Thread by @DanielAlpert

On @NPR @MorningEdition this morning with @NPRinskeep chatting about unemployment and my @nytopinion essay from yesterday...
npr.org/2021/06/03/100…

...and here is a link to the @nytimes piece:
Americans Don’t Want to Return to Low Wage Jobs nyti.ms/2S1Jzbx

Continuing on the U.S. Employment front this morning, we just had a really good number out of #ADP of 978,000 jobs added in May. We'll see tomorrow if that squares with the #BLS numbers and offers a "catch-up" from the disappointing April data. But now, Unemployment Claims...

....For the week ended May 29th, Initial Claims for Unemployment Insurance Benefits fell - very nicely - to 385,000. The lowest level, by far, since the pandemic. And edging back slowly into its normal range of just above 200K...
But the claims themselves are no longer the story>

Continuing claimants remain at 15.4 million workers. And the complexion of those claimants is changing. Conventional (28 week) state and federal benefit recipients are down to 3.5 million. The number on extended (13 week) federal benefits actually rose to 5.3 million week/week>>>

And we still have 6.4 million formerly self-employed workers receiving federally-paid unemployment benefits.
Together, this is nearly $10 billion/week that the federal government is pumping into the economy, likely all of which is being spent by recipients (its ~$750/week total).

So here's the (annualized) $520 billion question: Will there be sufficient jobs to employ (or offer self-employment gigs) to ~13 million workers between now and September 6th when all federal supplements cease? Hard to imagine so, as I covered here:
nytimes.com/2021/06/01/opi…

So keep an eye on those continuing claims numbers as we head closer to the federal unemployment benefits cliff. We are likely to have a terrific summer of reopening fun - but the fall may bring negative surprises when it comes to household consumption.