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Welcome back. Keeping it short today to respect Labor Day weekend.
This edition is being sent from Dana Point, California. Just outside the hotel room the Pacific Ocean is crashing onto shore, totally unaware of this newsletter.
Below: a quick look at school districts restricting A.I.; why August’s jobs numbers matter less than headlines suggest; and — for paid subscribers only — the link between Labor Day, a dog park, and Macro Talk's “why.”
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The Rising Tide:
Schools vs. A.I.
Chart source: Ballotpedia
The country's two largest school districts, in New York City and Los Angeles, announced restrictions on A.I. this week.
“Both developments seem to respond to an extraordinary movement, driven by parents, to push back against the incursion of technology and screens into childhood,” the NYT reported.
My take: No one should be surprised by the moves — least of all tech executives themselves, who routinely limit their own kids’ screen time.
The macro view: Since the launch of ChatGPT nearly four years ago, state departments of education have been creating guidance on A.I. too. As of July this year, 35 states had released materials about it for K-12 public schools, according to Ballotpedia.
I’ll do a deeper dive into this in a future edition.
Decoding:
August Jobs Report
The typical article about any given jobs report can be hard to absorb.
Usually it’s full of facts and figures, but what can you practically take away from it?
Trend lines and context are more useful for day-to-day decision-making, so here’s what you really need to know about the August data:
Overall diagnosis:
“It’s a very good report; I can’t emphasize that enough,” Blerina Uruci, the chief U.S. economist at T. Rowe Price, told NYT.
Gains were broad, not just due to healthcare.
A.I.-exposed industries — information and finance — lost jobs.
But:
“The recent swings in hiring are likely the result of at least some mismatches in seasonal adjustment of the data. Looking at the quarterly average when the September data is available will be more representative of the underlying conditions.” - Theresa Sheehan, Economic Analyst at Econoday
“[S]trength is not the same as acceleration.” - Kory Kantenga, LinkedIn’s Head of Economics, Americas.
For executives:
“It bears remembering, the initial headline number in the jobs report — will be revised twice. It should always be taken with a grain of salt. This doesn’t mean it isn’t meaningful, however. This is the jobs report the Fed will take into their next meeting,” - Elizabeth Renter, senior director of economic insights at Life360
“The Federal Reserve will meet on September 15-16 and will remain firmly focused on inflation. After Jackson Hole, we can expect the Federal Reserve to be leaning more toward hikes, and today’s numbers do nothing to change that.” - Stephen Kates, founding principal of Clocktower Financial Consulting
For workers:
“Less hiring, less movement, less salary negotiating power. But job security is actually pretty solid.” - Augustus Christensen, founder and CEO of Share Scoops
“Inflation has wiped out all wage gains since April.” - Heather Long, chief economist at Navy Federal Credit Union
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Macro Talk Insider:
What’s My Why?
My “why” is figuring out the world’s whys.
Labor Day celebrates the “social and economic achievements of American workers,” the U.S. Department of Labor notes.
And in a lot of ways, Macro Talk does too.
Earlier this week I taped a video explaining the origins of Macro Talk’s mission and what I hope business leaders gain from this platform.
Fun fact: The original name for Macro Talk was Job Decoder.
Initially, I wanted to build something that helped workers understand where their jobs were headed. But as I iterated,
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