The November Jobs Report

November's Misleading Jobs Report Headline

This morning the Bureau of Labor Statistics released the November jobs report with a stunning headline:

"Payroll employment rises by 227,000 in November; unemployment rate changes little at 4.2%"

According to the results of their most favorite survey, the Establishment survey, all is merry and bright in the labor market. Any concerns that you or your family may have had about your ability to seek and attain gainful employment are nought but illusions; propagandistic byproducts of the unregulated Joe Rogans of the misinformation-peddling alternative media complex!

The results from the Establishment survey below report that from October to November, the U.S. added 227K jobs with 194K of those being private sector jobs. While job growth in the goods-producing sector has been more or less flat for the last three months, the private service-providing sector has experienced tremendous growth––an additional 160K jobs month-over-month.

Of course, for those familiar with the problems of the Establishment survey reported by the MacIver Institute last month (see: The Jobs Report Is Worse Than You Think), the much more reliable Household survey tells a story less akin to a Christmas miracle and more akin to a Krampus nightmare.

The Household Survey: Job Losses and Dropouts

As per usual, the results from the Household survey––which relies on the results from surveys of individuals––are the exact opposite of those reported by the Establishment survey.

The Household survey finds that for the second month in a row, the U.S. has lost jobs and lost labor market participants. People can't find jobs and are either so discouraged or have been unemployed for so long that they've dropped out of the labor market.

According to the survey results below, from October to November the U.S. lost another 355K jobs (October lost 368K) and 193K people dropped out of the labor force. Additionally, the number of unemployed persons increased by 161K, those not in the labor force increased by 368K, and minority unemployment rates have all increased significantly.

The "official" unemployment rate, called U-3 Unemployment, increased from 4.1% to only 4.2%, but unemployment rates for groups that are disproportionately low-skill have all increased significantly. The teenage unemployment rate decreased from 13.8% to 13.2% but remains at permanent depression-level rates courtesy of the minimum wage; Black unemployment jumped .7% from 5.7% to 6.4%; Hispanic unemployment also increased from 5.1% to 5.3%; and those with only high school educations faired much worse this month, with group unemployment increasing from 4% to 4.6%.

As for the other measures of unemployment––U-4, U-5 and U-6––the U-4 rate increased .1% to 4.5%, U-5 rose to 5.1% and U-6 unemployment increased by .1% to 7.8%.

And most striking of all––although not at all a new phenomenon in the U.S.––foreign born workers continue to acquire all new jobs in the U.S. while native born workers lose jobs. 

The Household survey showed that from November '23 to November '24 foreign born workers increased their employment numbers significantly by 401K jobs, while native born workers have lost 1,094,000 jobs.

If it wasn't already clear enough, the Biden-Harris-Powell-nomics of the last four years isn't working for Americans.