September 05, 2025 10:34 AM UTC

Horrible New Jobs Numbers Show "Trumponomics" Is Killing The Golden Goose

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• by: Colorado Pols

CNN kicks off your weekend with a fresh dose of troubling economic news:

Economists were already expecting an unimpressive set of data for the August jobs report. The actual numbers came in far worse:

Just 22,000 jobs were added in August, compared to expectations for 76,500 new roles.

June’s job total was negative, shedding 13,000 positions and marking the first time since the pandemic that the economy actually lost jobs. [Pols emphasis]

The unemployment rate rose to 4.3%, its highest level since 2021, meaning 7.4 million Americans are without work.

In early August, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported jobs numbers below expectations, along with a revision downward of estimates for previous months, to which President Donald Trump responded by firing BLS Director Erika McEntarfer. But if that shooting of the messenger was supposed to “encourage” rosier numbers from the Labor Department this month, it didn’t happen–and there’s no figurehead to fire.

So what’s Trump’s answer now, you ask?

Talking to reporters Thursday night at a dinner with wealthy tech executives, Trump had seemed to shrug off whatever hiring numbers would come out Friday. “The real numbers that I’m talking about are going to be whatever it is, but will be in a year from now,’’ the president said.

Obviously, if jobs numbers aren’t going to matter until “a year from now,” numbers a month ago that were bad enough to fire the BLS director and claim they were somehow cooked shouldn’t have provoked Trump’s wrath. Either way, it’s not like Americans who can’t find work today can afford to wait another year for Trump’s grand economic plan to finally start Golden Aging.

Like Trump’s promises to end the wars in Ukraine and Gaza in 24 hours, the Trump economy is substantially failing to perform up to what voters in 2024 were told to expect. Republicans disgusted by Trump’s broken promises, rhetorical excesses, and strategy of fomenting broad social conflict were willing to tolerate those downsides as long as Trump delivered consistent economic growth.

The numbers don’t lie: Trump’s one ‘redeeming virtue’ doesn’t exist.