September 6, 2019

Chart of the Day: Net New Jobs in August

The American economy gained 130,000 jobs last month. We need 90,000 new jobs just to keep up with population growth, which means that net job growth clocked in at a very sluggish 40,000 jobs. A lot of people gained employment (590,000) but a lot of people also dropped out of the labor force (364,000). The headline unemployment rate stayed steady at 3.7 percent.

On the wage side of things, the news was very bright. Hourly wages for blue-collar workers increased at an annual rate of over 4 percent after adjusting for inflation. Weekly wages rose about 8 percent after accounting for inflation. These are quite astounding numbers. I hope I didn’t make some kind of dumb arithmetic mistake here.

So this is a mixed report. Job growth was pretty tepid but wage growth was terrific. Go figure.

UPDATE: Actually, wage growth was good but not terrific. More here.

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WE CAME UP SHORT.

We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

So we urgently need this specific ask, what you're reading right now, to start bringing in more donations than it ever has. The reality, for these next few months and next few years, is that we have to start finding ways to grow our online supporter base in a big way—and we're optimistic we can keep making real headway by being real with you about this.

Because the bottom line: Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we hope you might consider pitching in before moving on to whatever it is you're about to do next. We really need to see if we'll be able to raise more with this real estate on a daily basis than we have been, so we're hoping to see a promising start.

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