1.8m jobs created is a relief, a little higher than expectations and higher than many indicators suggested.

But this is mostly the “easy” job growth as the number of people on temporary layoff fell by 1.3m.

The gross flows in the job market remain staggeringly high. We knew from UI claims that many people lost jobs in July. This report showed 4.3m people shifted from employed to unemployed in July, exceeding any month prior to the pandemic.

Obviously even more people gained jobs.

I’ve been tracking 3 unemployment rate concepts and will have an updated blog later this morning.

The headline rate fell to 10.2%. But were it not for misclassification and an unusually large decline in labor force participation the “realistic UR” would have been 12.0%.

And super-optimistically, if everyone on temporary layoff returned to their jobs—and there was a commensurate adjustment in labor force participation—the “full recall” unemployment rate would have been 7.0%, basically unchanged in the last two months.

Finally, all of this happened in the face of extraordinary fiscal assistance over the past few months—assistance that has now ended.