One Good Month
By PAUL KRUGMAN
Published: April 9, 2004
nytimes.com
At last, a favorable surprise on jobs: estimated payroll employment rose 308,000 in March, above almost everyone's expectations. You can't blame the administration for trying to play up the good news, and for being dismayed when the sound of popping Champagne corks was drowned out by the crackle of gunfire. But has the economy, after so many false starts, finally started to deliver?
For perspective, it helps to remember what solid job growth looks like. During Bill Clinton's eight years in office, the economy added 236,000 jobs per month. But that's just an average: a graph of monthly changes looks like an electrocardiogram. There were 23 months with 300,000 or more new jobs; in March 2000, the economy added 493,000 jobs. This tells us not to make too much of one month's data; payroll numbers are, as economists say, noisy. It also tells us that by past standards, March 2004 was nothing special.
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