The U.S. economy created 209,000 jobs last month, according to the most recent Bureau of Labor Statistics jobs report, exceeding expert predictions by nearly 30,000 jobs.
This gives the Trump administration momentum to continue pushing for meaningful reforms that help grow the economy and increase prosperity.
According to the report, the U-3 unemployment rate (unemployed job seekers as a percentage of the civilian labor force) fell by one-tenth of a percent from 4.4 percent back to a low 4.3 percent, while the labor force participation increased from 62.8 percent to 62.9 percent, and the U-6 measure for unemployment (which combines all the factors together) remained unchanged.
These numbers signal that Americans are seeing reasons and motivation to jump back into the labor force to seek employment, and are actually finding jobs.
Breaking down the unemployment numbers further, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported the following unemployment rates for major worker groups: adult men (4 percent), adult women (4 percent), teenagers (13.2 percent), whites (3.8 percent), blacks (7.4 percent), Asians (3.8 percent), and Hispanics (5.1 percent).
The majority of the job gains came from bars and restaurants (plus 53,000 jobs), professional and business services (plus 49,000 jobs), and health care employment (plus 39,000 jobs).
While mining jobs only increased by 1,000 jobs in July, the U.S. is averaging 7,000 new mining jobs per month since President Donald Trump’s election in November 2016.
Wages were essentially unchanged this month, but are up 2.5 percent over the past year.
At the beginning of his presidency, Trump said that he wanted the economy to create 25 million jobs over 10 years. To meet this goal, the U.S. will need to average roughly 208,000 jobs per month.
Since Trump’s inauguration, we have averaged nearly 184,000 new jobs per month, but that is without major substantive reforms like repealing Obamacare or tax cuts. Instead, gains have likely come from reductions in harmful regulations that make it easier to run businesses in the U.S.
For a good example, look no further than the coal industry.
In February, Trump signed executive orders that eased the regulatory burden on coal put in place by the Obama administration. This has not only led to the hiring and rehiring of out-of-work miners, but has also helped place coal back on top of electricity production in the U.S., according to the Energy Information Administration.
Such reforms work, and will continue to work.
We are told that the Trump administration will begin to focus on tax reform later this month. There is no question that if significant tax reform is passed, other jobs reports in the near future will make this one look insignificant.
It happened during the Reagan administration, and it can happen again.