Celebrating Labor Day with a strong jobs report, growing support for labor unions across the US, and more
Happy Labor Day!
Happy Labor Day! I hope you all are doing well, staying safe, and enjoying a long weekend. This will be another rather brief article, but I wanted to follow up last month’s good news with more reasons to remain optimistic. One of those reasons is that the U.S. labor force continues to grow.
Strong Job Growth Throughout August 2022
The Bureau of Labor Statistics put out another Jobs Report this past Friday which reflected strong job growth once again. While not quite as strong as July’s growth, the preliminary estimate for August puts net job growth at over 300,000 jobs, as you can see in the graph below.
The average rate of growth is also decelerating a bit, but this growth is now making up for jobs that likely would have been added had the pandemic not disrupted the economy. Recall from last month how employment levels now exceed the pre-pandemic peak level we reached in February 2020.
The headline unemployment rate did technically tick upwards to 3.7% despite this growth, but much of that appears to be attributable to more people entering the labor force who had previously not been seeking work. The graph below, in particular, shows how people between 25 and 54 years of age—or “prime age” workers—are once again approaching pre-pandemic levels of employment. More than 80% of people in this age group are employed.
In addition to most American job seekers being able to find one, a growing number of Americans view labor unions favorably.
71% of Americans View Labor Unions Favorably
Last year, I shared several labor union stories with readers, including how polls show Americans increasingly view labor unions favorably. I am pleased to report that after last year’s Gallup poll showing 68% of Americans approve of labor unions, this year that number grew to 71%.
I encourage you to go back through some of last year’s Labor Day stories I shared if you are interested in learning more about the U.S. labor movement’s history.
President Biden’s Poll Numbers Are Rebounding
In addition to unions showing higher polling numbers, President Joe Biden is making a comeback with his favorability ratings as well. Rather than continuing to scold voters for asking him to do his job, Biden and the Democratic majority in Congress delivered meaningful—if not ideal—progress throughout August, and the polls reflect this change.
The FiveThirtyEight poll tracker below shows how Biden reached a low point in his presidency in July and has since rebounded to approximately 42% approval ratings. While this is still far below the ratings he was getting while leading the charge on the American Rescue Plan, and still talking about passing the PRO Act, I’m relieved to see Biden learning from at least some of his mistakes.
But before I wrap up this Labor Day article, I want to mention another important and overwhelmingly popular program I’ve been learning more about lately: Social Security.
Social Security Celebrated its 87th Anniversary
Last month, Social Security celebrated its 87th anniversary, and it remains one of the most popular programs in the United States. However, many retired Americans are struggling to make ends meet, especially those who rely on Social Security as their sole source of retirement income. Some Democratic politicians, like Senator Bernie Sanders, are proposing to expand Social Security benefits to address the problem.
Regular readers of this newsletter might remember that I recently got a book on retirement programs. I can now happily report that I finished reading it this weekend, and I learned quite a lot from James W. Russell’s book: The Labor Guide to Retirement Plans. Sanders’ solution is certainly one way we could approach expanding benefits, and Russell mentioned other approaches as well, but this writer generally supports any efforts to bolster Social Security.
Perhaps we can discuss some of the details of how different approaches to expanding Social Security will play out in a future article, but in the meantime, I hope you have a great Labor Day!
Thank you for reading my newsletter and taking the effort to learn about making the world a better place. I look forward to hearing your thoughts on how we can make progress towards a more just economy.
-JJ
Another great article!