The official level of unemployment for September in the USA has fallen to 3.7%, a level not seen for 49 years, since the time of the Hippies in 1969. The official unemployed figure, it must be recalled, relates to the number of people registered as unemployed and actively seeking work. Many economists regard an unemployment level of 5% as the functional level for full employment (but their definition of unemployed would be without a job and wanting one, which is different).

The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) has warned about what it refers to as people “at the fringes” of the employment market – a significant population in the US economy, according to OECD. A proportion of these uncounted unemployed (or not regularly employed) people are suggested to be victims of the “opioid crisis”, those addicted to or abusing prescription drugs.

The news is not completely positive since the job creation rate for September came in below expectations at 134000 and hourly earnings increased at 2.8% in September, down marginally on the August figure of 2.9%. Usually, if the employment market is strong, wages would expect to rise as employers try to attract workers. However, revision of the July and August job creation figures were revised upwards by 87000 jobs.

Jobs were created particularly in the professional and business service sector; in healthcare and construction. However, September saw a negative impact due to the hurricane/tropical storm Florence which was blamed for the loss of 18000 jobs in the leisure and hospitality sectors. Obviously, jobs will have been created in the construction and infrastructure/repair sectors as damaged communities struggle to rebuild after the storm. As yet, US job creation data has not shown any clear effects from the protectionist measures implemented by the Trump administration on exports from nations that the US regards as taking unfair advantage of sectors of the US economy.