbers out of the second quarter very closely.
The Atlanta Federal Reserve currently forecasts second-quarter GDP rising at a 2.9 percent rate, though the continuing high level of inventories (among other factors) likely means they are overestimating growth. The economy grew at a 1.4% rate in the fourth quarter.
Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders told Jake Tapper on CNN’s “State of the Union” Sunday he had a problem with the Clinton Foundation taking money from foreign governments, particularly while Hillary Clinton was serving as secretary of state.
“If you ask me about the Clinton Foundation, do I have a problem when a sitting secretary of state and a foundation run by her husband collects many millions of dollars from foreign governments, many governments which are dictatorships… yeah I do,” Sen. Sanders said.
The self-described socialist’s comments come as he is hoping to upset Mrs. Clinton in California, when the biggest delegate prize holds its primary on Tuesday. While the frontrunner hopes to clinch the nomination that same day, she will likely need the superdelegates to put her over the top. But Sen. Sanders hopes a humiliating and fading poll numbers against presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump will persuade them to change their minds.
Up until this past week, the Vermont socialist has been unwilling to go after his rival on the issue of corruption. As PPD previously reported, the Federal Bureau of Investigation has expanded their probe into whether Mrs. Clinton mishandled classified information to include public corruption with the Clinton Foundation.
Mr. Tapper asked whether he thought that the Clinton Foundation’s activities represented a “conflict of interest,” Sen. Sanders took it farther than he had been previously willing to do.
“Yes, I do,” it is a “conflict of interest.”
There are a total 548 delegates up for grabs in the California Democratic primary, including 317 in the congressional districts. Another 105 are at large, 53 are Pledged PLEOs and 73 Unpledged PLEOs.
“This may be the end of the road for the Sanders campaign,” said PPD’s senior political analyst Richard D. Baris. “They don’t believe these numbers and actually feel that they have a good shot to defeat Mrs. Clinton in the Golden State. It wouldn’t be the first primary this cycle where the polling was grossly off.”
“But if it’s the end of a longer-than-anticipated road for Bernie, it looks like the beginning of a tough road for Mrs. Clinton.”
It’s even been bad for some of the special interest groups that backed the legislation. The big insurance companies supported the law, for instance, because they thought it would be good to have the government force people to buy their products.
And these corrupt firms even got a provision in the law promising bailouts from taxpayers if the Obamacare system didn’t work.
But the companies mistakenly assumed their sleazy pact with Obama, Pelosi, and Reid was permanent. Fortunately, their Faustian bargain appears to be backfiring.
Senator Marco Rubio has led the fight to stop bailouts for the big insurance companies.
Here are some excerpts from his recent column in the Wall Street Journal.
Six years after being signed into law, ObamaCare is a costly and unsustainable disaster. …ObamaCare is also bringing out corporate America’s worst crony-capitalist impulses. The health-insurance lobby has teamed up with trial lawyers to sue the federal government—through individual lawsuits and a $5 billion class action—for not following through on a sweetheart bailout deal buried in the law. This provision of ObamaCare would have required taxpayers to bail out insurers.
But in a rare victory for taxpayers, the Florida Senator got the law changed to restrict bailouts.
My conservative colleagues and I sounded the alarm about the likelihood of a taxpayer-funded bailout of health insurers (and were mocked as Chicken Littles for it). …When it came time to pass a spending bill at the end of 2014, we succeeded in making it the law of the land that the ObamaCare bailout program could not cost taxpayers a single cent—which ended up saving taxpayers $2.5 billion. In December of last year, we came back and repeated the feat. Now I am urging leaders in both the House and Senate to make this a priority and stop the bailout a third time.
As you might imagine, there’s a counterattack by the corrupt insurance companies that conspired with the White House to impose Obamacare on the nation.
…the health-insurance companies are suing to try to get their bailout…professional attorneys from the Congressional Research Service…said that the administration’s practice of making other payments to insurers under the ObamaCare reinsurance program “would appear to be in conflict with the plain text” of the law. …Health insurers can hire all the high-paid trial lawyers they want, but they will run into a constitutional buzz saw: America’s founding document grants Congress the power of the purse… Health-insurance companies need to wake up to the reality that this…money they are fighting for, and that the Obama administration is trying to weasel a way to somehow give them, belongs to taxpayers. Taxpayers get to decide—through me and others in Congress—whether to bail them out. And the people have spoken: No, we will not bail out health insurance companies for ObamaCare’s failures.
Amen to Senator Rubio.
Let’s hope Congress continues to oppose bailouts, and let’s also hope the White House isn’t successful in somehow giving our money to the big insurance companies.
Speaking of which, here’s what Investor’s Business Dailywrote about the bailout controversy.
Right when you think Washington can’t get any worse, it does. That much was evident at a recent U.S. House of Representatives committee hearing into the Obama administration’s bailout of private health insurance companies. It’s a textbook case of government officials ignoring federal law to put special interests before the interests of American taxpayers and families.
Here’s how the mess was created…and how the Obama White House chose to respond.
Thanks to the Affordable Care Act’s labyrinthine mandates, health insurance companies have collectively lost billions of dollars on the exchanges, leading to an increasing number of them limiting their participation in or exiting the exchanges altogether. As a result, many insurers have demanded larger subsidy payments. …responding to insurance industry demands — in November the Obama administration promised to “explore other sources of funding” for payments to insurers. Yet rather than work with Congress, the administration flouted the law entirely — and in this case, that means using tax dollars to bail out insurers left on the exchanges. CMS simply decided to ignore the law.
Unfortunately, ordinary people don’t have that option.
They simply pay more to get less.
Meanwhile, Americans rightly wonder who’s looking out for them. Premiums have actually risen faster in the five years after passage of the Affordable Care Act than in the five years before, while deductibles average nearly $3,000 for the most popular exchange plans.
Speaking of special deals, let’s look at another Obamacare rescue for a privileged group.
Bob Moffit of the Heritage Foundation explains the contortions needed to keep health insurance subsidies flowing to Capitol Hill.
…one scandal is truly bipartisan: How key administration and congressional officials connived to create, under cover of the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, special health insurance subsidies for members of Congress.
Here’s the background.
Rushing to enact the giant Obamacare bill in March 2010, Congress voted itself out of its own employer-sponsored health insurance coverage—the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program. …But in pulling out of the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program, they also cut themselves off from their employer-based insurance contributions.
Subjecting themselves and their staff to Obamacare may have been smart politics, if only to avoid the charge of hypocrisy, but that created a different problem.
Obamacare’s insurance subsidies for ordinary Americans are generous, but capped by income. No one with an annual income over $47,080 gets a subsidy. That’s well below typical Capitol Hill salaries. Members of Congress make $174,000 annually, and many on their staff have impressive, upper-middle-class paychecks. …Realizing what they had done, congressional leaders sought desperately to get fatter taxpayer subsidies in the Obamacare exchange system. …The standard excuse was that, without a special “sweetener,” a Capitol Hill “brain drain” would ensue; the best and brightest would flee to the private sector to get more affordable employment-based coverage.
Gee, it would have been a shame if the people who have screwed up public policyhad to get jobs in the private sector (or, more likely, the parasitic lobbying sector).
But the law oftentimes is not an obstacle when the Obama White House wants something to happen.
…at a July 31 closed-door meeting with Senate Democrats, President Barack Obama had promised he would “fix” the mess they made of their health coverage. So, on Aug. 7, 2013, just as Congress was getting out of town for the August recess, the Office of Personnel Management ruled that members of Congress and staff enrolled in the exchange program would get Federal Employees Health Benefits Program subsidies, even though they were no longer in the program.
But how exactly did the White House evade the law?
…the Office of Personnel Management declared that Congress and staff were eligible to enroll in the Washington, D.C., “SHOP” Exchange, a health insurance exchange reserved for small businesses with fewer than 50 employees. The exchange offers special insurance subsidies to participating small businesses. The problem was, of course, that Congress is not a “small business,” at least under any clinically sane definition of the term, and no section of the Affordable Care Act provided for any congressional exemption from the ban on large employer participation in the SHOP exchanges.
By the way, as a former staffer on Capitol Hill, I do have some sympathy for the lower-level folks who didn’t create the Obamacare mess and would suddenly be in a position of having to pay all their health costs out of pocket if the law was obeyed.
But that’s not a reason to engage in legal chicanery.
Presidential candidates Sen. Bernie Sanders (socialist) and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton during the second Democratic debate, left, and President Barack Obama during a press conference at the G-20 Summit in Turkey. (Photos: Reuters)
I thought this effort was useful because it shows, for instance, that the United States, France, and Hong Kong are all on the right side, but that there are nonetheless obvious differences in the amount of economic freedom for those three jurisdictions. Likewise, it’s not good to be Mexico, China, or North Korea, but there are degrees of statism and it’s worse to be farther to the left.
Speaking of left, not all advocates of bigger government are the same. So earlier this year I created another spectrum showing that there are various strains of statism, especially among true believers.
The value of this spectrum is that it shows the differences between totalitarians, genuine socialists, and run-of-the-mill hard-core leftists like Bernie Sanders.
And both of these spectrums were implicit in my interview yesterday about Venezuela. I pointed out that Venezuela technically isn’t socialist, but also suggested that doesn’t matter because the country is definitely on the wrong part of the statism spectrum.
[brid video=”40267″ player=”2077″ title=”Coast to Coast Dan Mitchell Explains Statism is Bad But Venezuelan Statism Is Horrible”]
And Venezuela definitely is proof that being on the wrong side of the spectrum is a recipe for collapse (or, in the case of North Korea, a recipe for never getting off the ground in the first place).
Since we’re discussing statism, let’s close with some really good news. Matt Yglesias of Vox likes big government. A lot. But he’s also capable of dispassionately analyzing what works and doesn’t work for his side. And he writesthat “socialism” is a bad word for those who want to expand the size and scope of government.
Bernie Sanders refers to his ideology — which I would characterize as social democracy or even just welfare state liberalism — asdemocratic socialism, a politically loaded term that seems to imply policy commitments Sanders hasn’t made to things like government ownership of major industries. …the socialist branding seems to have offered Sanders some upside…earning him enthusiastic support from a number of politically engaged people who seem to really besocialists… Against this, though, one has to weigh the reality that socialism is really unpopular in the United States.
How unpopular? Yglesias shares some new polling data from Gallup.
This is great news. Not only is socialism unpopular, but it ranks below the federal government (which traditionally gets low marks from the American people). And the supposed Sanders revolution hasn’t even translated into a relative improvement. This poisonous ideology is actually slightly more unpopular than it was in 2010 and 2012.
Here’s what Yglesias wrote about these numbers.
Any form of left-of-center politics in the United States, frankly, is going to have a problem with the fact that “the federal government” is viewed so much less favorably than cuddly targets like “small business,” “entrepreneurs,” and “free enterprise.” Even big business does better than the federal government. And both big business and capitalism do far better than socialism.
As I said, this is excellent news.
A few closing thoughts.
First, Yglesias and I don’t agree on very much (he’s referred to me asinsaneandirrational), but we both think that a socialist is someone who believes in government ownership of the means of production, not simply someone who believes in bigger government.
Second, the Gallup data reinforces what I wrote back in April about “free enterprise” being a much more appealing term than “capitalism.”
The bottom line is that economic liberty works while left-wing ideologies (all based on coercion) don’t work, so let’s use whatever words are most capable of disseminating this valuable message.
[brid video=”40254″ player=”2077″ title=”Top 10 Muhammad Ali Best Knockouts HD”]
Muhammad Ali, the three-time heavyweight boxing champion of the world, died Friday at the age of 74 at a Phoenix hospital.
In this viral video produced by ElTerribleProduction and viewed more than 10,049,313 times, we remember the “The Greatest” boxing champion at his best.
Muhammad Ali, the legend and three-time heavyweight champion.
Muhammad Ali, the three-time heavyweight boxing champion of the world, died Friday at the age of 74 at a Phoenix hospital. Ali was diagnosed with Parkinson’s syndrome in 1984 and had been hospitalized earlier in the week.
Bob Gunnell, spokesman for the family, said in a statement that Ali’s funeral will take place in his hometown of Louisville, Ky.
“The Ali family would like to thank everyone for their thoughts, prayers, and support and asks for privacy at this time.”
Louisville Mayor Greg Fischer said all flags on municipal buildings will be lowered to half-staff Saturday in honor of Ali.
Tributes immediately began to pour out on Twitter and social media, including one from another icon George Foreman. “Big” George himself exchanged blows with the “Greatest” in the famous “Rumble in the Jungle” series.
Ralph Ali, Frazier & Foreman we were 1 guy. A part of me slipped away, "The greatest piece" https://t.co/xVKOc9qtub
Ali, who was born Cassius Clay first gained worldwide notice at the 1960 Olympic Games in Rome, where he won gold as a heavyweight. Ali, at 6-foot-3 and around 215 pounds, had a 78-inch reach and, in 1964 as a 7-1 underdog, he fought and knocked out Sonny Liston for the professional heavyweight championship. It was before the fight when he made his famous “I am the Greatest” rant and vowed to “float like a butterfly and sting like a bee.” At 22, Ali knocked out Liston in seven rounds, making him at the time the youngest boxing champion in history.
But Ali was also a very controversial figure, a persona was taken to a whole other level after the Liston fight when he announced he would be joining the even more controversial Nation of Islam. He openly praised his friendship with fellow nation Nation member Malcolm X and refused to be drafted for military service in Vietnam, saying “the white man” was more his enemy than the Communists in Vietnam.
“Man, I ain’t got no quarrel with them Vietcong,” adding that “no Vietnamese ever called me n—–.”
Fifteen months after their first fight, Ali won a rematch with a first-round knockout punch that came out of nowhere. It was so quick in fact that many commentators and journalists believed Liston threw the fight. That produced one of the most iconic sports photos in American history, which depicts Ali waving a fist over the knocked-out Liston, screaming at him to get off the canvas.
Due to the controversy and draft-dodging, Ali’s boxing license was revoked in all 50 states and he was not allowed to fight for more than three years. In 1971, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously overturned his conviction and Ali would regain the heavyweight title two more times, in 1974 and 1978. He defended that title 19 more times.
Ali is survived by his wife, the former Lonnie Williams, and nine children: Maryum, Rasheda, Jamillah, Hana, Laila, Khaliah, Miya, Muhammad and Asaad. Ali was married four times: to Sonji Roi from 1964 to 1966; to Belinda Boyd from 1967 to 1977; and to Veronica Porsche Ali from 1977 to 1986; and Williams, whom he married in 1986.
Service sector employee, nurse at a hospital. (Photo: REUTERS)
The Non-Manufacturing Report on Business (NMI), a gauge of U.S. service sector activity by the Institute for Supply Management, expanded slowly in May. However, the NMI continued to show growth and 14 non-manufacturing industries show signs of resilience in a weakening U.S. economy. Non-manufacturing activity on the NMI fell to 52.9 in May, down 2.8% from 55.7 in April. Economists surveyed by The Wall Street Journal expected a smaller tick down to 55.5. A reading above 50 indicates that services activity is expanding, while a reading below 50 signals contraction. May marked the 76th month of expansion in the service sector of the economy, which covers everything from banking to burger chains.
ISM® NON-MANUFACTURING SURVEY RESULTS AT A GLANCE COMPARISON OF ISM® NON-MANUFACTURING AND ISM® MANUFACTURING SURVEYS* MAY 2016
Non-Manufacturing
Manufacturing
Index
Series Index May
Series Index Apr
Percent Point Change
Direction
Rate of Change
Trend** (Months)
Series Index May
Series Index Apr
Percent Point Change
NMI®/PMI®
52.9
55.7
-2.8
Growing
Slower
76
51.3
50.8
+0.5
Business Activity/Production
55.1
58.8
-3.7
Growing
Slower
82
52.6
54.2
-1.6
New Orders
54.2
59.9
-5.7
Growing
Slower
82
55.7
55.8
-0.1
Employment
49.7
53.0
-3.3
Contracting
From Growing
1
49.2
49.2
0.0
Supplier Deliveries
52.5
51.0
+1.5
Slowing
Faster
5
54.1
49.1
+5.0
Inventories
54.0
54.0
0.0
Growing
Same
14
45.0
45.5
-0.5
Prices
55.6
53.4
+2.2
Increasing
Faster
2
63.5
59.0
+4.5
Backlog of Orders
50.0
51.5
-1.5
Unchanged
From Growing
1
47.0
50.5
-3.5
New Export Orders
49.0
56.5
-7.5
Contracting
From Growing
1
52.5
52.5
0.0
Imports
53.5
54.0
-0.5
Growing
Slower
4
50.0
50.0
0.0
Inventory Sentiment
60.0
61.0
-1.0
Too High
Slower
228
N/A
N/A
N/A
Customers’ Inventories
N/A
N/A
N/A
N/A
N/A
N/A
50.0
46.0
+4.0
Overall Economy
Growing
Slower
82
Non-Manufacturing Sector
Growing
Slower
76
* Non-Manufacturing ISM® Report On Business® data is seasonally adjusted for Business Activity, New Orders, Prices and Employment Indexes. Manufacturing ISM® Report On Business® data is seasonally adjusted for New Orders, Production, Employment and Supplier Deliveries. ** Number of months moving in current direction. The 14 non-manufacturing industries reporting growth in May — listed in order — are: Health Care & Social Assistance; Accommodation & Food Services; Utilities; Wholesale Trade; Agriculture, Forestry, Fishing & Hunting; Construction; Public Administration; Real Estate, Rental & Leasing; Management of Companies & Support Services; Information; Finance & Insurance; Retail Trade; Transportation & Warehousing; and Arts, Entertainment & Recreation. The four industries reporting contraction in May are: Mining; Other Services; Educational Services; and Professional, Scientific & Technical Services.
A Ferrari cargo crane moves shipping containing on a U.S. trade port. (Photo: Reuters)
The Commerce Department said on Friday the U.S. trade deficit rose 5.3% to $37.4 billion in April, unexpectedly narrowing to $37.4 billion. Economists were looking for the U.S. trade deficit to grow to $41.3 billion.
March’s deficit was revised lower to $35.5 billion, which was the smallest since December 2013. In fact, the government revised trade data going back to 2013. The U.S. trade deficit in April was now smaller than the monthly average for the first quarter, indicating it will likely contribute positively to gross domestic product in the April-June period. Until now, trade overall has been a drag on GDP growth, that is, at least over the last three quarters.
Exports of goods and services overall increased by 1.5% to $182.8 billion in the month of April. However, exports to the European Union fell 6.0% and to Canada gained 1.1 %. Exports to China fell 3.2%.
Imports of goods overall increased 2.4% to $178.9 billion, though a large part of the increase reflected a rise in oil prices. Oil prices averaged $29.48 per barrel in April, which is up from $27.68 in March. The petroleum trade deficit was the smallest since February 1999.
Imports from China skyrocketed by 10.5% even as exports continued to fall. As a result, the politically sensitive U.S.-China trade deficit increased 16.3% to $24.3 billion in April.
An unemployed American speaks to a recruiter at a jobs fair. (Photo: Mark Ralston AFP/Getty)
The Labor Department on Friday said the U.S. economy created just 33,000 jobs in May, the fewest number of jobs in more than five years and badly missing expectations. While nonfarm payrolls saw the smallest gain since September 2010 in May, the unemployment rate still fell three-tenths of a percentage point to 4.7%, the lowest since November 2007.
However, the decline in the unemployment rate was again fueled by American workers dropping out of the labor force. Excluding government jobs, the private sector added only 25,000 jobs, the smallest since February 2010.
The median economic forecast called for 164,000 jobs to be created and the unemployment rate to fall to just 4.9%. The May jobs report, which is conducted by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, said they revised the previous two months down, reporting employers hired 59,000 fewer workers in March and April.
In May, the civilian labor force participation rate fell 0.2%, back down to a 37-year low at 62.6%. The labor force participation rate has declined 0.4%over the past 2 months, which has completely erased gains in the first quarter. The less-cited but equally important employment-population ratio was flat and clocked in at an abysmal 59.7%.
Meanwhile, the government is blaming the month-long Verizon strike for depressed job creation and economic growth. But that would’ve only accounted for 34,000 jobs, at best. Wages were also relatively stagnant as the U.S. economy continued to migrate from having a full-time to part-time labor market.
The number of American workers stuck in low-paying part-time jobs increased by a staggering 468,000 to 6.4 million in the month of May, after showing little movement since November. These people are not full-time for economic reasons and also referred to as involuntary part-time workers. These workers, who would have preferred full-time employment, were part-time because their hours had either been cut back or because they were unable to find a full-time job.
The higher-paying goods producing sector, which includes mining and manufacturing, lost a whopping 36,000 jobs, the most since February 2010. Even without the Verizon strike, payrolls would have increased by a paltry 72,000.
As a result, the average workweek for all employees on private nonfarm payrolls was flat at 34.4 hours. The manufacturing workweek increased by just 0.1 hour to 40.8 hours, and manufacturing overtime was unchanged at 3.2 hours. Average hourly earnings for all employees on private nonfarm payrolls increased by just 5 cents to $25.59, following a similarly weak gain of just 9 cents in April.
Over the year, average hourly earnings have risen by 2.5%. Average hourly earnings of private-sector production and nonsupervisory employees increased by 3 cents to $21.49 in May.
In May, 1.7 million persons were still marginally attached to the labor force, which hasn’t changed from a year earlier. These American workers were not in the labor force, wanted and were available for work, and had looked for a job sometime in the prior 12 months. However, they were not counted as unemployed because they had not searched for work in the 4 weeks preceding the survey.
The Labor Department claimed real unemployment, or the U-6 rate that counts total unemployed plus all marginally attached to the labor force and part-timers, remained flat at 9.7%. But even the normally cited U-4 was not at all optimistic.
Among the major worker groups, the unemployment rates for adult men (4.3%), adult women (4.2%), Whites (4.1%), and Hispanics (5.6%) declined in May. The rates for teenagers (16.0%), Blacks (8.2%), and Asians (4.1%) showed little or no change.
The number of long-term unemployed–or, those jobless for 27 weeks or more–fell by 178,000 to 1.9 million in May. These individuals accounted for 25.1% of the unemployed. The number of persons unemployed less than 5 weeks decreased by 338,000 to 2.2 million.
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