It's that business journalist's favorite day
of the month when the jobs report comes out
in the morning and we get to see what's happening
in the labor market.
And I'll let you tell us a little bit
about today's report.
What did we find out?
Well, again the economy continues to move
in the right direction -- 156,000 jobs.
I think the best news in this report is the
wage growth, Marilyn.
In 2016 we saw the best wage growth in this
recovery.
And I tend to put reports like this, given
it's my last month, in perspective.
You know, eight years ago this economy was
hemorrhaging jobs.
800,000 jobs a month lost roughly eight years
ago.
And now we've had 75 months in a row of job growth.
That's the longest streak on record.
The second longest streak was 48 months.
So we've passed that streak.
The unemployment rate when the president took
office was heading towards 10 percent.
Now we're at 4.7 percent.
This has been a global recession, as you well
know, and your listeners know.
And we've gained more jobs in the United States
than all of the G-7 economies combined.
And so I hear these dooms-dayers talk about
"that job-killing Affordable Care Act."
Well, the unemployment rate was 9.9 percent
when the president signed the Affordable Care
Act and now it's 4.7 percent.
The Affordable Care Act has been anything
but a job-killer -- it's been a lifesaver.
There are about five and a half million job
openings right now but we have seven and a
half million people without work.
So, how do you describe that?
Why do we have so many job openings and yet
still all these people who are not working,
and the labor force participation rate is
pretty low.
So there is some kind of a giant mismtach
where there's jobs, wages are rising, and
yet we don't have the seven and a half million
people moving into those jobs.
What's the key problem?
I actually think it's important to put it
in a broader perspective.
We have an economy -- we've got 140 million
people or thereabouts who are in the workforce
in any given month.
So you're always going have that churn.
You have people coming in and out of the workforce.
And one sign of a vibrant workforce is the
number of openings.
In the depths of the Great Recession we had
2 million openings a month.
Now over the last year or so the range has
been 5.5 to 5.9 thereabouts.
That's a good sign.
In the depths of the recession the number
of people who voluntarily quit their job slowed
to a trickle because they didn't have faith
that they could get a better job.
Now you've seen that number go up precipitously
because, as you correctly point out, Marilyn,
the labor market is indeed tightening and
so people have confidence they can leave that
job for a better job.
And so, when you look at all of the various metrics
-- the first-time claims for unemployment -- again
when this president took office we were talking
about 600,000 roughly per week.
Now first-time claims for unemployment that
we reported just over the course of the last
day or so, I think, was 235,000.
And we have the longest streak of first-time
claims under 300,000 since 1970.
So when you look at the broad picture of the
economy, we were in a deep ditch and we've
come a long way, and I absolutely agree with
what you said. We still have work to do.
We gotta make sure that the wind at our back
creates shared prosperity for everyone because
there's still too many people who aren't feeling
it.
So I'm sure that each of us could go back
to our hometowns and find a heck of a lot
of people who would feel pretty bad about
the economy even though in the aggregate --
really, these are great numbers.
But there's still all these mismatches between
job openings and the people getting into them.
What is it?
Is it mostly a skills gap?
Is it a relocation problem?
Is it a communication problem that people
don't hear and know about what opportunities
are there?
What do you see is the single biggest impediment
to getting those people that we know into
the jobs we know exist?
Well I think a number of things we need to
do: I'm a big believer that when you upskill
someone you give them a better chance to succeed.
The education dividend is undeniable.
In Buffalo and Youngstown, when you were growing
up and I was growing up, a 10th-grade education
could punch your ticket to the middle class
at Bethlehem Steel or Republic Steel.
And those jobs -- many of them dried up, as
you know.
And so that steel worker I met in Ohio, who
was on the line for literally 28 years, what
we did with him -- and I remember vividly
-- was we used our tools of training and we
helped that person upskill.
So now he's working in advanced manufacturing.
And that's what we do at scale at the Department
of Labor, and that's been a main component
of the president's job-creation strategy -- is
upskilling people because the more skills
you have, the better your chances are of punching
your ticket to the middle class.
And that's why we invest in apprenticeship.
Apprenticeship is the other college -- except
without the debt.
And there's so many people -- some of whom
have more than a high school degree and some
of whom don't -- but the apprenticeship model
can work for everybody.
And I meet so many people for whom life has
already intervened.
You can't ask them to take two years off to
upskill because they got kids.
They're taking care of mom or dad or grandma
and that's why the apprenticeship model -- it's
not only a model we're using in the skilled
trades.
It's a model were using in IT, in cybersecurity,
in healthcare -- these are growth industries
-- in places like Youngstown and Buffalo and everywhere else.
We've seen the largest investment in renewing
and restoring apprenticeship under this president
than we've seen in generations.
We were discussing how much things have changed.
I started out in newspapers and I think when
I went into newspapers I just assumed they'd
been around for, you know, a hundred and fifty
years or something, that they would be there throughout
my career.
And having to learn all the different skills,
constantly changing, constantly updating -- it's
frustrating and annoying, but it does keep
me employed.
So you know you've gotta continue educating
yourself and I hope that that's something
you feel like you've accomplished.
Absolutely.
My father and mother always taught me that
the one constant in life is change.
And the challenge and tragedy of my upbringing
in Buffalo was that many folks in my parents'
generation, when manufacturing went south
literally and figuratively, they didn't get
the opportunity to transition to the next
phase of the economy and that's what this
president has focused on -- making sure that
not only do workers have the skills to compete
in today's market, but they have the core
competencies to thrive tomorrow.
And that's what it's all about -- that's what
upskilling is about.
Innovation and change is always gonna be America
and we've gotta equip workers with those tools
to ride that wave not get overtaken by that
wave.
Alright well thank you so much -- really appreciate
you joining us.
And thank you.
Ad he's basically been with President Obama
for the entire second term as the labor secretary,
so really appreciate you coming to see us
today.
Marilyn, it's been a pleasure to be with you.
