The U.S. economy added 312,000 new nonfarm payroll jobs in December, pleasantly surprising financial markets and most economic observers. Average wage gains also hit 3.2% for the past 12 months, the strongest gain since the end of the Great Recession. And the Bureau of Labor Statistics revised up the October and November job gains by 58,000. Foodservice hired 41,000 new employees in December and added 235,000 last year, down only slightly from 261,000 in 2017. BLS: Dec. Jobs Report; WSJ: December Jobs Report
Be aware that the BLS’s numbers for January will crash, as furloughed federal government workers, 800,000 of them, are “unemployed” until they get their back pay. Government contractors not working, and there are hundreds of thousands of them, too, who are now unemployed. See following article.
Market Trends/Economic Trends, Operator Trends
