Payrolls about in line when including lower revisions and gets boost from birth/death model plug-in

April payrolls grew by 177k, 39k above expectations but the two prior months were revised down by a combined 58k. The household survey said jobs grew by 436k, almost matching the rise in the labor force of 518k. The result was no change in the unemployment rate of 4.2%. The all in rate ticked lower by one tenth to 7.8% vs 7.9% in March, 8% in February and 7.5% in January.

Hours worked ticked up to 34.3 from 34.2 where no change was expected. Wages were up by .2% m/o/m and 3.8% y/o/y, one tenth under the estimate. Combine the two and we saw a gain of .2% m/o/m and 4.1% y/o/y. The participation rate was 62.6% vs 62.5% in the month before. The key 25-54 yr old cohort rebounded by 3 tenths to 83.6% which is the most since last September.

Private education/health continued to drive much of the job growth, adding 70k (in contrast to what ADP said that they declined). Transporation and warehouse added 29k and I have to believe that maybe this was in response to the front loading going on with incoming trade because many of these jobs are going to be lost if trade with China doesn't resume soon. Retail lost 2k jobs.