re: U.S. economy added 353,000 jobs in January

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You're lying again

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Used cars, particularly sedans, are MORE than double what the were 10 years ago.

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BLS themselves told us last month that data from Jan '24 and later months are NOT directly comparable to prior months b/c of methodology changes

the number of people missing from the labor force remains stubbornly high, artificially reducing the unemployment rate

Depending on which methodology you prefer, you can calculate a more realistic unemployment rate that accounts for all of these missing workers: somewhere btwn 6.3% and 7.4% - that's not horrific, but significantly higher than "official" 3.7%

part-time has trended upward fairly consistently while full-time has leveled off; economy has lost ~1.6 million full-time jobs since Jun '23 and replaced them w/ ~1.6 million part-time jobs, which helps explain the next red flag.

Weekly hours are plummeting, now down to lowest level since covid lockdowns; aside from abnormalities of '20, it's at the lowest level since the Great Recession w/ housing meltdown and global financial crisis; firms are cutting hours and replacing full-time jobs w/ part-time:

As people work fewer hours, their paychecks buy less, even w/ hourly raises, b/c prices are still rising faster than weekly earnings; significantly higher hourly wages still leave workers behind - about 4.3% behind Jan '21

Interesting to note who has the jobs: they've all gone to foreign-born workers; not only are native-born workers way below their pre-pandemic trend, but they're even below the pre-pandemic level (Jan '24 vs. Jan '20):

TLDR: economy is still adding jobs, but they're overwhelmingly lower pay, fewer hours, and either directly or indirectly paid by gov't; also, Fed will need to look for a different excuse to cut rates and end QT - another banking crisis would fit the bill perfectly

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