Excellent Employment

August’s employment growth of 201,000 was strong, and employment growth over the last three months of 185,000/month is slightly above the CY2017 pace of 182,000. Better yet, wage growth rose 2.9% Y-o-Y, its fastest pace since mid-2009, and the broadest measure of unemployment hit 7.4%, its lowest level since 4/2001. The only downer, the labor force participation rate declined to 62.7%, suggesting powerful demographic trends are preventing it from improving.