
<p>The latest Jobs Report showed the addition of 315,000 new jobs in August. ; At any other time that would be good news – not great, but pretty good. ; Of course, President Biden is taking a victory lap as if it is a really great report – and taking full credit.</p>



<p>But is it really good news?</p>



<p>Probably not – and that is because we do not live in normal times. ; We have a major inflation problem – and at the current rate, workers are losing one month of their income to inflation.</p>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-recovering-old-jobs"><strong>Recovering Old Jobs</strong></h2>



<p>Undoubtedly, Biden will again point to the fact that there has been a record number of jobs created during his year-and-a-half in office. ; What he will not say is that the record numbers are virtually all due to the anticipated return of jobs after the devastating Covid shutdown. ; In fact, after Biden’s one-and-a-half years in office, America has not yet reached the pre-Pandemic job levels. ; That will take a few more good job reports.</p>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>Fueling Inflation</strong></h2>



<p>The second mitigating issue with the jobs report is that the good news is actually not-so-good news. ; To get the inflation under control, we need to INCREASE the unemployment rate in order to lower the amount of money in the market – reduce consumer spending. ; That is what Jerome Powell is doing at the Federal Reserve. ; He basically has only one tool to reduce employment and the money in circulation and that is to increase the interest rates – and that means increased unemployment. ; There was a slight uptick in unemployment from 3.5 to 3.7 percent. ; In this case that is good news – but not enough to make a difference. Probably not enough to impact on the inflation rate since the uptick was largely do to more folks re-entering the work force. ; That stay-at-homes are running out of money.</p>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>Higher Interest Rates</strong></h2>



<p>If we continue to create jobs at this rate, we can expect another BIG leap in the interest rates in the next month or so. ; And that would come on the heels of previous large increases. ; If the Fed goes too far, it will plunge America into a Recession – and technically it already has, albeit more of sticking our toes in the waters of recession rather than a full plunge.</p>



<p>Increases in the interest rates are not good for the consumers – and especially those in the lower tax brackets. ; It means higher mortgage rates for new buyers and those on variable interest mortgages. ; It will hit people through their credit cards – which already carry high interest rates and special charges.</p>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>Unfilled Jobs</strong></h2>



<p>Then there is the issue of who is going to take these new jobs. ; We have more job openings than at any time in history – even as more and more folks do not have jobs because they are not looking. ; We only need to create more jobs, but we need to have people taking them.</p>



<p>The simple fact is that America has more jobs than we have productive people. ; We still have too many consumers and not enough producers – but those consumers and even those non-producers have enough money to keep the fires of inflation burning brightly for now.</p>



<p>Incidentally, the drop in gas prices is good news, but gas is only one of many inflationary pressures. That is why we still see inflation at the grocery store. ; We are not yet winning the battle over inflation – and we are not yet out of danger of a recession.</p>



<p>Hurray for the job numbers … arrrrgh for what they mean.</p>



<p>So, there ‘tis.</p>

Damn! … The economy produced lots of jobs again
