In a Manufacturing Recession Ending?

Initial Jobless Claims (week ended 3/12/2016)

 
– Initial  Claims seasonally adjusted  265,000. Previous was 258,000
– Initial  Claims unadjusted were  237,168  a decrease of 10,462 from previous
– 4-week Moving Average seasonally adjusted   268,000. Previous was 267,250

The past several years have seen good but not great increases in jobs but the quality of the new jobs is poor. This helps explain what GDP growth has been so low.  Minimum wage jobs do not afford much discretionary spending.

 
Philadelphia Federal Business Outlook Survey (March 2016)

 

– General Business Conditions Index  12.4. Previous was -2.8.

This is good news for the manufacturing sector especially after yesterday’s Industrial production.  Before we stop worrying about the manufacturing sector it would be good to see another few months of positive data.

 

JOLTS (January 2016)

– Job Openings 5,541,000. Previous was 5,281,000.

It is difficult to draw inferences because the previous month was revised down by more than 300,000.

 
Leading Indicators (February 2016)

– Leading Indicators month/month +0.1%. Previous was -0.2%.

This is a composite of ten economic indicators.  Lately this has been less useful than in the past because this index heavily weighs money supply and Fed monetary policy has been ineffective.