Instead of claiming there's some kind of 'hidden growth' in GDP the more obvious cause to stagnant GDP with increasing employment is that the newly employed are vastly less productive than the people employed at the last peak of growth. The peak of Boomer births occurred around 1957, 65 years ago. We're in the process of swapping Boomers who have decades of work experience for Zoomers with zero experience and woke college degree.
That lower productivity per worker issue was my thought too, kind of an obvious third option. I know at my company a lot of people are spending a lot of time manually getting goods and parts sent to the right spots due to shortages of everything. I wouldn’t be too surprised if lots of other companies were doing that, too. Not being able to get enough to get by comfortably affects businesses just as much as individuals.
I hadn’t even thought of the replacement of experienced workers with a much smaller set of less experienced, but I should have.
It is always the case that more productive older workers retire and are replaced by less productive younger workers. This phenomenon is always biasing the overall productivity down.
But overall productivity still goes up over time because the average gen-Z entrant to the labor market is more productive than the average boomer was when he entered the labor market. In other words these increases in productivity over time supercede the negative effect of intergenerational worker substitution.
So if boomers retiring is what’s driving a productivity decrease, why aren’t the increases in overall productivity over time managing to counterbalance it?
1: There is no inherent reason to believe that the average gen-Z entrant is more productive than the average boomer when both enter the market. That depends a lot on the type of job, no to mention other questions like education, skills, work ethic, etc. It might be true, on average, but there is also good reason to believe gen-z has rather lower productivity.
2: Is overall productivity over time increasing monotonically? GDP per capita hasn't exactly been skyrocketing the past few decades, and if it is true that GDP has been negative for two quarters yet there is rising employment, that implies productivity is falling. It seems to me we spend a lot of manhours on zero and negative marginal productivity jobs. It feels like we are doing so at an increasing pace, although that is just a feeling based on my knowledge of a few industries. I think it is possible we have perhaps over invested in those sorts of consumption jobs, zero or negative marginal productivity roles.
Now, I don't think the boomers retiring and getting replaced by a smaller number of less productive zoomers is all the story. I expect the other issues I pointed out are more relevant. The replacement story is pretty compelling though as a strong contributing factor, however. Cultural shifts can matter quite a bit, after all, and there has been a pretty big cultural shift over the past 20 years.
If boomers getting replaced by zoomers in the work force is a strong contributing factor to falling productivity, we should expect a gradual trend of decreases in productivity, not some sudden shift that has been seen in two slightly negative quarters. After all, boomers have been getting replaced for years now.
See my response to Toad Worrier below. If the rate of replacement was steady that would be the case, but there is reason to believe the rate is not steady. I think we have seen productivity grow slower than it would otherwise for a lot of reasons (productivity has a lot of drivers), and a sudden shift down in GDP for a half a year while hiring increases probably has multiple causes as well. A shift in demographics of the labor market could be part of that along with other issues.
There is also reason to believe the job types are not one to one, eg. replacing a positive marginal productivity job with a zero or negative productivity job, but that's another issue.
Again, I am not saying it is ALL "Boomers good, Zoomers bad." In fact my primary point was that lower productivity per worker is an obvious reason for shrinking GDP but rising employment; it's practically tautological, yet Kling doesn't mention it. My guess for why productivity is taking a hit is that operations and supply chains are unable to run smoothly due to rampant shortages, and require a lot of people to just get the sand out of the gears as it were. If I had to pick one cause or my child would get murdered, that would be it. The generational thing isn't helping things, too I suspect, but I don't think it is the dominant cause. Just a cause.
I think the thing to be explained is how there can be net job creation but a decrease in GDP. If we figure the people who dropped out of the work force the most during COVID were the very young due to lower attachment (no kids, maybe still living with parents anyway) or those who didn't even have a job yet (college grads) while more experienced workers stayed in more frequently, that would artificially boost productivity per worker, as the bottom end of the distribution tended to be the ones out of work. (Marginal workers would also be more likely to get laid off, or not bother looking for another job while other payments were coming in, etc.) So for the past two years the average productivity could be higher than expected, because the lower productivity workers were out of the market.
Now those lower productivity workers are coming back in at a higher than normal rate, while old people are retiring at the same rate. Average observed productivity drops as a result. Toss in the increasing desperation for workers to do things related to micromanaging inventories to work around supply shortages and the like, and you might see a few percentage drop in productivity such that it shows up in GDP moving in a different direction than employment.
I see notable ineffeciencies in my economic world. Certain airlines that used to be extremely reliable are now unable to service flights that before Christmas 2021 were the norm. Why? What in the world is causing such a degradation in service?
I know people who will not fly in the current environment because they do not trust their flight will complete as scheduled!
I see retail chains wholly understaffed and merchandise poorly organized. Walked into a certain major pharmacy last night at 6pm and there was one person handling checkout. And the checkout system was glitching - had to wait 5 minutes for it to come back online. No problem, except my lost time. I was the only customer buying anything! At 6pm.
I could see people being hired, especially in the summer months. But I'm not confident these hires are keeping up with people quitting.
There are troubles in the economy that are not being captured in the numbers. Hopefully the real economy improves. If not the numbers will start looking bad.
Months ago you argued about inflation but ignored significant differences in U.S. price indexes (and similitudes in consumer price indexes among developed countries). Now you argue about the U.S. recession/stagnation and rely on some BLS employment data but ignore important BLS data.
Please tell me what you think about these ZH posts based on all BLS data for the last two months:
I believe that you and many other economists have been ignoring the economic consequences of government responses to Covid-19. Indeed, U.S. economists have ignored what happened in the rest of the world. I understand that in all countries politicians want to ignore those consequences but the economists' failure to assess them properly makes me laugh at their conclusions. BTW, here in Chile, I'm watching the same movie aggravated by the ongoing political conflict.
I was explaining your idea to a friend about why GDP growth is a mishmash measure with low precision while employment is a much better measured concept, and that's why you thought we were not in a recession (or a major reason why). But, and this echos what Christopher B, Invisible Sun, and a few others seem to indicate, I realized in the course of that explanation that saying "Economic Activity" is increasing when employment is increasing is equivalent to saying that "Productivity" is constant or increasing.
But productivity varies from industry to industry, job to job, and even worker to work. And the productivity measures we have are basically GDP measures, because aggregate productivity requires making comparisons between different workers producing different things. Just to make up a vaguely topical example, if 150k computer programmers with an average wage of 250k lose their jobs and 600k waiters with a wage of 50k become employed, that's a net decline in economic activity even though employment is going up. I agree we should focus on better signals, but if we want to measure economic activity we need to make aggregation assumptions about the relative value of different activities. I don't see how using the employment and not GDP figures helps us with that.
Are these new hires in new jobs = economic expansion, or are they plugging gaps in the labour force created by the economic shutdown?
Why are so many companies reporting they cannot find enough staff to bring them up to pre-shut down levels and resume normal output?
Shutting down the global economy for two years is going to produce economic situations that are difficult to analyse. But one thing is certain: we are in trouble, and it’s only just started nit least because the same people responsible for getting us into it, are the same bungling fools responsible for getting us out of it.
You can ignore the Zerohedge conclusion, but not the data. The employment surveys aren't correlated anymore which means none of them is a proxy for economic health on its own. I strongly suggest not coming to any conclusions unless you are willing to comb through the data at a high (low?) level yourself as former strong correlations have broken.
I submit it’s helpful to keep in mind that reporting the 528,000 change in employment understates the magnitude of economic activity or, borrowing from Arnold, of “patterns of specialization and trade”.
In round numbers, hires in June were probably around 6,500,000 and separations around 6,000,000.
While hires minus separations as reported by the Bureau of Labor Statistics don’t tie out exactly to the BLS’s 528,000 net figure, I think they’re close enough to illustrate the important point that the absolute change is far larger than the relative change.
So net new jobs were 500,000, but there were something like 10 times that many “new jobs” and “lost jobs”.
Thanks to Alchian & Allen for the insight.
PS. With the margin of error caveat noted, total seasonally adjusted non-farm employment of 152,536 as reported does appear to surpass the previous record of 152,504 pre-Covid record set in February 2020.
The establishment survey is a lagging indicator- always has been. In 2008, employment in that survey increased until June 2008, and didn't really decline until after October of that year.
Sure, the GDP numbers are probably uninterpretable right now with regards to whether or not there is a recession, but the inflation numbers are not. I track with spreadsheets all my spending. I am spending 50% more on food than I did just 3 years ago, and I buy the same items at the same rates as I did then. 3 years ago, my 12 month running average (I buy for both myself and my mother) was $101/week. As of last Wednesday, it was $142, and I have spent a running average of $156/week averaged over the last 2 months. My health insurance, a policy I haven't changed in 3 years has gone from $55/month to $252/month, and it covers a little less than it did 3 years ago since Blue Cross/Blue Shield has, itself, altered the policy slightly. I don't drive a lot, so gas isn't a big expense, but, of course, it is up over 50% in the last 3 years as well.
I can't find a single item that is at the same price or lower than it was prior to 2019. I recently had to replace my dumb cell phone because 3G is being phased out at the end of the year and the battery isn't holding much of a charge any longer. The phone I bought in 2015 cost me $95. I replaced it with a phone that is exactly as capable functionally but much more tedious to use, but is literally the lowest grade available at Verizon. Cost 150 dollars. That isn't indicative of growth to me, of any kind. It is all money illusion at this point as far as I can tell, and it doesn't seem to be getting better or increasing in a less worse way.
I say we revisit this topic 6 months from now after Powell has been forced to increase the rates he has control over by another 2-4%, if he has the courage to tried to get a handle on inflation.
The situation remains the same. I am totally confused by all the chop in the system. The only bet that feels reasonable right now is continue to expect volatility. My newest confusion based on yesterday’s numbers: how long will the yield curve stay inverted? People are loaning money to the government at a lower rate for ten years than for two months. That is a sign of deep underlying disfunction in the capital markets. Usually it indicates a recession is coming. Of that isn’t the case, what gives? Would love to have markets that didn’t have a thumb on the scale from the fed.
"The big question about economic statistics these days has to be, “Where is the missing GDP?” Either firms were hiring all those workers to sit around doing nothing or the GDP data are not picking up all of the economic activity that is taking place. "
I don't think one can immediately assume GDP was low for one of the two reasons you give, even if I agree data errors seems the best guess. For example, aren't there a lot of new vehicles sitting waiting for computer chips before they can be sold? Aren't companies still waiting unusually long for shipping deliveries? What else is held up? (except that industrial production supposedly went up)
Although it seems a small factor over 6 months, Christopher B makes a different point about replacing experienced with inexperienced workers. And I'd bet much of the recent hiring was in lower wage, lower skill, lower productivity service sector jobs. It wouldn't take much reduction in output from the highly productive to cancel out the less productive workers being added. I'd bet there are other factors too.
Low likelihood of it being called a recession so far.
Little talk about the 4/5 month (Feb/Mar-Jun) Covid recession of 2020, which messed up statistics; less than 2 quarters.
What does "recession" mean, tho? (What is a "woman"? Speaking truth requires stable definitions of words used to speak the truth - controlling words controls "truth")
Sad that many who don't want to call this a recession are willing to call Jan 6. an insurrection; and vice versa (no to insurrection but yes to recession).
Insurrection means “a violent uprising by a group or movement acting for the specific purpose of overthrowing the constituted government and seizing its powers."
When unarmed, non-violent protesters get killed by gov't violence, or crowd influenced heart stoppages, does that count as a violent uprising? I say no.
Not sure on "recession", but if it is, it is mild so far.
Most folk prefer mild inflation to big recession.
Most don't think the inflation is mild, and many think it will get worse before it gets better.
Sure that Biden is doing terrible, AND far far worse than Trump would have done.
I have read that around 800,000 jobs were added by seasonal adjustment and that unadjusted jobs were down by over 300000. So the actual jobs don't indicate increased economic activity, just less of a decline than usual, if you believe that the seasonal adjustment is legitimate.
Instead of claiming there's some kind of 'hidden growth' in GDP the more obvious cause to stagnant GDP with increasing employment is that the newly employed are vastly less productive than the people employed at the last peak of growth. The peak of Boomer births occurred around 1957, 65 years ago. We're in the process of swapping Boomers who have decades of work experience for Zoomers with zero experience and woke college degree.
That lower productivity per worker issue was my thought too, kind of an obvious third option. I know at my company a lot of people are spending a lot of time manually getting goods and parts sent to the right spots due to shortages of everything. I wouldn’t be too surprised if lots of other companies were doing that, too. Not being able to get enough to get by comfortably affects businesses just as much as individuals.
I hadn’t even thought of the replacement of experienced workers with a much smaller set of less experienced, but I should have.
It is always the case that more productive older workers retire and are replaced by less productive younger workers. This phenomenon is always biasing the overall productivity down.
But overall productivity still goes up over time because the average gen-Z entrant to the labor market is more productive than the average boomer was when he entered the labor market. In other words these increases in productivity over time supercede the negative effect of intergenerational worker substitution.
So if boomers retiring is what’s driving a productivity decrease, why aren’t the increases in overall productivity over time managing to counterbalance it?
Two problems there:
1: There is no inherent reason to believe that the average gen-Z entrant is more productive than the average boomer when both enter the market. That depends a lot on the type of job, no to mention other questions like education, skills, work ethic, etc. It might be true, on average, but there is also good reason to believe gen-z has rather lower productivity.
2: Is overall productivity over time increasing monotonically? GDP per capita hasn't exactly been skyrocketing the past few decades, and if it is true that GDP has been negative for two quarters yet there is rising employment, that implies productivity is falling. It seems to me we spend a lot of manhours on zero and negative marginal productivity jobs. It feels like we are doing so at an increasing pace, although that is just a feeling based on my knowledge of a few industries. I think it is possible we have perhaps over invested in those sorts of consumption jobs, zero or negative marginal productivity roles.
Now, I don't think the boomers retiring and getting replaced by a smaller number of less productive zoomers is all the story. I expect the other issues I pointed out are more relevant. The replacement story is pretty compelling though as a strong contributing factor, however. Cultural shifts can matter quite a bit, after all, and there has been a pretty big cultural shift over the past 20 years.
If boomers getting replaced by zoomers in the work force is a strong contributing factor to falling productivity, we should expect a gradual trend of decreases in productivity, not some sudden shift that has been seen in two slightly negative quarters. After all, boomers have been getting replaced for years now.
See my response to Toad Worrier below. If the rate of replacement was steady that would be the case, but there is reason to believe the rate is not steady. I think we have seen productivity grow slower than it would otherwise for a lot of reasons (productivity has a lot of drivers), and a sudden shift down in GDP for a half a year while hiring increases probably has multiple causes as well. A shift in demographics of the labor market could be part of that along with other issues.
There is also reason to believe the job types are not one to one, eg. replacing a positive marginal productivity job with a zero or negative productivity job, but that's another issue.
Again, I am not saying it is ALL "Boomers good, Zoomers bad." In fact my primary point was that lower productivity per worker is an obvious reason for shrinking GDP but rising employment; it's practically tautological, yet Kling doesn't mention it. My guess for why productivity is taking a hit is that operations and supply chains are unable to run smoothly due to rampant shortages, and require a lot of people to just get the sand out of the gears as it were. If I had to pick one cause or my child would get murdered, that would be it. The generational thing isn't helping things, too I suspect, but I don't think it is the dominant cause. Just a cause.
Isn't that a longer term phenomenon that wouldn't much shift the quarter-by-quarter deltas that are being argued over?
I think the thing to be explained is how there can be net job creation but a decrease in GDP. If we figure the people who dropped out of the work force the most during COVID were the very young due to lower attachment (no kids, maybe still living with parents anyway) or those who didn't even have a job yet (college grads) while more experienced workers stayed in more frequently, that would artificially boost productivity per worker, as the bottom end of the distribution tended to be the ones out of work. (Marginal workers would also be more likely to get laid off, or not bother looking for another job while other payments were coming in, etc.) So for the past two years the average productivity could be higher than expected, because the lower productivity workers were out of the market.
Now those lower productivity workers are coming back in at a higher than normal rate, while old people are retiring at the same rate. Average observed productivity drops as a result. Toss in the increasing desperation for workers to do things related to micromanaging inventories to work around supply shortages and the like, and you might see a few percentage drop in productivity such that it shows up in GDP moving in a different direction than employment.
I see notable ineffeciencies in my economic world. Certain airlines that used to be extremely reliable are now unable to service flights that before Christmas 2021 were the norm. Why? What in the world is causing such a degradation in service?
I know people who will not fly in the current environment because they do not trust their flight will complete as scheduled!
I see retail chains wholly understaffed and merchandise poorly organized. Walked into a certain major pharmacy last night at 6pm and there was one person handling checkout. And the checkout system was glitching - had to wait 5 minutes for it to come back online. No problem, except my lost time. I was the only customer buying anything! At 6pm.
I could see people being hired, especially in the summer months. But I'm not confident these hires are keeping up with people quitting.
There are troubles in the economy that are not being captured in the numbers. Hopefully the real economy improves. If not the numbers will start looking bad.
Months ago you argued about inflation but ignored significant differences in U.S. price indexes (and similitudes in consumer price indexes among developed countries). Now you argue about the U.S. recession/stagnation and rely on some BLS employment data but ignore important BLS data.
Please tell me what you think about these ZH posts based on all BLS data for the last two months:
https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/something-snaps-us-labor-market-full-part-time-workers-plunge-multiple-jobholders-soar
https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/something-snaps-job-market-multiple-jobholders-hit-all-time-high-unexplained-18-million
I believe that you and many other economists have been ignoring the economic consequences of government responses to Covid-19. Indeed, U.S. economists have ignored what happened in the rest of the world. I understand that in all countries politicians want to ignore those consequences but the economists' failure to assess them properly makes me laugh at their conclusions. BTW, here in Chile, I'm watching the same movie aggravated by the ongoing political conflict.
I was explaining your idea to a friend about why GDP growth is a mishmash measure with low precision while employment is a much better measured concept, and that's why you thought we were not in a recession (or a major reason why). But, and this echos what Christopher B, Invisible Sun, and a few others seem to indicate, I realized in the course of that explanation that saying "Economic Activity" is increasing when employment is increasing is equivalent to saying that "Productivity" is constant or increasing.
But productivity varies from industry to industry, job to job, and even worker to work. And the productivity measures we have are basically GDP measures, because aggregate productivity requires making comparisons between different workers producing different things. Just to make up a vaguely topical example, if 150k computer programmers with an average wage of 250k lose their jobs and 600k waiters with a wage of 50k become employed, that's a net decline in economic activity even though employment is going up. I agree we should focus on better signals, but if we want to measure economic activity we need to make aggregation assumptions about the relative value of different activities. I don't see how using the employment and not GDP figures helps us with that.
Definitely part of the story is the avg wage offered for the new jobs.
Are these new hires in new jobs = economic expansion, or are they plugging gaps in the labour force created by the economic shutdown?
Why are so many companies reporting they cannot find enough staff to bring them up to pre-shut down levels and resume normal output?
Shutting down the global economy for two years is going to produce economic situations that are difficult to analyse. But one thing is certain: we are in trouble, and it’s only just started nit least because the same people responsible for getting us into it, are the same bungling fools responsible for getting us out of it.
I wouldn't take a single report as confirmation anymore
https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/something-snaps-job-market-multiple-jobholders-hit-all-time-high-unexplained-18-million
You can ignore the Zerohedge conclusion, but not the data. The employment surveys aren't correlated anymore which means none of them is a proxy for economic health on its own. I strongly suggest not coming to any conclusions unless you are willing to comb through the data at a high (low?) level yourself as former strong correlations have broken.
I submit it’s helpful to keep in mind that reporting the 528,000 change in employment understates the magnitude of economic activity or, borrowing from Arnold, of “patterns of specialization and trade”.
In round numbers, hires in June were probably around 6,500,000 and separations around 6,000,000.
While hires minus separations as reported by the Bureau of Labor Statistics don’t tie out exactly to the BLS’s 528,000 net figure, I think they’re close enough to illustrate the important point that the absolute change is far larger than the relative change.
So net new jobs were 500,000, but there were something like 10 times that many “new jobs” and “lost jobs”.
Thanks to Alchian & Allen for the insight.
PS. With the margin of error caveat noted, total seasonally adjusted non-farm employment of 152,536 as reported does appear to surpass the previous record of 152,504 pre-Covid record set in February 2020.
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?graph_id=1068786
Fine link to the data, showing the US #employeed equaling the prior max.
But what about the employment/population ratio?
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/EMRATIO
Current 60.1% is still a bit less than Feb, 2020 peak of 61.2%.
The establishment survey is a lagging indicator- always has been. In 2008, employment in that survey increased until June 2008, and didn't really decline until after October of that year.
Sure, the GDP numbers are probably uninterpretable right now with regards to whether or not there is a recession, but the inflation numbers are not. I track with spreadsheets all my spending. I am spending 50% more on food than I did just 3 years ago, and I buy the same items at the same rates as I did then. 3 years ago, my 12 month running average (I buy for both myself and my mother) was $101/week. As of last Wednesday, it was $142, and I have spent a running average of $156/week averaged over the last 2 months. My health insurance, a policy I haven't changed in 3 years has gone from $55/month to $252/month, and it covers a little less than it did 3 years ago since Blue Cross/Blue Shield has, itself, altered the policy slightly. I don't drive a lot, so gas isn't a big expense, but, of course, it is up over 50% in the last 3 years as well.
I can't find a single item that is at the same price or lower than it was prior to 2019. I recently had to replace my dumb cell phone because 3G is being phased out at the end of the year and the battery isn't holding much of a charge any longer. The phone I bought in 2015 cost me $95. I replaced it with a phone that is exactly as capable functionally but much more tedious to use, but is literally the lowest grade available at Verizon. Cost 150 dollars. That isn't indicative of growth to me, of any kind. It is all money illusion at this point as far as I can tell, and it doesn't seem to be getting better or increasing in a less worse way.
I say we revisit this topic 6 months from now after Powell has been forced to increase the rates he has control over by another 2-4%, if he has the courage to tried to get a handle on inflation.
The situation remains the same. I am totally confused by all the chop in the system. The only bet that feels reasonable right now is continue to expect volatility. My newest confusion based on yesterday’s numbers: how long will the yield curve stay inverted? People are loaning money to the government at a lower rate for ten years than for two months. That is a sign of deep underlying disfunction in the capital markets. Usually it indicates a recession is coming. Of that isn’t the case, what gives? Would love to have markets that didn’t have a thumb on the scale from the fed.
"The big question about economic statistics these days has to be, “Where is the missing GDP?” Either firms were hiring all those workers to sit around doing nothing or the GDP data are not picking up all of the economic activity that is taking place. "
I don't think one can immediately assume GDP was low for one of the two reasons you give, even if I agree data errors seems the best guess. For example, aren't there a lot of new vehicles sitting waiting for computer chips before they can be sold? Aren't companies still waiting unusually long for shipping deliveries? What else is held up? (except that industrial production supposedly went up)
Although it seems a small factor over 6 months, Christopher B makes a different point about replacing experienced with inexperienced workers. And I'd bet much of the recent hiring was in lower wage, lower skill, lower productivity service sector jobs. It wouldn't take much reduction in output from the highly productive to cancel out the less productive workers being added. I'd bet there are other factors too.
We need better metrics AND all the metrics are messed up by Covid and the gov't responses.
The Army is letting go thousands who don't want to get jabbed - and yet is failing to achieve its recruitment goals, by a lot.
Vax qualifications and exclusions mess up the metrics.
Inflation is much less messed up - too much money chasing too few goods (AND higher energy prices, which look a lot like inflation.)
Fred Blog agrees with Arnold:
https://fredblog.stlouisfed.org/2022/08/are-we-in-a-recession-yet/
Low likelihood of it being called a recession so far.
Little talk about the 4/5 month (Feb/Mar-Jun) Covid recession of 2020, which messed up statistics; less than 2 quarters.
What does "recession" mean, tho? (What is a "woman"? Speaking truth requires stable definitions of words used to speak the truth - controlling words controls "truth")
Sad that many who don't want to call this a recession are willing to call Jan 6. an insurrection; and vice versa (no to insurrection but yes to recession).
https://definitions.uslegal.com/i/insurrection/
Insurrection means “a violent uprising by a group or movement acting for the specific purpose of overthrowing the constituted government and seizing its powers."
When unarmed, non-violent protesters get killed by gov't violence, or crowd influenced heart stoppages, does that count as a violent uprising? I say no.
Not sure on "recession", but if it is, it is mild so far.
Most folk prefer mild inflation to big recession.
Most don't think the inflation is mild, and many think it will get worse before it gets better.
Sure that Biden is doing terrible, AND far far worse than Trump would have done.
I have read that around 800,000 jobs were added by seasonal adjustment and that unadjusted jobs were down by over 300000. So the actual jobs don't indicate increased economic activity, just less of a decline than usual, if you believe that the seasonal adjustment is legitimate.