Preston Mui

There's a great deal of literature on the connection between tighter credit conditions, economic activity, hiring, and inflation. Very large body of literature. The question is, how significant will this credit tightening be and how sustainable it will be. Jerome Powell, March 22, 2023 FOMC Press Conference In

It has now been almost exactly one year since the Fed started raising interest rates to combat inflation. When they started raising rates, the unemployment rate was at 3.6%. In February, the unemployment rate was… also at 3.6%. Even construction employment, a notoriously interest rate sensitive sector, remains

At the Senate Banking Committee’s Humphrey Hawkins hearing on Tuesday, Senator Warren questioned Chair Powell about the implications of the Fed’s projections for unemployment, which call for an unemployment rate of 4.6% by year’s end, around an additional two million people without jobs. Powell was resistant

The data from the February labor market show continued labor market strength. Almost all employment-based indicators show improvement from the previous month, even as the general trend of wage growth is downwards. The headline unemployment number rose from 3.4% to 3.6%, but this was due to a strong

For months now, the JOLTS job openings have told a divergent story from other labor market indicators, such as quits, hires, and employment-based measures. This month’s data release is no different. While all labor market indicators show a strong labor market, the difference is one of magnitude: the job

Just how tight is the labor market? It depends on which measurement you pick! Some economists look to the unemployment rate, or to its difference from some estimated, but not measured, “natural level” to try to assess whether the labor market and economy are in equilibrium (we are not fans