The U.S. economy shed 92,000 positions last month, pushing the unemployment rate up to 4.4 percent, per Friday's Bureau of Labor Statistics release. The February report painted a picture of a labor market deteriorating much faster than anticipated, catching economists off guard — analysts had forecast a gain of around 60,000 jobs, even as they correctly predicted the 4.4 percent unemployment figure.
Meanwhile, Donald J. Trump has repeatedly insisted that he's heralded us into the "Golden Age," so it was awkward with President Fox News Grandpa's abysmal jobs numbers being read on Fox Business. Host Maria Bartiromo and Cheryl Casone are trying to cope with today's report showing negative numbers for February.
"So we have a negative number for February non-farm payrolls," Casone said. "A loss of 92,000 jobs. You can see the market reacting. We are also seeing the unemployment rate tick up to 4.4 percent."
"A loss of factory jobs of 12,000," she continued. "Government jobs, a loss of 6,000. Private sector jobs, a loss of 86,000."
"Average hourly earnings up 3.8 percent, which is better than expected, but obviously the headline here is what we're seeing within the report," she continued. "We also got a negative read on January retail sales, two-tenths of a percent to the downside, but I do want to say again it is the jobs report."
"We're also seeing here again the U-6, the underemployment rate, that came in at 7.9 percent," she said. "Labor force participation, 62 percent. Again, all of these numbers, to be clear here, are the opposite of the estimates that we got. Let me get into the report to give you exactly where the government says that these massive job losses are actually happening. Sticky report, messy report, and I'm going to be looking for revisions here in a moment."
"Employment and health care decreased, according to the government, reflecting strike activity, which is what Mohammed said to you moments ago, Maria," Casone said. "Employment and information in federal government continue to trend to the downside, according to the federal government. So again, Maria, this report, you know, these numbers are certainly not the expectations whatsoever."
"A loss of 92,000 jobs," she added. "The street again was looking for a gain of 59,000 jobs, and this also flies in the face of the ADP numbers that we got on Wednesday, where we saw actually hiring in the private sector, construction, education, and health care. I think sticky is a very key word here in a very noisy report, Maria."
Bartiromo tried to paint a rosy picture of the apocalyptic jobs report by pointing to "AI efficiencies," and we're not sure what to do with that. Because real people are out of work, trying to make ends meet, while Trump is spending $1 billion per day on the Epstein War in Iran. Democrats wanted affordable health care, but instead, we ended up with Donald KinderFicker at the helm, morphing everything good about this country into a rancid shit sandwich. Enjoy your future canned cat food dinners, MAGA. It only goes down from here. I'm not being dramatic. Gas and food prices are up, health care in this country is an unaffordable hot mess, and there is a housing crisis.
