Speaker 1: Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news.
Speaker 2: We welcome our Bloomberg TV and radio audience. I'm Danny Berger.
Speaker 2: And we saw US jobs jumping one hundred and fifteen
Speaker 2: thousand in April. It beats estimates, marking the first back
Speaker 2: to back gain in nearly a year. Joining us now
Speaker 2: and please to say is the White House Director of
Speaker 2: Economic National Economic Council, Kevin Hassett. Director Hasset, thank you
Speaker 2: so much for joining a strong jobs number a beat.
Speaker 2: Let me just get your initial reaction right.
Speaker 1: Well, you know, two months in a row now we've
Speaker 1: had blackbuster jobs numbers. And the really interesting thing is
Speaker 1: that we look at these things that you guys do too,
Speaker 1: I'm sure, called heat maps where you look by category,
Speaker 1: like where's the green and where's the red, and pretty
Speaker 1: much it was green across the board. And so what
Speaker 1: it means is it's a rip roarin jobs market. And
Speaker 1: it's completely consistent with what we saw with the claims
Speaker 1: data just a few days ago, right like, initial claims
Speaker 1: for unemployment churns right now are the lowest since we've
Speaker 1: ever been counting them.
Speaker 3: All the way back to the iteen sixties. And so
Speaker 3: the job market is really, really really strong, Kevin.
Speaker 2: Part of the issue though, that people would folk to
Speaker 2: focus on is the fact that the job's creation is narrow.
Speaker 2: It's in issues like healthcare. Meanwhile, we saw financial jobs down,
Speaker 2: tech jobs down. These are exactly the type of categories
Speaker 2: you would expect if AI is having an impact on
Speaker 2: jobs in this economy. Is there a plan from this
Speaker 2: administration to combat job loss over AI's impact.
Speaker 1: Well, right now, what we're seeing is the AI is
Speaker 1: creating job creation. There are a couple of new studies
Speaker 1: out at the National girl of Economic Research that show
Speaker 1: and one at Stanford University that show that AI adjacent
Speaker 1: jobs at AI adjacent professions are actually increasing faster than
Speaker 1: everywhere else. But of course, in the medium to long term,
Speaker 1: people are right to be concerned about what might AI
Speaker 1: mean for them. But right now, the very very best
Speaker 1: thing that you could do in order to protect yourself
Speaker 1: and protect your career is start to use AI tools
Speaker 1: yourself to make yourself more productive.
Speaker 3: And that's what we're seeing the data.
Speaker 2: Guess, Kevin, will there be a point where the White
Speaker 2: House needs to address this. I've talked to many, many
Speaker 2: people who say that twenty twenty eight, the election will
Speaker 2: be centered around AI and what politicians are saying about it.
Speaker 2: You're already seeing hints of it in twenty twenty six.
Speaker 2: Does there need to be a clear plan going forward
Speaker 2: if there are huge economic consequences of what AI does?
Speaker 1: Absolutely, of something that's being very very careful, carefully studied
Speaker 1: by all of government. We've got five different work plans
Speaker 1: depending on which direction we're going, what topic it is,
Speaker 1: whether it's AI and the workforce, AI and security and
Speaker 1: so on, and these have been underway since President Trump
Speaker 1: took office. Really so absolutely, we're working through policy options
Speaker 1: as we watch.
Speaker 3: The data evolve.
Speaker 1: But right now, where we are sure to see the
Speaker 1: AI adjacent jobs are the ones that are growing the fastest.
Speaker 1: And so the story the AI is destroying people's jobs
Speaker 1: right now is not anywhere in the data. But we
Speaker 1: can imagine, we can imagine things, especially once robots get
Speaker 1: better and better, then we're going to have to have
Speaker 1: more policies to help people, you know, reskill and so
Speaker 1: a lot.
Speaker 2: So in the meantime, as you say the figures are
Speaker 2: strong for this jobs market, doesn't that essentially kill any
Speaker 2: hopes of a rate cut this year?
Speaker 3: You know?
Speaker 1: For me, I think that when we have a strong
Speaker 1: supply sock, then that means that there's downward pressure on
Speaker 1: inflay should and that's what we're seeing. And in fact,
Speaker 1: even with the oil prices going up, excuse me for
Speaker 1: the big truck threading byby look, even when the oil
Speaker 1: price is going up, you saw core inflay should remain stable.
Speaker 1: And you could even see that in the wage data
Speaker 1: in today's jobs report, where there were strong wage growth
Speaker 1: but not anything that was a sign of the kind
Speaker 1: of runaway Philip's curb inflationhold that should make the FED
Speaker 1: want to lift Rakes.
Speaker 2: Well, I suppose, Kevin. Last time you were on the
Speaker 2: show last Friday, after the CPI report, you mentioned that
Speaker 2: you were looking forward to a wash FED share because
Speaker 2: of the independence it would bring to the FED. Since then,
Speaker 2: we've learned more about the descents coming from the FOMC
Speaker 2: that one of the language of the statement change to
Speaker 2: take out any bias, any sort of easing bias. It
Speaker 2: was three descents. You can make that four if you have,
Speaker 2: Susan Collins adding as she spoke to Bloomberg, saying that
Speaker 2: she agreed with that idea. Do you think that this
Speaker 2: is an FOMC, at least those four members that are
Speaker 2: gearing up to push back against a worsh fed shair.
Speaker 1: Well, I can tell you speak specifically about Susan Collins.
Speaker 1: I've known her since graduate school. She's an A plus
Speaker 1: economist who goes where the evidence leads. Disappointed that these
Speaker 1: people made the decision that they did, but I'm sure
Speaker 1: that when Kevin Worf's fed shair, he'll have lots of
Speaker 1: people that will be open to argument and open to evidence,
Speaker 1: and he's a very persuasive guy. I think Kevin believes
Speaker 1: as I do, that a supply shock is a time
Speaker 1: when you don't have to lift rates just because you
Speaker 1: have high growth. And I think that he'll bring lots
Speaker 1: of evidence to bear and convince his colleagues. So I
Speaker 1: think we're really likely to see rake cuts this year
Speaker 1: because of Kevin.
Speaker 2: Warsh ELSEWEUR Director. Last night, the Court of ISSI International
Speaker 2: Trade once again declared unlawful President's teriffs, this time the
Speaker 2: one twenty two duties on imports. When does the administration
Speaker 2: plan to appeal this?
Speaker 1: Well, you know, I think that we're studying all our
Speaker 1: options right now, and Jameson Grier will have a message
Speaker 1: out of that probably later today.
Speaker 2: Are there are there any mechanisms in mind to keep
Speaker 2: those tariffs in place or any other stop gap measures.
Speaker 3: I'm going to leave that to the trade lawyers for you.
Speaker 2: Okay, fine, I guess there is this bigger question than
Speaker 2: if we're going to leave that part to the trade lawyers.
Speaker 2: But the economic talks with China, then, does this put
Speaker 2: the White House at a disadvantage as the President goes
Speaker 2: to have those discussions with she next week?
Speaker 1: You know, I don't think so, first of all, that
Speaker 1: this affects, you know, one corner of the trade policy.
Speaker 1: The strategy really is to finalize the deals that we
Speaker 1: have negotiated over last year with three oh one's and
Speaker 1: two thirty two's, two authorities that are basically ironclad in
Speaker 1: the courts, and so the job has always been for
Speaker 1: Jamison Greer to get ready to sort of finalize the
Speaker 1: deals with these much stronger authorities. We believe the IEPA
Speaker 1: authority that you originally use was a solid authority and
Speaker 1: disagree with the court's decision that is forcing us to
Speaker 1: refund the tariffs, But we have a backup plan that
Speaker 1: is going to make sure that the President's trade policy
Speaker 1: is made a reality very very shortly.
Speaker 2: Okay, so a backup plan. Might we expect to hear
Speaker 2: something today, Director has.
Speaker 1: It excuse me from Jamison Greer, Yes, you you have.
Speaker 2: To talk to him, Okay, Okay, fair enough.
Speaker 3: I spoke with him yesterday about it.
Speaker 2: Okay. I know it is fresh news. But again to
Speaker 2: your point, the White House always looking for alternatives. What
Speaker 2: about when it comes to the Europeans. The President has
Speaker 2: sent this July fourth deadline to reach some sort of agreement.
Speaker 2: Does this also complicate things?
Speaker 3: Well, I don't know if it complicates things.
Speaker 1: We've got lots of deep agreements with the Europeans and
Speaker 1: they haven't really kept up their end of the bargain,
Speaker 1: and that has the President pretty frustrated. But my expectation
Speaker 1: is by the fourth of July that they will and
Speaker 1: then we'll have these this pro America, pro worker trade
Speaker 1: deal with Europe that has already been negotiated and agreed to.
Speaker 2: Director Hasse. Before I let you go, there's been this
Speaker 2: outstanding question of the debt piles in the United States
Speaker 2: and what that means going forward and the need to
Speaker 2: service that debt. We heard from Double Line Jeffrey Gunlock
Speaker 2: speaking to Bloomberg TV, saying that he was positioning for
Speaker 2: a world in which the government unilaterally lowers coupons on
Speaker 2: existing US debt in order to manage those internal costs.
Speaker 2: I just wonder what you think of that. Might that
Speaker 2: be the direction that we had.
Speaker 1: There's not a chance in a million years that this
Speaker 1: administration would ever do anything that looks in any way
Speaker 1: like a debt default. We believe in the strong dollar,
Speaker 1: and we believe in a strong fiscal responsible government, and
Speaker 1: so that's why we reduced the deficit last year by
Speaker 1: hundreds of billions of dollars. We reduced federal employment by
Speaker 1: the most it's ever been reduced. Actually, their fewer federal
Speaker 1: employees right now in the US than there have been
Speaker 1: in any year since World War Two. That's the kind
Speaker 1: of fiscal responsibility the lifts confidence of the debt. And
Speaker 1: you know, we're not done yet again with the growth
Speaker 1: that we're seeing, the growth that was echoed in the
Speaker 1: reports today and last month, you know, we absolutely are
Speaker 1: seeing the kind of growth you need as you had
Speaker 1: in the nineties, to get the deficits under control.
Speaker 3: And that's our plan.
Speaker 2: So of course, no way to do debt default but
Speaker 2: might you look at restructuring it again in this way,
Speaker 2: maybe lowering the coupon something like that.
Speaker 1: There's absolutely nothing that we're going to do other than
Speaker 1: be fiscally responsible.
Speaker 2: All right, Director Kevin Hasset, thank you so much for
Speaker 2: joining us after that one hundred and fifteen beat on
Speaker 2: the jobs figures, that is, the national Director of National
Speaker 2: Economic Council, Kevin Hassett, thank you so much.