Last Friday, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported the economy added 678,000 in February, much higher than expected.
- Why it matters: The job market is hopping. But the employment-population ratio is 1.3 percentage points below pre-pandemic level (that is a lot). If this ratio was the same as Feb. 2020, there would be 3.4 million more workers employed.
Be smart: The labor force grew another 304,000 last month, demonstrating that workers are coming back to the labor market finally.
- And: Job growth has been exceptionally strong the last three months, as we also added 588,000 jobs in December.
By the numbers:
- Wages rose more than 0.03% from January and 5.1% annually from February 2021. It’s not as fast as inflation, so real wages fell.
- Leisure and hospitality added 179,000 jobs; education and health services 112,000, professional and business services 95,000; construction 60,000; and wholesale and retail trade 54,000.
Bottom line: Even with recent strong job creation the labor market is only recovering to where it was prior to the pandemic when the worker shortage was already a crisis. We have a lot of work to do.
- Through the America Works initiative the Chamber is working to ensure businesses have enough workers so America remains competitive by fixing our immigration system, enhancing retraining efforts, and removing barriers for people to reenter the workforce.
—Curtis Dubay, Senior Economist, U.S. Chamber of Commerce |
