- A shocking report today onAmerica's unemployment rate
as the May unemploymentrate actually went down,
falling to 13.3%
from 14.7% the month before.
Economists had predictedthat the unemployment rate
would go up to as high as 20%.
The economy actually added2 1/2 million jobs in May,
as the impact from the coronaviruslock downs has eased up.
Stock market futures shot up on the news,
and some analysts believethe economy will recover
much more quickly than mosteconomists had expected.
Joining us now to talk more about how
the coronavirus is affecting the economy
is financial expert Dan Celia.
Dan, what was yourreaction to today's report?
Were you surprised?
- I was surprised, I think everybody was.
I wasn't expecting it to beas bad as everybody thought
it was going to be, that 20% number
that everybody was anticipating,
but nonetheless, I was still surprised,
and I think Mark, reallywhat we've got here
is a month early, andeverybody was expecting
numbers like this nextmonth, or this month,
for the month of June, not now,
so this caught everybody by surprise
in a very positive way,and there were a lot of
positive pieces in this number
that I think we can takea lot of optimism from.
- Dan, every week we hearabout two or three million
new jobless claims, so howcan the unemployment rate
go down from the month prior?
Break it down for us.
- Well, what happened was wehad an awful lot of people
come back into the workforce.
We had 2.7 million just in
the leisure/hospitality arena.
That's the exact same amount of people
that went out last month
on part-time work,
so many of them and more
came back into the workforce,
and one of the reasonswe're seeing is obviously
things are opening up.
The fact that it started such a big number
in leisure and hospitality tells us
that people are gonna start getting out,
gasoline is gonna startbeing in demand again,
travel is going to start to pick up,
and the other thing thatwas really good is we had
34.8 hours work per week.
We haven't seen that, Mark, in probably
since before 2008,
so that is a very good number,
usually runs about 34.4
in a good, strongeconomy, so that tells us
that we have a lot of people
working more hours than businesses
or they would like to be working,
meaning that now we'reseeing them hire people.
That number will come down,
but I would suspect in June, this month,
we're gonna see another surge in hiring.
- Dan, President Trumpsays the current downturn
was artificial, notlike a normal recession,
and he expects a strong and fast recovery.
What are your thoughts on that?
- Well, he's absolutely right, Mark.
This is nothing like a normal recession.
Remember this, that in a normal recession,
there's an underlying economic fundamental
that is going wrong.
Generally the economy has been sliding
for an extended period of time,
and finally leading to a recession
in negative GDP growth.
That has not happened this time.
This had nothing to do with the economy.
We had an incredibly strong economy
and an incredibly strong workforce,
so none of that was present,
so we aren't waiting now
for the economy to get strong.
We instead are waiting for this
national health crisis to begin to subside
and people getting back to work,
very different situation.
- And quickly, thestock market has shot up
like a rocket in thelast couple of months.
What's your outlook for themonths and the years ahead?
- Well, I think this year is going to be
a little better than we expected.
I don't even think thata slight resurgence
in the virus is gonnaimpact it too dramatically.
I think we're gonna get alittle bit better than this,
and then for the rest of the year,
it's gonna somewhat stabilize,
but I'll tell you, 2021 isgonna be a very good year
for the economy and for the markets.
- All right, Dan Celia, financial expert.
Thank you so much for your insights, sir.
- You're welcome, Mark,great to be with you.
