Nice read. Really helpful framing with the “no-hire” equilibrium because it matches what I’m hearing anecdotally (few layoffs, but hiring pipelines frozen). Curious what indicator you’d watch as the earliest sign it’s thawing: JOLTS hires rate, temp staffing stabilization, quit rate, or something like small biz hiring intentions?
I'm incredibly thankful to have a job. I remember the anxiety of not being able to land anything, so I really feel for the under 25 crowd applying to hundreds of jobs and getting zero hits.
Awesome read. I'm curious what do you think it would take for the labor markets to start picking up again and do you think a weak labor market will start showing itself up in capital markets this year?
I just both simultaneously graduated college and got laid off (by a company that I acquired an internship at and got hired full time) and now i can't find anything over one month in. What was the point of going to college, then??!!!
Because nobody took out their calculator, said that if a 4 year private college degree ALL IN costs $400,000 and instead you invested that in SPY and assumed SPY would return 10% for 50 years, same as last 50 years, you would have $46mm in your account
The distributional impact here is what's most concerning. When wage growth for the bottom quintile stalls while high earners maintain momentum, we're reversing the 2021-22 compression that actually felt like progress. The "no-hire" framing captures the stickiness perfectly: established workers weather this fine, but anyone trying to enter or reenter gets locked out. Young college grads facing 1.6pp unemployment increases aren't just statsthey're a generation's economic trajectory getting bent.
Small businesses, less than 25 people account for +70% of the jobs in the US, and businesses with 1-5 employees are 40% of the jobs. These are the businesses hardest hit by tariffs, health insurance costs, rising cost of living and loss of immigrant labor. The slowdown in hiring and rise in bankruptcies are concentrated in these businesses. And they often don't get invited to an inauguration.
Hang on! Wasn't Trump going to fix this? He wouldn't have lied to me would he?
Nice read. Really helpful framing with the “no-hire” equilibrium because it matches what I’m hearing anecdotally (few layoffs, but hiring pipelines frozen). Curious what indicator you’d watch as the earliest sign it’s thawing: JOLTS hires rate, temp staffing stabilization, quit rate, or something like small biz hiring intentions?
This is grim.
I'm incredibly thankful to have a job. I remember the anxiety of not being able to land anything, so I really feel for the under 25 crowd applying to hundreds of jobs and getting zero hits.
Awesome read. I'm curious what do you think it would take for the labor markets to start picking up again and do you think a weak labor market will start showing itself up in capital markets this year?
I just both simultaneously graduated college and got laid off (by a company that I acquired an internship at and got hired full time) and now i can't find anything over one month in. What was the point of going to college, then??!!!
Because nobody took out their calculator, said that if a 4 year private college degree ALL IN costs $400,000 and instead you invested that in SPY and assumed SPY would return 10% for 50 years, same as last 50 years, you would have $46mm in your account
The distributional impact here is what's most concerning. When wage growth for the bottom quintile stalls while high earners maintain momentum, we're reversing the 2021-22 compression that actually felt like progress. The "no-hire" framing captures the stickiness perfectly: established workers weather this fine, but anyone trying to enter or reenter gets locked out. Young college grads facing 1.6pp unemployment increases aren't just statsthey're a generation's economic trajectory getting bent.
Small businesses, less than 25 people account for +70% of the jobs in the US, and businesses with 1-5 employees are 40% of the jobs. These are the businesses hardest hit by tariffs, health insurance costs, rising cost of living and loss of immigrant labor. The slowdown in hiring and rise in bankruptcies are concentrated in these businesses. And they often don't get invited to an inauguration.