Almost 25% of Jobs Added Didn’t Exist

(DailyDig.com) – The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) reports that there was a reduction of 749,000 jobs from the initial number of employment recorded in 2023 by the US government. This means that almost 25% of the jobs that were reported to be produced that year were not actually generated.

U.S. Treasury rates and markets are affected by U.S. employment statistics, so this is important. Also, they play a major role in determining the direction of interest rate cuts and rises by the Federal Reserve. This impacts the wallets of all Americans.

David Rosenberg, founder of Rosenberg Research Associates, has said that if payroll data is incorrect by that much, it’s time to cease using it to change interest rates.

The BLS says that in 2023, the original estimate for the total number of new jobs was 3,140,000, based on each monthly employment growth report. However, subsequent reports revised the figure down by a total of 443,000. Additionally, in August, the BLS revealed a change to the total March employment figures, removing an additional 306,000 positions.

According to E.J. Antoni of the Heritage Foundation, approximately 25% of the jobs that were anticipated to be gained last year have been erased. The erasure of the anticipated jobs gained last year is attributed to taking into account the monthly revisions and annual benchmark revisions.

Compared to the prior two years, 2023 saw an unusually high number of negative revisions. In 2022, for example, the BLS reported that revising positions fell by 66,000 during the year, with negative adjustments occurring in only five months. As the nation recovered from the epidemic in 2021, the BLS revised the number of jobs higher by almost 2 million jobs for that year, marking the sole downward adjustment to the data given in March.

According to Antoni, if it’s not a recession, then something else is driving the mistakes to mostly all point in the same negative direction by a lot. It is fairly evident from these data patterns that BLS’s computations last year were flawed.