Bessent rejects the suspension of the monthly reports of jobs in the middle of data problems
Allysia Finley, member of the Wall Street Journal editorial committee, discusses President Donald Trumps saying that the job report was politically manipulated before the elections to help Joe Biden on Varney & Co.
Treasury secretary, Scott Bessent, said on Wednesday that he did not think that the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) had to stop Monthly jobs versions due to cases of important revisions in data in subsequent reports.
Bessent was interviewed on “Bloomberg surveillance” And he was asked about the comments made by the chief economist of the Heritage Foundation, EJ Antoni, who was appointed BLS commissioner, that the agency should suspend the publication of the monthly report and publish quarterly data.
“Not at all,” replied Bessent when asked if it was something he would support.
“What someone says when it is a private is very different. You know, I have called for a shadow chair, and now that I am in this seat, I don’t think we have to do it,” he added.
The choice of Trump to direct the agency of labor statistics could suspend a monthly report on jobs on precision problems
The Treasury Secretary, Scott Bessent, said in an interview that the BLS did not need to take a break from the monthly versions of the job report. (Fox News Channel / Fox News)
Antoni declared in an interview with Fox News Digital on August 4 that until the BLS improves the data collection process of the job report, the agency “should suspend the publication of monthly employment reports but continue to publish the most precise, but less opportune, quarterly data. “He continued to add that the” Wall Street “decision -makers” count on these figures, and a lack of confidence in the data has consequences of a large range “.
“I was there when EJ was interviewed, and he is incredibly qualified,” said Bessent. “I think that the most important thing here is that we take up the integrity of the figures, because it has become OK – just like so many things in our government – so that it becomes sloppy.”
“EJ is precise, he has a doctorate in economics. I think President Trump has thought about it a lot, he was very meticulous in his questioning. So what we want is good data, because you cannot make good decisions without good data,” said Bessent. “It is very likely that the Fed would have done something else in June, in July, if they had this data.”
The former BLS commissioner says that there are better ways to collect data for job reports
Bessent was asked about how the data collection process for the job report can be improved and said: “This idea that we accept mediocrity to government – why not bring things to the 21st century, why don’t we do it in the digital age?”
“I do not know the political bias in one way or another, but what I can tell you is that the size of the response of the sample continued to become more and smaller, then they filled the cells. And each time you get a judgment against the data, things become qualitative and non-quantitative,” he said.
“I think EJ will do a great job to bring quantitative standards,” said Bessent.
Antoni will have to navigate the Senate confirmation process to become BLS Commissioner.
Why does the labor department revise job reports? Here are 3 reasons
The Labor Department’s Labor Statistics Office compiles monthly job reports. (Anna Moneymaker / Getty Images / Getty Images)
The BLS was put under the spotlight after the publication of the lower than expected July job report, which has shown only 73,000 added jobs – well below the estimate of 110,000 LSEG economists – while employment in May and June was revised downwards of 258,000 jobs.
President Donald Trump Commissioner BLS was dismissed Erika MCENTARFERAffirming that job data was subject to political manipulation.
The BLS data collection process is designed with revisions in place to improve data accuracy over time as the sample is reported. For example, the monthly job report includes revisions for the previous two months to give more precise reading on the data because more and more employers send their information.
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This gives the public the opportunity to obtain an initial sense in a timely manner economic conditions With the first version, a more complete image emerges with the first and second revisions.
Response rates to the initial survey have decreased over the past decade, and with smaller initial samples, it can lead to larger revisions – especially during the economic volatility.
