Julie Su, nominee to function Secretary of Labor, arrives for her affirmation listening to within the Senate Well being Schooling Labor & Pensions Committee on Thursday, April 20, 2023.
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WASHINGTON — The U.S. economic system noticed the smallest jobs enhance in July since December 2020, however Performing Labor Secretary Julie Su stated the quantity displays what consultants more and more consider see as a :mushy touchdown” for the U.S. economic system.
Nonfarm payrolls elevated by 187,000 final month, barely under expectations, and the unemployment charge fell barely to three.5%.
“That is an instance of what gradual and regular development appears to be like like,” Su informed CNBC’s “Squawk on the Avenue” on Friday.
“That is nonetheless lower than 4% for the longest stretch because the Nineteen Sixties,” Su stated of the unemployment charge, which has remained low for the previous 18 months.
She additionally touted the “very excessive labor drive participation charge, particularly amongst prime-age employees aged 25 to 54.”
The share of girls within the labor drive rose to 49.9% in July, a charge seen solely twice earlier than in public knowledge: Dec. 2019, simply earlier than the pandemic, and 2009, when it rose on account of the excessive variety of males who misplaced jobs within the Nice Recession.
Regardless of the encouraging numbers, Su stated the federal government can nonetheless do a greater job of supporting a easy transition for ladies again to work within the post-Covid economic system.
“I feel that what it’ll take to additional enhance labor drive participation goes to be addressing among the structural points that maintain employees out of the labor market,” stated Su. Securing childcare that’s reasonably priced and dependable shall be essential, she added.
