Interesting, this article doesn't seem to mention the layoffs from the tech industry. Which, if you look at the numbers, sort of make up the bulk of it.
No, this is wrong. If you read the report, the bulk of the job contraction was in industries entirely divorced from the tech sector. I don’t understand why you would make this comment without even reading the article, let alone the report itself.
> In yet another troubling sign for the labor market, the Bureau of Labor Statistics said that it revised down the prior two months by a combined 103,000. May’s jobs total was cut by 66,000 to 129,000 total jobs added, while June’s total was lowered by 37,000 to a total gain of 57,000.
Not strange. All the money and wealth is in the hands of the olds and olds need much more health care than the young. So it's a gold rush to get their juicy dollars.
Based on their July 2026 report, there were tiny increases in several sectors. The big declines were in service providing, leisure and hospitality, and government (bc of a summer decline in local gov education).
there's a massive wave of elderly coming (boomer generation) so it makes sense health care is going to becoming an even bigger economic force than it already is.
The market is going up because the market (AI) thinks it means there will be a rate cut. Which is good for stocks.
But I have to inform you all that we are in a period of stagflation and there is no way out but pain for someone. Either the asset holders or the regular people who need to buy things.
These jobs lost/gained and unemployment statistics, especially on a monthly basis, and when the numbers are so small, are just noise. Seasonal adjustments alone (baseline assumptions on how many people should be employed) make them meaningless, as does the government definition of being unemployed or looking for work.
As far as the government is concerned if you have been looking for a job for so long and/or are so discouraged that you stop looking, then you are no longer "unemployed" since you are not looking for a job.
If you are software engineer who has not been able find a software job, and are now flipping burgers to at least have some income, then you have also dropped off the government stats since you now have a job.
And then you have the current president's habit of just lying about everything, and threatening anyone who doesn't support his lies, and it seems we have truly entered a post-truth world where "alternate facts" rule the day.
When you read headlines of companies laying off thousands of employees, that's real. When the government says they've retroactively adjusted their seasonally adjusted fake news, then not so much.
Indeed. Something to note is the labor force participation rate keeps dropping. We’re down to 61.4%. It was 61.5% in June 2026, 62.3% in June 2025.
We also have 4.8 million that are part-time employed, but want full-time work. That’s up from 4.7 million last month, and up from 4.5 million in June 2025, and up further from 4.2 million in June 2024.
There’s also 6.0 million that want a job, but aren’t employed. This is the same as June 2025, but up by 800,000 since June 2024.
So if you take the U-3 number (what’s reported) then factor in the other two figures, you really have 10.5% that are unemployed, discouraged, or underemployed.
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The other question never answered is, “How many jobs are needed to create equilibrium?”, or where the employment rate remains stable. That’s NEVER talked about by media or the BLS, but it’s actually not difficult to get an approximate answer.
You’d want to look at population growth rates for 18-22 years ago (as those people would now be entering the workforce), multiply that by the labor force participation rate, and then divide as appropriate for the period. Typically, the US economy would need 140,000 - 145,000 new seasonally-adjusted jobs created every month to maintain a steady employment rate, given its historic and current population growth rates.
> The BLS said employment contracted the most in “local government education,” which declined by 50,000 roles, likely reflecting teachers during summer break
Are most teachers considered and counted as unemployed during summner break? All the teachers I know are paid 12 months a year. 10-month appointments are seen in colleges and universities but even there professors often have grants that pay for their research in the summer and even if not I don't think I'd consider them "unemployed" in the summer.
The 2026 midterm election date is November 3rd, the jobs numbers are released on the first Friday of the month, November 6th. Intentionally trending numbers down in August, with only two more jobs reports before the election, would be risky (and stupid, and extremely unlikely). The Trump Administration just doesn't look ahead like that either, they live in the perpetual now.
if the government was able to lie on the jobs report, why wouldn't they just continuously pretend that jobs are up from now all the way through the election? (all the way through to the presidential election, for that matter)
Meanwhile, Canada adds 75k jobs in the same month.
> Gains were focused on the private sector, with strength in wholesale and retail trade, finance and insurance, and professional and scientific services. Public sector jobs fell by 14,500 amid an official bid to cut government spending.
As a data scientist it is very frustrating to see a consistent lack of error bars on these numbers or any discussion about the magnitude of uncertainty around them by all news reports every time these numbers get released
53 comments
[ 0.22 ms ] story [ 36.5 ms ] thread> In yet another troubling sign for the labor market, the Bureau of Labor Statistics said that it revised down the prior two months by a combined 103,000. May’s jobs total was cut by 66,000 to 129,000 total jobs added, while June’s total was lowered by 37,000 to a total gain of 57,000.
Lateral Thinkers: quietly sipping tea, nursing our wounds from layoffs, lamenting another unheard Cassandra moment.
Basically sums up the mood, I find. Don’t worry, we’re always steeping a fresh pot for the new club members when stories like these hit the wire.
https://www.cbc.ca/lite/story/9.7299225
I'm not actually suggesting there's a good reason for market swings, just that bad news shouldn't necessarily cause the market to go down.
But I have to inform you all that we are in a period of stagflation and there is no way out but pain for someone. Either the asset holders or the regular people who need to buy things.
As far as the government is concerned if you have been looking for a job for so long and/or are so discouraged that you stop looking, then you are no longer "unemployed" since you are not looking for a job.
If you are software engineer who has not been able find a software job, and are now flipping burgers to at least have some income, then you have also dropped off the government stats since you now have a job.
And then you have the current president's habit of just lying about everything, and threatening anyone who doesn't support his lies, and it seems we have truly entered a post-truth world where "alternate facts" rule the day.
When you read headlines of companies laying off thousands of employees, that's real. When the government says they've retroactively adjusted their seasonally adjusted fake news, then not so much.
We also have 4.8 million that are part-time employed, but want full-time work. That’s up from 4.7 million last month, and up from 4.5 million in June 2025, and up further from 4.2 million in June 2024.
There’s also 6.0 million that want a job, but aren’t employed. This is the same as June 2025, but up by 800,000 since June 2024.
So if you take the U-3 number (what’s reported) then factor in the other two figures, you really have 10.5% that are unemployed, discouraged, or underemployed.
—
The other question never answered is, “How many jobs are needed to create equilibrium?”, or where the employment rate remains stable. That’s NEVER talked about by media or the BLS, but it’s actually not difficult to get an approximate answer.
You’d want to look at population growth rates for 18-22 years ago (as those people would now be entering the workforce), multiply that by the labor force participation rate, and then divide as appropriate for the period. Typically, the US economy would need 140,000 - 145,000 new seasonally-adjusted jobs created every month to maintain a steady employment rate, given its historic and current population growth rates.
Are most teachers considered and counted as unemployed during summner break? All the teachers I know are paid 12 months a year. 10-month appointments are seen in colleges and universities but even there professors often have grants that pay for their research in the summer and even if not I don't think I'd consider them "unemployed" in the summer.
it's all about optics for mid term.
> Gains were focused on the private sector, with strength in wholesale and retail trade, finance and insurance, and professional and scientific services. Public sector jobs fell by 14,500 amid an official bid to cut government spending.
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/business/economy/article-can...