President Donald Trump’s economy added 225,000 jobs in January, smashing industry expectations and defying Democrats who said that tax cuts and deregulation were no longer spurring economic growth.
Wage growth for American workers has been at or above 3 percent for the past 18 months, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) report. BLS also highlighted “notable job gains” in industries like construction, transportation, and warehousing. Prior to this streak, wages had not reached 3 percent growth during the previous 10 years. Workers are also experiencing higher wage growth than managers.
In 35 of the past 38 months since Trump was elected, businesses have added more than 100,000 jobs a month.
The unemployment rate ticked up slightly to 3.6 percent as Americans flooded the job market last month. The labor force participation rate increased to 63.4 percent, the highest level in seven years.
January’s job growth wildly outpaced expectations by economists surveyed by Dow Jones, who predicted that January would only see 158,000 jobs added. Jobs numbers for November and December were also revised upwards.
The main takeaway from this jobs report is clear — Trump’s economic agenda is working for American workers. The Republican Tax Cuts and Jobs Act is continuing to grow the economy over two years after Trump signed it into law.
Businesses have responded to the tax cuts by giving employees higher wages and creating new employee benefit programs, while utility companies are passing tax savings onto consumers in the form of lower rates.
Families are also seeing direct tax reduction – a family of four with annual income of $73,000 (median family income) will see a tax cut of more than $2,058, a 58 percent reduction in federal taxes.
The establishment press attributed this impressive job growth to the weather. This is nonsense. President Trump’s economic agenda delivered yet another month of strong jobs growth for workers all across the country.