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March employment up 180,000; unemployment down to 4.4 percent; January and February jobs revised up 16,000 each. Even construction jobs increased by 56,000 in March.
I thought for a while this morning I was watching ESPN rather than CNBC. An on-screen clock counted down to announcement time for the March employment report. An e-mailer notified the CNBC crew that he was waiting for the report naked. I wondered what he was up to, being reminded of the late, great Lewis Grizzard's distinction between nude and naked: nude means you have no clothes on; naked means you have no clothes on and are up to something. Luckily my household no longer has kiddos running around or I would have to install a V-Chip to filter the employment reports.
A net increase of 180,000 payroll jobs in March plus a net increase of 32,000 to the previous two months' estimates was good news indeed. The even larger 335,000 increase in net employment in the household survey wasn't even mentioned on-air, even though that was the number that pushed the unemployment rate down from 4.5 percent to 4.4 percent. Too bad the stock market was closed for Good Friday and will have a cooling off period before reacting to the good news. Monday's verdict may well be negative if investors continue to prefer an economy weak enough to require a Fed easing. Well, investors had better get over it; it ain't going to happen.
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