Here is a shocker… TrimTabs is warning of a bad number that is coming ….
TrimTabs Estimates U.S. Lost 472,000 Jobs in June, 24% More Than 380,000 in May
Wages & Salaries Dropped 5.8% Y-o-Y in June, Steeper Than May‘s 4.8% Y-o-Y Decline
Sausalito, CA July 1, 2009 TrimTabs Investment Research estimates that 472,000 jobs were lost in June, 24% more than the 380,000 jobs shed in May. TrimTabs also reports that wages and salaries are dropping much more rapidly than the Bureau of Economic Analysis is indicating.
“June‘s job losses are likely to push the unemployment rate uncomfortably close to 10%,” said Charles Biderman, Chief Executive Officer of TrimTabs. “Job losses slowed temporarily in May as consumers benefited from income tax refunds, President Obama‘s tax credit, low interest rates, and low energy costs. With the exception of the tax credit, all of those factors have disappeared or reversed.”
TrimTabs‘ employment estimates are based on analysis of daily income tax deposits to the U.S. Treasury from all salaried U.S. employees. Historically, TrimTabs‘ employment estimates have been more accurate than those of the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
As job losses are worsening, declines in wages and salaries are accelerating. According to TrimTabs‘ tax data, wages and salaries fell 5.8% year-over-year in June, even steeper than the decline of 4.8% year-over-year in May.
“Last week‘s report from the Bureau of Economic Analysis that wages and salaries fell just 1.1% year-over-year in May is ridiculous,” said Biderman. “The BEA is using unemployment insurance reports from the fourth quarter to estimate wage and salary growth five months later.”
TrimTabs explained that by overestimating wages and salaries, the BEA is grossly overstating the savings rate. While the BEA reported that the savings rate jumped to a 15-year high of 6.9% in May, TrimTabs‘ real-time data shows the savings rate was only 2.8%. Excluding one-time factors, the savings rate was a miniscule 0.9%, added Biderman.
“We asked BEA economists how they reconcile the huge declines in real-time tax deposits with their report of a modest decline in wages and salaries, and they could not answer our question,” said Biderman. “The BEA is ignoring real-time data that shows the economy is in much worse shape than it is reporting.”
