U.S. Jobs Data Beats Expectations For Second Straight Month

Added: 2026-05-13

[00:00:00]So, what does this April jobs report signal about the overall health of the US economy?

[00:00:06]>> Well, it's more or less steady as you go, but what what does steady as you go actually mean? And I think the best way to do it is not get too excited about these monthly numbers that come out, this kind ofbody's gotten into this rut of watching data day by day, month by month, week by week, and so forth. If you look at what's happened in the last year, the job market has really been a disaster.

[00:00:36]We had in 2024, Sean, the increase of jobs, about 2.2 million. 2025, that was last year, we only added 181,000 jobs. It was a a very poor year.

[00:00:55]So, we're in in kind of a poor rut. and manufacturing.

[00:00:59]Even worse, remember the tariffs were supposed to bring back manufacturing to the United States. We actually lost 108,000 manufacturing jobs last year in 2025 in the United States. So, putting the whole package together, I I would characterize it as it might be steady as you go, but steady as you go is pretty weak, actually.

[00:01:25]>> Yeah. So let's uh take a look at these numbers and also kind of compare and contrast that to how the information we have out there that shows how workers are actually feeling.

[00:01:38]>> Well, the the workers we you indicated in the report earlier that uh consumer sentiment and that's workers consumers are workers is is reached an all-time low. The Michigan report on consumer sentiment would tanked completely and the reason for that is that people are looking ahead and and all they can see is the fallout coming from both the war in in Iran as well as the tariffs and and those that's really a knock on one two knockout punch. So they they know that these are bad policies and and they ultimately will hurt the economy. That's everybody learns this in principles of economics and they're just waiting for the train wreck to happen.

[00:02:30]>> I guess that's that's my next question.

[00:02:32]When does this come home to roost?

[00:02:34]Because if you look at wage growth uh playing out in the broader economy, it simply is not keeping up with the cost of rising uh living cost. fill up your tank, go to the grocery store, and you know know exactly what I'm talking about.

[00:02:48]>> I I think we we'll see it this summer.

[00:02:51]And and we'll see it because I think the war in Iran has has sparked what I've been anticipating and that's what's called a commodity super cycle where all commodity prices rise dramatically, including oil. you you had the Brent oil and the WTI prices on earlier. Uh those I think will be going up over the summer and the reason for that is that we've lost about 15 million barrels a day of oil going through the straight and and to balance the market of course the price has gone up by about 60 to 70%.

[00:03:32]But the demand for oil is very insensitive to price changes, Sean.

[00:03:39]Yeah. And and as a result, there's only been the demand destruction of of roughly about 3 million barrels a day.

[00:03:47]So if you subtract the 3 million from the 15 million, you you end up with 12 million barrels. Now, where is that coming from? It's coming from those storage tanks that you're showing right now. Those inventories and stocks of fuel are going down, down, down, down, right?

[00:04:06]>> And and they're almost at the bottom in Asia. And by the end of July, they'll hit bottom in the United States. And as they hit bottom, the only thing you can do is you're facing then a shortage of oil and things will start shutting down and prices will go up. Let's let's talk more about these global events and how they're these higher glo uh oil prices are beginning to affect hiring as well as job stability. What is that going to do in the in the months ahead? Let's expand on that just a bit.

[00:04:39]>> Well, first of all, the the hiring is actually slowed down. So, that's that's kind of anticipating the problem. And and of course the the the market is the labor market's a little bit in in limbo in a way because a lot of people aren't getting fired because that that's the last thing you want to do, right? Is fire a worker a work a worker you've trained and and is on the job and is loyal and so forth.

[00:05:09]You don't want to let them go. So the last thing you you let go in the crunch is labor. So that comes at the end of the line so to speak. So if if things deteriorate, as I think they will deteriorate as the fallout from the war becomes more apparent in the US economy, then you'll start seeing more workers laid off, but they'll they'll be the last to go. By the way, you you never want to let a good worker go.

[00:05:41]>> Indeed. Steve Hanky, always a pleasure.

[00:05:42]Thanks for your insight. We appreciate it.

[00:05:45]Thank