Thoughtful Money with Adam Taggart · Saturday, August 8, 2026
Despite a disappointing jobs report showing a decline in payrolls, the US unemployment rate fell to 4.1%. Michael Lebowitz explained this decrease is a result of a falling labor force participation rate, meaning more people are no longer counted as actively seeking employment.
“Although interestingly, kind of due to a quirk of of accounting, um, the unemployment rate dropped even though the payroll numbers were weak. The unemployment rate dropped down to 4.1%, which is quite low by historic levels.”
“That's a function of the participation rate falling. Another words, people that were in the workforce last month are no longer in the workforce.”