WONDERFUL WORK

April net job growth was a strong 115,000, February/March were revised down just 16,000, and the workweek rose to 34.3, awesome. While the unemployment rate held at 4.3%, it was courtesy of the declining labor force participation rate, now 61.8%. Wage growth is utterly anemic at 0.16% M-o-M and 2.8% annualized over Feb/March/April despite rapidly rising costs from the Iran War. Absent meaningful wage growth sustained inflation isn’t possible.