Real-time tax data indicates that employment growth remains quite strong. We estimate based on real-time income tax withholdings that the U.S. economy added 248,000 jobs in April, down slightly from 288,000 jobs in March. The employment growth in the past two months was the strongest since April 2015.
Our estimate is not an attempt to predict the initial estimate that the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) will report on Friday, May 5. The BLS data is subject to so many seasonal adjustments and so much statistical manipulation that we have no way to know what the BLS will report.
Job growth has been much better early this year than it was in the same period last year. We estimate that employment growth averaged 224,000 jobs per month in the first four months of this year, up 56% from an average of 144,000 jobs per month in 2016.
Source: TrimTabs Investment Research and Bureau of Labor Statistics.
TrimTabs Investment Research is part of the Financial Intelligence division of Informa