Job growth has slowed sharply; the question is why

30 paulpauper 10 8/8/2025, 6:57:56 PM stayathomemacro.substack.com ↗

Comments (10)

duxup · 33m ago
>Currently, the data suggest that reduced labor supply is likely the key driver

It's interesting as far as people I know looking for jobs, they're supply ... and having a hard time finding jobs. Reduced supply you'd hope you'd get a job.

Granted the article addresses this both in the types of jobs and:

>The stability of the unemployment rate masks effects of the low-hiring, low-firing labor market.

I do wonder, if this continues and a sense of economic slowdown or worse continues, would lowering a rate really fire up hiring? I know small businesses who can't eat /dance around tariffs like big companies, some are seriously terrified / facing hard decisions, others fine.

mathgeek · 3m ago
Yeah, anecdotally no one I know exemplifies that finding. Everyone who had had to job search ran into a ton of competition and either beat them all out or is under-/unemployed currently. Only way I could see the finding of reduced labor supply is that no one can afford to work in the low wage jobs that are open.
dileeparanawake · 38m ago
Increasing wealth inequality, drives prices inflation, wage stagnation and less disposable income, driving less consumption, driving less revenue for businesses, meaning cuts happen and hiring freezes, drives slowing growth in new job market.
mlinhares · 29m ago
Title is clickbait (we all know why) but its a great read. Its so many shocks to the economy at the same time, and with no goal other than to cause harm that I don't think anything the FED does will have any real impact in the real world.

The author goes for an OR between reasons but I really don't see it like that, its an AND, all jumbled together and pushing the economy down.

andsoitis · 23m ago
> with no goal other than to cause harm

My read is not that it is to cause harm / break things down per sé, but instead to deglobalize. At various times, the left and the right have made globalization the bogeyman and something to fight, so this idea has been in the ether.

For many reasons (economic, geopolitics, peace), globalization is a great thing.

Even if deglobalization were a great idea, then the execution is haphazard, incompetent, rushed.

duxup · 19m ago
The execution and evaluation (granted, that's part of the execution).

If for some reason someone smart (with an education and who did something other than default to praise Trump's ego in press conferences) were to decide we should go to the mattresses wildly with tariffs to fight globalization:

I would hope they would care to actually evaluate if it is working / the impact, and not fire government workers when they report one thing that didn't sound good.

If you're not bound by any results you don't like then you can't know if you're even winning.

Granted ... that might not matter as I suspect market manipulation and bribes is the only real measurement with this administration.

davidw · 8m ago
I have been enjoying Paul Krugman's writing, now that he's free from the shackles of the New York "both sides!" Times

https://paulkrugman.substack.com/p/its-beginning-to-smell-a-...

He's obviously got a political angle, but doesn't let that completely color his economic analysis.

No comments yet

devwastaken · 12m ago
Red administration is in bed with tech and gives them H1B’s to prevent domestic labor cooperation
tcfhgj · 27m ago
More interesting question: more spare time for everyone or just for a small part of the population?
bluefirebrand · 20m ago
More spare time for a vanishingly small part of the population that has wealth, and to hell with the rest of us