Personal Income and Jobless Claims

The day after the GDP report comes out, the government releases the income and spending data for the prior month. This morning, the report said that personal income rose 0.5% in October while personal spending rose by 0.6%. Those are both very good numbers.

Here’s the long-term trend:

One point of concern is that this morning’s jobless claims report rose to 234,000. That’s the highest since March 31, although it ties a report from May 19. Is the labor market in trouble?

A few points to note. One is that this report is coming off very low readings for jobless claims, literally 50-year lows. Secondly, this data series tends to bounce around a lot. That’s why most economists use the four-week moving average. I’d want to see more evidence from the official jobs report before I’d say that the jobs market is cracking.

Posted by on November 29th, 2018 at 12:56 pm


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