Bad news for the media.
After some stock market turbulence, it had settled comfortably into pushing an economic decline narrative. And the tariffs had brought that out to the fore. So the jobs report is particularly badly timed.
The economy added 313,000 jobs in February, crushing expectations, while the unemployment rate remained at 4.1 percent, according to a Labor Department report Friday that could help quell inflation fears.
Economists surveyed by Reuters had been expecting nonfarm payroll growth of 200,000 and the unemployment rate to decline one-tenth of a point to 4 percent.
It's always nice when the economy outperforms expectations by over 50%.
An increase in the labor force participation rate to its highest level since September helped keep the headline unemployment number steady, as the number of those counted as not in the workforce tumbled by 653,000 to just over 95 million.
The total counted as "employed" in the household survey surged by 785,000 to a record 155.2 million.
It's a new record for this century. And the perfect jobs report comes at the worst possible time for media narratives.
The Federal Reserve remains on track to hike rates in March and at least two or more times this year after a surprisingly strong February jobs report, described by some economists as "the best of the recovery."
February's employment report — with 313,000 jobs created — marks a turning point for the economy. Companies are hiring at a rapid enough pace to bring the long-term unemployed off the sidelines.
For the Fed, economists say the number is "Goldilocks," meaning not too hot to suggest an overheating, or more interest rate hikes, nor too cold, meaning the Fed could be concerned by softness in wages. For the markets, the economy looks strong, but not so strong that inflation will push interest rates up more quickly — a perfect case for stocks.
"These numbers are remarkable," said Ward McCarthy, chief financial economist at Jefferies. "806,000 people came back into the labor force and 97 percent of them found jobs. If you want a job you can get one. This is about as much as you can expect. … We've waited 10 years for this, and here we are."
Obama was right. We were the ones we were waiting for. And the economy was waiting for him to leave.