OCTOBER 6, 2025 – – GOVERNMENT SHUTDOWN PREEMPTS DATA RELEASES
With the federal government at a stalemate, the departments that release the latest economic data have been temporarily closed. We were expecting the September jobs report on Friday, which was forecasted to show growth of 51,000 new jobs and the unemployment rate was expected to be unchanged at 4.3 percent. Indications are that the job market is not on fire, but it’s not in a crisis position either.
The job market is softening, but employers are reluctant to lay people off. Employers do not want to relive the inability to fill positions after mass layoffs, which happened during covid.
On Friday, the Chicago Fed President Austan Goolsbee spoke on CNBC, addressing the Fed’s dual mandate of low inflation and full employment. He is concerned about inflation and the job market, but feels the data indicates a fairly stable labor market. As such, he feels rates should move slowly down, with no urgency to front end load rate cuts.