The unemployment rate held steady at 6.9% in July, beating estimates for an increase to 7%…

… despite a big miss on the change in employment, with 51K full-time jobs lost…

… across a number of industries led by information, construction, management services, and health care.

The reason this employment miss didn’t ding the unemployment rate was a drop in workforce participation to 65.2%. Down only slightly Y/Y, the decrease isn’t ringing any alarm bells…

… but it’s likely a symptom of the highest structural unemployment we’ve seen since 1998 (excluding the pandemic), with nearly a quarter of unemployed people having been so for more than 27 weeks.

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