00:00So we have the ADP saying that jobs fell an average of 11,250 on a weekly basis in the four weeks up to October 25, John.
00:10Now, on a headline basis, taking that at face value, it suggests that it certainly leans against the labour market stabilisation idea.
00:17It probably does capture some of those headlines we've been seeing on big high-profile companies making job cuts across the country.
00:24There are some caveats with this data set. Number one, it's new, so old economists are getting used to it and working out what trends they can extrapolate from it.
00:33And then secondly, of course, some have cautioning that maybe the government shutdown, the federal workers' layoffs might be complicating this figure,
00:42and you might see a rebound as we go forward in the weeks and months ahead.
00:45But right here, right now, this ADP figure suggesting that the weak labour market story remains intact.
00:50And how does that stack up with the other data points that we've had outside of the official data over the past few weeks?
00:57Well, we're getting mixed data points. We did have an interesting read on small business this morning, John,
01:01seeing a dip in their confidence, which is quite interesting, talking about declining sales and demand there.
01:07And, of course, small business are the biggest employers in the country, so that's one to keep an eye on.
01:11As you know, we're kind of flying a little bit blind on the jobs market side of things,
01:15plucking what we can from state level and plucking what we can from private sector.
01:18We have had one official read on the CPI since the government went into shutdown,
01:22and that suggested the inflation story was perhaps, at least it wasn't worsening.
01:27It's certainly well above the Fed's target, but maybe not worsening,
01:30all of which suggests that the Fed are in a position to, it's a wide-open decision as to what to do in December,
01:35whether they could or not. It all comes down to how do you wait, inflation versus jobs.
01:39And from here in the weeks ahead up to that meeting, a lot will depend on what official data do we get,
01:45what time period will it cover, and, of course, then there will be a debate over the quality of that data.
01:51So I'd say, John, it's all about what numbers we get in the weeks ahead in terms of getting a good handle
01:55on where the economy is actually at right now.
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