You should never focus on any particular month, that’s true. These statistics are noisy and subject to significant revisions later, though the pattern seems to be good months bring upward revisions of past months and bad months bring downward revisions.
But the critical thing here is that June and July are the months during which people’s view of how the economy is going gets baked in for the rest of the election season, pretty much regardless of what happens in August, September and October.
There you go.
I also feel that shenanigans are a part of the picture.
If big business wants a particular outcome, they can skew the numbers by hiring or not at a given time to encourage one candidate or another. Just as the 40 hour work week is played with to give the impression of underemployment or not full time work.
In the end, the media will also portray the general state of the economy as they see fit.
If they focus on the odd slow month, then that picture gets painted into many people’s heads.
This is why the long range trend is what matters to me. Where were we, where are we and how are we compared to historic medians and the actual numbers that make the economy work.
For instance, the 4.7% unemployment figure is so good that it hinges on possibly being bad. Obama could be a victim of his own success in this.