Labor Dept Overestimated Job Growth By More Than 800K, Revises Data

Government figures for job growth over the past year have been significantly revised after being overestimated by more than 800,000 jobs.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Wednesday that job growth throughout the 12 months ending in March would be revised downward by 818,000 jobs, a hefty drop that is roughly equivalent to 0.5% of total jobs, according to The Washington Examiner. A downward revision of more than 501,000 would be the largest in 15 years.

The drop knocks the average monthly job growth over those 12 months down from about 242,000 jobs to about 174,000. The revisions are preliminary and part of an annual review process that reconciles and revises monthly data with more reliable but slower-coming records from state governments, according to The New York Times.

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Daily Wire host Ben Shapiro said in a post on X that the revision is “amazing for two reasons.”

First, “[t]hey’ve been lying for a year about Biden job creation,” Shapiro said. Secondly, “[t]hey’re dumping this data just in time to justify a Federal Reserve interest rate decrease for the election.”

This is amazing for two reasons.
1. They’ve been lying for a year about Biden job creation.
2. They’re dumping this data just in time to justify a Federal Reserve interest rate decrease for the election. https://t.co/p5D8aqT7EW

— Ben Shapiro (@benshapiro) August 21, 2024

The revised figures will be incorporated into official government data next year after the revisions are finalized.

The revision would bring jobs numbers into line with other economic indicators that have suggested that the strong jobs reports over the past year were at the very least an outlier, if not giving a false impression of the health of the economy, according to the Times.

Michelle Bowman, a member of the Federal Reserve’s Board of Governors, said in a speech on Tuesday that there are “risks that the labor market has not been as strong as the payroll data have been indicating.”

The reduction in the jobs numbers may be cited by Federal Reserve officials next month if they decide to lower interest rates. A lowered interest rate could become a campaign talking point for Vice President Kamala Harris as she tries to find an economic message that can connect with Americans who are concerned about the health of the economy by a wide majority.

“A large negative revision would indicate that the strength of hiring was already fading before this past April,” Wells Fargo economists Sarah House and Aubrey Woessner wrote last week, according to the New York Post. A large revision would make “risks to the full employment side of the Fed’s dual mandate more salient amid widespread softening in other labor market data.”