The Conference Board’s Employment Trends Index – which forecasts employment for the next 6 months improved with the author’s saying “While Friday’s job numbers were slightly disappointing, the ETI does not provide any indication of slowing employment growth“.

Analyst Opinion of Conference Board’s Employment Index

Econintersect evaluates year-over-year change of this index (which is different than the headline view) – as we do with our own employment index. The year-over-year index growth rate improved from last month. However, our index’s growth deteriorated modestly.

Still, Econintersect is forecasting modest improvement to the growth rate six months from now. Note that the Econintersect Employment Index is not based on employment data.

From the Conference Board:

The Conference Board Employment Trends Index™ (ETI) increased in August, after increasing in July. The index now stands at 134.62, up from 133.60 (a downward revision) in July. The change represents a 5.6 percent gain in the ETI compared to a year ago.

“The rapid growth in the Employment Trends Index continued in August, suggesting solid job growth in the months ahead,” said Gad Levanon, Chief Economist, North America, at The Conference Board. “While Friday’s job numbers were slightly disappointing, the ETI does not provide any indication of slowing employment growth.”

August’s increase in the ETI was fueled by positive contributions from six of the eight components. From the largest positive contributor to the smallest, these were: Percentage of Respondents Who Say They Find “Jobs Hard to Get,” Industrial Production, Real Manufacturing and Trade Sales, Initial Claims for Unemployment Insurance, Ratio of Involuntarily Part-time to All Part-time Workers, and Number of Employees Hired by the Temporary-Help Industry.

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