Trump's pick for BLS commissioner floated suspending monthly jobs report before apparently backing off

RNZ News

3 days ago

By
Alicia Wallace
and
David Goldman
, CNN
Job seekers waiting to enter an auditorium for a job fair in Chicago on June 26.
Photo:
Jamie Kelter Davis/Bloomberg/Getty Images via CNN Newsource
EJ Antoni, President Donald Trump's pick to lead the Bureau of Labor Statistics, is no longer considering suspending the monthly jobs report - one of the most crucial and historic measurements of US economic activity - after proposing the unprecedented action during an interview.
Antoni would continue to publish monthly jobs numbers if confirmed, Heritage Foundation economist Stephen Moore told CNN on Tuesday (US Time).
Moore said he discussed the issue with Antoni, who had since backed off the notion.
Antoni had previously told Fox News Digital that the monthly jobs report should be suspended in favour of quarterly data, claiming the report was unreliable and frequently revised.
In an interview with Fox News Digital that was published on Tuesday (US Time) but took place August 4, a week before his nomination, Antoni said the BLS should publish only quarterly data until BLS could ensure its monthly jobs data was more accurate.
"Until it is corrected, the BLS should suspend issuing the monthly job reports but keep publishing the more accurate, though less timely, quarterly data," he told Fox.
"Major decision-makers from Wall Street to D.C. rely on these numbers, and a lack of confidence in the data has far-reaching consequences."
Moore, who recommended Antoni for the BLS commissioner role, told CNN's Danny Freeman on Tuesday (US Time) that the nominee changed his mind.
"I think it's a bad idea to do that. In fact I've talked to EJ about it and he's not going to do that. We need monthly numbers," Moore said.
"Now what he's talking about is we do a quarterly number that's much more accurate than the monthly one and he's saying maybe - but he's backed off that. We're going to continue to do monthly numbers."
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt earlier on Tuesday (US Time) acknowledged Antoni's suggestion to suspend the monthly jobs report but said the Trump administration intended on continuing to issue jobs numbers every month.
"I believe that is the plan, and that's the hope, and that these monthly reports will be data that the American people can trust," Leavitt said at a press briefing.
Trump
fired former Bureau of Labor Statistics commissioner Erika McEntarfer
after the July jobs report showed weak growth that month and included revisions for May and June that were historically large.
Trump claimed, without evidence, the revisions constituted a "scam" and a vendetta against his presidency.
Trump says in a Truth Social post on August 11 that he is nominating Dr. E.J. Antoni as the next Commissioner of the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Photo:
President Donald Trump/Truth Social via CNN Newsource
Antoni told Fox he disagreed with Trump, saying he didn't believe the BLS intentionally manipulated the jobs data. But Antoni has criticised the BLS' approach to data collection, noting that revisions to monthly jobs reports had been significantly larger since the pandemic.
However, the May and June revisions were not unprecedented.
May's jobs total was revised lower to 19,000, down from an initial estimate of 139,000 - a total revision of 120,000 jobs.
For the June jobs total, the BLS on Friday (US Time) said the US economy added just 14,000 jobs, down from a preliminary estimate of 147,000 - a revision of 133,000 jobs.
The BLS tracks each month's revisions dating back to 1979, but introduced a new probability-based sample design for revisions in 2003. Between 1979 and 2003, the average monthly revision was 61,000 jobs. Since 2003, the average monthly revision is only a slightly more accurate 51,000 jobs.
The BLS gathers troves of data from all corners of the economy and produces scores of reports tracking economic activity over varying timeframes.
Especially these days, the economy moves fast, and businesses, investors and policymakers crave immediate but also detailed and trustworthy information.
However, while high-frequency data like the monthly jobs report provides a more timely look at employment activity, it comes with some trade-offs: The initial survey-drawn estimates are not as comprehensive as other measurements, such as the BLS' Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages, which is compiled from quarterly tax reports submitted by businesses to their states. (But that particular measurement, while more robust, is heavily lagged: The 2025 first-quarter county-level QCEW data is due out on September 9).
Even so, scrapping the monthly jobs report would leave many flying blind as to how the economy was faring on a monthly basis, chief economist of The PNC Financial Services Group Augustine Faucher said.
"When we look at the jobs report in context; including the revisions, when we look at the industry mix; when we look at what's going on with average hourly earnings and weekly hours and so forth, all of that is very helpful in gauging where the economy is going," Faucher told CNN on Tuesday (US Time) in a phone interview.
"I don't think the fact that we've had revisions, and even if the ones we got in July were larger than average, I don't think that's justification for not releasing the data on a monthly basis."
He added: "The solution there is to improve the data, not to stop releasing it."
Economic data is frequently revised - especially as more comprehensive information becomes readily available - to provide a clearer, more accurate picture of the dynamics in play.
Measuring economic activity has grown more challenging in recent years because of the pandemic's seismic impact on global supply chains, US businesses and households, and the lingering effects that still continue to this day.
To adjust to these economy-shaking shifts, the BLS implemented several methodological changes to help construct its seasonal adjustment models, which smooth out cyclical fluctuations in the economy.
Still, one of the most illustrative examples of ongoing revisions is the BLS' labor market data and, specifically, the closely watched jobs report.
The numbers in the monthly employment reports (which have a rich history stretching back more than 100 years) will change in the months (and years) to come.
Revisiting and refining are just the nature of data collection, statistics and research.
"Revisions are not a bug, they're a feature," former BLS commissioner at the Bureau of Labor Statistics Erica Groshen told CNN earlier this year.
When the market-moving jobs report (which is composed of two large surveys) is released, that initial estimate is often based on incomplete data and thus will be revised twice further in the two jobs reports that follow, as the BLS receives more information.
In addition to the surveying, the BLS also incorporates methodology to try to capture employment activity at new businesses and those that have closed.
Even then, the monthly numbers aren't final and fully comprehensive.
Every year, the Bureau of Labor Statistics conducts an annual benchmark revision by making a thorough review of the survey-based employment estimates from the monthly jobs report and reconciling those estimates with fuller employment counts measured by the QCEW program.
The first part of that process is due out on September 9, when the BLS will publish preliminary benchmark revisions. The final revisions is scheduled to be released in February 2026 alongside the January jobs report.
Federal economic data is considered the "gold standard", because of its longstanding reliability, quality, comprehensiveness, history and transparency.
However, that critical statistical infrastructure has long been at risk of crumbling.
Economists, statisticians and policymakers have sounded the alarm bells for years, stating that federal data is in a precarious state, because of decreased funding, response rates and public trust.
Those warnings have grown even louder this year.
Trump, who criticised economic data when not in office, has continued to question the legitimacy of economic metrics during his second term.
Additionally, his administration not only has shut down several data-heavy federal programmes and websites, but also made funding and employment cuts at statistical agencies.
At the BLS, the most clear-cut example has been recent reductions in the price collections that feed into the Consumer Price Index, the most widely used inflation gauge that also is used to adjust Americans' payments (such as Social Security), set wages and deflate other economic series to adjust for inflation.
Those reductions are likely to make the monthly CPI data more volatile and subject to revisions, economists say.
"If you're concerned about the quality of the data, then spend more on data collection efforts to try to improve the response rates for the surveys," PNC's Faucher said.
William Beach, who served as BLS commissioner during Trump's first term, previously told CNN that surveys, which serve as the backbone for many critical economic databases, "are dying … and it's not a cold, it's a terminal disease."
Response rates for the monthly jobs survey have tumbled from 60 percent in January 2020 to under 43 percent in April 2025.
Beach said earlier this year that the poor response rates lead to increased volatility in the data and larger revisions.
He suggested that federal statistical agencies, when money was short, could focus on exploring partnerships with universities or other credible research institutions on critical surveys and cutting lesser-used programmes.
On July 29, a bipartisan group of nearly 90 economists wrote to Congressional chairs, urging them to "safeguard" the US statistical system by investing in efforts to modernise it.
"Our statistical agencies are outstanding - steadfast and prolific producers of the most consumed and scrutinised economic indicators in the world. The economy is changing rapidly, however," members of the Economic Innovation Group wrote.
"Without focused and funded efforts to modernise how these essential statistics are collected and produced, the quality and quantity of the system's output are at risk."
They called for Congress to issue flat or increased budget appropriations to statistical agencies.
Leavitt said Trump's nomination of Antoni was aimed at improving the data.
"As you know, the Bureau of Labor Statistics has made massive revisions after the last several reports that they have put out, and there has certainly been a decline in the quality and the reliability of data coming from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, and there's been an increase in revisions," Leavitt said.
"And this president and the administration is finally tackling this problem that so many have talked about, and the president is actually doing something about it."
- CNN