Even allowing for the strikes by 31,000 Kaiser Permanente health care workers in California and Hawaii and 15,000 nurses in NYC, the 92,000 decline in payroll employment in February, combined with the 69,000 downward revision to the preceding two months, suggests the labour market remains fragile. With core PCE inflation rising back above 3% to start the year, oil prices surging and the unemployment rate only edging up to a still-muted 4.4% in February, we don’t expect a near-term rate cut from the Fed.
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