The final jobs report released in the 2010s shows the economy is both vibrant and growing.
This may or may not come as an unwelcome surprise to those who have spent the last several months warning that a recession is right around the corner.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Friday that employers added an astounding 266,000 jobs in November, pushing the unemployment rate down to 3.5%, its lowest point since the year astronauts first walked on the moon.
The U-6 unemployment rate, which is a broader measure of real unemployment, registered at 6.5% in November, which is on par with numbers reported over the summer. The labor force participation rate meanwhile held steady at about 63.2%, while wage growth actually increased by 3.1% over the last year.
In other words, it is an excellent report that “crushes” all earlier expectations, especially in the “jobs added” category. In fact, to put Friday’s numbers in perspective, Bloomberg News’s rosiest estimates predicted 180,000 new jobs. The actual number surpasses even those expectations.
This is good news for everyone — everyone, that is, except for the people who have cheered both explicitly and implicitly for a recession as a means to oust President Trump from office.
People such as 2020 Democratic primary candidate Sen. Elizabeth Warren, who wrote a blog post in July titled, “The Coming Economic Crash — And How to Stop It.” Naturally, the solution to the coming recession is to support her and her policy positions.
People such as Bill Dudley, former chair of the New York Federal Reserve, who authored an op-ed in August encouraging the Fed to interfere in the democratic process by working against the president’s trade war with China. Dudley reasoned that a major economic downturn would be worth it if it means “making it abundantly clear that Trump will own the consequences of his actions.”
Then there are people such as Democratic Party booster Bill Maher and NBC News’ chief foreign correspondent Richard Engel, both of whom said they hoped for a Trump-canceling recession.
“I do [want a recession],” Maher said in August. “We have survived many recessions. We can’t survive another Donald Trump term.”
Engel chimed in, “Short-term pain [is] better than long-term destruction of the Constitution.”
Lastly, there are the newsrooms that are all too enthusiastic to promote a recession panic.
“A Recession Is Coming (Eventually). Here’s Where You’ll See It First,” the New York Times reported in July.
BuzzFeed wrote in August, “Here’s Some Actually Useful Information To Help You Prepare For A Recession.”
“Here’s a list of recession signals that are flashing red,” reads the headline to a CNBC report in September.
CNBC asked later in October, “Is a Recession Inevitable?”
“Is a Recession Coming?” asked Bloomberg News in November.
Sure, something terrible may still happen to the economy. We may still be due for a recession in 2020 or 2021. Anything is possible, and no one has a perfect record predicting the notoriously fickle markets. But after Friday’s jobs report, those who have been hoping that a recession will rescue them from another four years of Trump in the White House should probably look elsewhere for salvation.
