On Friday the government presented another anemic job report for the month of May. The total number of people added to the job rolls was 69,000 but the expectation was for 150,000 jobs to be added. Additionally, April’s numbers were revised downward from the original 115,000 jobs to 77,000 jobs and May’s unemployment rate ticked back up to 8.2%. This was obviously not good news and the global equity markets (with some added problems from China) sold off fast and hard. Our take is that job growth will continue to be slow for the foreseeable future with so much uncertainty plaguing the business environment. Those uncertainties include healthcare reform, Dodd Frank regulatory changes, the tax situation that will happen at the end of this year, our enormous debt problem or the upcoming election. With no clear path to solving these issues, we believe employers will continue to be very cautious in adding employees in the future.
