Bloomberg Surveillance · Friday, October 2, 2026
The September jobs report indicates a stable but not accelerating U.S. labor market, with job creation stabilizing and not showing a significant uptrend. Initial jobless claims remained low, and layoff rates were minimal, suggesting a 'low hire, low fire' environment, which is positive for those employed but challenging for job seekers.
“The labor market is much more stable. Like job creation has stabilized relative to last year when it was really sliding. But we are not in an uptrend.”
“So the August number, it was pop even with the downward revisions today. It's probably well above what it takes to keep the unemployment rate stable. But we're not going to we didn't get another month of that. It like popped back down.”
“So I think we're just in this place of very low job creation in the U.S., which does fit with it. low growth in the labor force and the unemployment rate, it did tick up, but basically it's unchanged.”