Trump won thanks to support from working-class voters in Rust Belt states. He even managed “Reagan-like support,” to use the Washington Post’s term, from union households in particular: he lost them by just eight points, tied with the Gipper’s 1984 performance. George W. Bush, John McCain, and Mitt Romney all lost union households by about 20 points; thanks to Ross Perot, Bill Clinton’s Republican opponents each fell about 30 points behind.
We suspect Lloyd Blankfein will be receiving a call from The White House (or Treasury) very soon as Goldman Sachs' economists did the unthinkable in the age of political correctness - while investigating the state of under-employment in America, the smartest people in the room found that ObamaCare has led to a rise in involuntary part-time employment, estimating that "a few hundred thousand workers" have been forced to cut hours and has "created disincentives for full-time employment."
Submitted by Mish Shedlock of MishTalk
The BLS JOLTS (Jobs Openings and Labor Turnover) report came out today.
The BLS claims jobs openings are up. Based on an alternate reports, I suggest opening are not only down, but falling steeply.
The implications are huge, so let’s dive into the discrepancies.
BLS: Job Openings vs. Hires
That’s how the BLS sees things. Before we dive into the alternate view, let’s take a peek at mainstream media analysis.
Mainstream JOLTS Comments
As former McDonald's CEO Ed Rensi so eloquently explained not long ago, raising the minimum wage would wipe out thousands of entry level jobs for those who don't have very many other options.
Washington, DC is validation of Rensi's theory. According to a report from the Employment Policies Institute, nearly half of Washington, DC employers said they have either laid off employees or reduced the hours of employees to adapt to the District of Columbia's minimum wage hikes since 2014.
After last Friday's disastrous jobs report and concurrent prior revisions, few were expecting any remarkable developments from "Yellen's favorite labor market indicator", the BLS' JOLTS, or Jobs Openings and Labor Turnover Survey, and yet there were two surprises.
First, when it comes to actual job openings, the number rose from a downward revised 5.675MM to 5.788MM, which meant the job opening rate remained flat at 3.9%, even if the actual number of job opening just matched the all time high of last July.