Diane Swonk

sort of the sugar high could be very short lived if it only makes inflation stick.

And as I said, inflation is already compounded to the place where most Americans feel that things are out of reach.

And that underscores and undercuts the Fed's inflation fighting credibility.

We've got 584,000 jobs created in 2025.

That is the lowest level since 2020 and the second lowest level for hiring since the global financial crisis in 2009.

What we did see on the positive side was a rebound in leisure and hospitality leading gains this month, and that's because of the catch-up due to the government shutdown, flight delays, everything like that.

Also, all of the month of December was sort of the entire holiday season was compressed into one month along with holiday travel.

So that showed up in December, that hiring instead of November.

Well, participation in the labor force actually receded in the month of November, so that's the wrong reason to see the unemployment rate go down.

The other important issue in the overall data is that we've seen those people who are having to accept part-time instead of full-time work swelled to almost a million this year.

That sort of reflects the underlying stress in the labor market.

The U6, which is that stress measure that we do of unemployment, which includes marginalized workers...

That fell to 8.4%, which is still 2.2% above the levels we saw back in 2019.

And it's really a sense that the overall unemployment rate is no longer representative of how people feel about the labor market.

Essentially, those who have a job are clinging on while those who do not have a job and trying to get a job are feeling locked out.

Well, first of all, we're not past it.

And he didn't say we were past it yet.

But an important issue is that's at the heart of the debate at the Fed.

Tariffs are typically a one-time bump in prices.

And so that is historically what you would count on.