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US economy unexpectedly sheds 92k jobs in February

bbc.com

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Re: US economy unexpectedly sheds 92k jobs in February

#81

Post by cameldrv »

cheesecompiler wrote: post #29
testfrequency wrote: post #4

I do not see the tourism industry mentioned here but I have to imagine that is a huge loss right now. Most of the world is not visiting the US right now which means projects and planning that was made in anticipation for summer has probably been halted or heavily reduced.

There is a significant majority of people in Canada who not only vocally decided to not go to US but discourage their friends from doing so too. People have judged me for driving through the states.

Likewise, I used to live in Germany, now in California, I used to get a fairly steady stream of old friends in town to visit, but not anymore, they essentially to a person refuse to come to the U.S.

Re: US economy unexpectedly sheds 92k jobs in February

#83

Post by Analemma_ »

paxys wrote: post #13

If the government-approved numbers are this bad the real ones must be catastrophic.

I can't find it now because Bluesky's search function is so dreadful, but after the January jobs report was better than expected, a bunch of people were assuming the BLS must have fudged the numbers. Then the person who was actually fired from the BLS by Trump actually showed up and posted saying that, as far as they can tell from talking to "surviving" colleagues, the blowback after that firing was so intense that there hasn't been further pressure on the BLS and that as far as they can tell, the numbers are still good.

If someone can find this post, please link it here, because this person was no fan of Trump and I considered it a matter of considerable personal integrity that they looked into the matter and determined they still stood by the numbers, instead of taking the easy win on Bluesky and denouncing them.

(There is a separate issue where for the last 2-3 years, the BLS's later revisions to jobs numbers have been almost entirely downward, instead of evenly distributed like they used to be, indicating some kind of systemic methodological issue, maybe some secular change in how labor markets work post-covid. The February numbers could mean maybe they've fixed the problem, or maybe they haven't and this will later get revised to something even worse. But that issue predates Trump.)

Re: US economy unexpectedly sheds 92k jobs in February

#84

Post by toddmorey »

joe_mamba wrote: post #57
testfrequency wrote: post #4

I do not see the tourism industry mentioned here but I have to imagine that is a huge loss right now. Most of the world is not visiting the US right now which means projects and planning that was made in anticipation for summer has probably been halted or heavily reduced.

>Most of the world is not visiting the US right now Only right now? The US touristic cities have been and continue to be the most expensive places in the world to visit by far, so most of the planet will never visit the US out of cost reasons alone, regardless of their views on $CURRENT_POLITICS. Foreign tourism probably isn't large enough part of the US GDP to be making a dent in the US economy as a whole. @WarmWash…

It accounts for 3% of the economy and provides around 15 million jobs. That’s absolutely going to make a dent.

And international tourism supports local tourism. I think Las Vegas will continue to be a shell of what it was until international tourism rebounds.

BEA used to have these cool interactive tables on GDP by industry, but they’ve now been discontinued. It really feels like our current administration just does not like public data.

Re: US economy unexpectedly sheds 92k jobs in February

#85

Post by danans »

boringg wrote: post #61

[flagged]

> Why is this on the top of hackernews?

Fundamentally because a lot of people here think it should be, but sure behind that, it's at the top for many of the reasons you state. This is a forum about work after all, something that has lots of uncertainty at the current time.

> Or is just a slow news day

I don't think these exist anymore

Re: US economy unexpectedly sheds 92k jobs in February

#86

Post by melenaboija »

nemo44x wrote: post #46
testfrequency wrote: post #4

I do not see the tourism industry mentioned here but I have to imagine that is a huge loss right now. Most of the world is not visiting the US right now which means projects and planning that was made in anticipation for summer has probably been halted or heavily reduced.

I have some Euro friends that went to Dubai instead because the USA is “too dangerous” right now. I wish them safe passage back, but yeesh talk about irrational perspective.

Yeah tough choice right now, don't know which one is more autocratic and oligarchic.

Re: US economy unexpectedly sheds 92k jobs in February

#87

Post by dmos62 »

nemo44x wrote: post #46
testfrequency wrote: post #4

I do not see the tourism industry mentioned here but I have to imagine that is a huge loss right now. Most of the world is not visiting the US right now which means projects and planning that was made in anticipation for summer has probably been halted or heavily reduced.

I have some Euro friends that went to Dubai instead because the USA is “too dangerous” right now. I wish them safe passage back, but yeesh talk about irrational perspective.

Are you implying they knew that Iran would get bombed and would in retaliation bomb everyone across the Persian gulf?

Re: US economy unexpectedly sheds 92k jobs in February

#88

Post by joe_mamba »

toddmorey wrote: post #84
joe_mamba wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Most of the world is not visiting the US right now Only right now? The US touristic cities have been and continue to be the most expensive places in the world to visit by far, so most of the planet will never visit the US out of cost reasons alone, regardless of their views on $CURRENT_POLITICS. Foreign tourism probably isn't large enough part of the US GDP to be making a dent in the US economy as a whole. @WarmWash…

It accounts for 3% of the economy and provides around 15 million jobs. That’s absolutely going to make a dent. And international tourism supports local tourism. I think Las Vegas will continue to be a shell of what it was until international tourism rebounds. BEA used to have these cool interactive tables on GDP by industry, but they’ve now been discontinued. It really feels like our current administration just does…

How much of that 3% is from foreign tourists versus domestic Americans?

And what types of jobs are those 15 million? High paid high skilled or low pay low skilled?

Because from what I can tell you about EU tourism jobs, most jobs tourism creates over here are low pay, hard labor, unskilled jobs, mostly filled by minimum wage migrant seasonal workers who then send the money back home, meaning the biggest beneficiaries from those jobs are the wealthy land/business owners who exploit cheap mirant labor, and not the local workforce who mostly suffers gentrification as they don't work in low pay tourist jobs and have to deal with increased rents from tourism on top.

Plus, the massive black economy tourism creates where a lot of the money is under the table and avoids the tax man further compounds to the problem. So I doubt much of the US working class will suffer from a tourism stagnation.

@HEmanZ: Did you read anything I said? Who's losing their job when almost all tourism jobs are done by foreign seasonal workers? The locals mostly aren't losing any job because they don't work in tourism due to pay and work conditions.

Are you using the same logic to cry for the western workers making clothes and sneakers who lost their jobs to Asian sweatshops? Do you think they miss that type of jobs and would want them back?

Re: US economy unexpectedly sheds 92k jobs in February

#89

Post by nerdsniper »

dmos62 wrote: post #72
testfrequency wrote: post #4

I do not see the tourism industry mentioned here but I have to imagine that is a huge loss right now. Most of the world is not visiting the US right now which means projects and planning that was made in anticipation for summer has probably been halted or heavily reduced.

An acquaintance had his phone taken away at a US airport by a border guard (or whatever you call them) for inspection. The guard went through his messaging apps, read chats. I understand the necessity for occasional physical searches for contraband or what have you, but reading private conversations is beyond what I can stomach. That, together with the infamous case of some guy being forbidden entry to US because he…

Even a single CBP employee scrolling through your texts feels like too much to me. But when they take your phone, they're making copies of all the content in the phone and as much as possible from any apps/websites you're logged into. And that permanently lives in a database which doesn't afford you even the very thin veil of protection against misuse that a US citizen might be granted.

It does all seem to be too much.

Re: US economy unexpectedly sheds 92k jobs in February

#90

Post by dv_dt »

imzadi wrote: post #7

I would like to know how much contraction is normal. I assume there's always some contraction around that time, because the holiday season is ending and the temp workers are being let go. I didn't see any mention of this in the article though (or I missed it).

These reports apply a seasonal adjustment for the reported numbers. This is the fairly standard economics approach, but if you're interested in the raw - they are usually buried deeper into the report. The BLS or other government stat agencies have historically published their data gathering and reporting methodology in detail.
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