Daily Rundown

March 9, 2026

Chart of the Day

Number of the Day

-34,000 - The decline in health care/education employment in February, the first pullback in the category in more than four years and, outside of the recession in 2020, the biggest one-month drop since 1989

Quote of the Day

"This confirms to me that the labor market continues to be weak, and it could use some support from our policy rate." - Federal Reserve Governor Michelle Bowman

Friday's Highlights

Nonfarm payroll employment (February) fell by 92,000 in a broad-based decline, the fifth pullback in the last nine months.

The unemployment rate (February) ticked up to 4.4 percent from a prior 4.3 percent.

The average workweek (February) held steady at 34.3 hours.

Average hourly earnings (February) rose by 0.4 percent on the month and 3.8 percent year-over-year.

Retail sales (January) fell by 0.2 percent, as auto sales moved lower for a second straight month. Core sales rose by 0.3 percent.

Consumer credit (January) increased by $8.0 billion, largely in line with the average across the last two years.

Business inventories (December) ticked higher by 0.1 percent while sales jumped 0.5 percent. The I/S ratio hit a 42-month low 1.36.

Quick Commentary

While Friday's jobs report was skewed a bit by poor winter weather and a strike that sidelined 31,000 health care workers, the numbers were still soft enough to suggest that the underlying risks remain on the rise. It is unusual for payrolls to fall this deep into an expansion, but this now makes six declines since the outset of last year and leaves overall employment in negative territory on a six-month basis. Some of this owes to dwindling labor supply, of course, but the plunge in job openings and the upward drift in the unemployment rate make a convincing case that demand is slipping, as well. While the exogenous shock of rising oil prices and war-related uncertainty more generally will dissipate at some point, history shows clearly that the endogenous cooling in the labor market will be much more difficult to reverse. There were legitimate near-term upside risks prior to the war (fiscal stimulus, booming capital spending), but the more deep-seated downside risks at the same time continued to fester.

Today's Highlight

Household expectations

Daily Trivia

Which two countries, whose film industries have rhyming nicknames, rank first and second in the world in movie production?

(Friday's Question: What New York City landmark temporarily ran in reverse in early 2000 after more than a decade of ticking rapidly higher? Answer: The National Debt Clock)