Each year, the institutional series undergoes benchmark revisions.This Preliminary estimates March was released yesterday. Short story – job growth looks faster and stronger – an increase of 462K relative to the original 150,856K (up 0.3%).
figure 1: Reported nonfarm payrolls (bold black), Bloomberg August consensus (pink triangle), March CES preliminary benchmark revisions (red squares), implied revisions (turquoise), sa in 000, log scale). Source: BLS via FRED, BLSBloomberg, author of calculations.
The benchmarking process is described here postal. The previous year (April 2021 to March 2022) will “wedge” the divergence to match in March 2022.
Private nonfarm payrolls were revised up 0.4%, while transportation and warehousing (+2.3%) and information (+2.2%) were revised down sharply, while mining and logging (-3.6%) and retail sales (-2.1%) were revised down.
How does the converged NFP series change the picture?
figure 2: Reported nonfarm payrolls (bold black), Bloomberg August consensus (pink triangle), implied revisions (turquoise), adjusted for NFP-concept civilian employment (yellow), in 000s sa, log scale ). Source: BLS via FRED, BLSBloomberg, author of calculations.
The benchmark revision further supports the view that the labor market has not slowed in the first half of the year and further weakens the thesis for a recession – defined as broadEconomic activity continued to decline – in the first half of the year.
