The Improbably Strong Economy

The economy is still generating jobs. A year ago, a lot of economists and Federal Reserve policy makers thought that it would be shedding them by now.

On Friday, the Labor Department reported that the U.S. added a seasonally 150,000 jobs in October from the previous month, versus September’s gain of 297,000 jobs. Some of that step down was due to auto workers’ strikes, which have since been resolved but temporarily caused workers to not draw paychecks.

Average hourly earnings rose 0.2% from a month earlier, putting them 4.1% higher than a year earlier. That was the smallest year-over-year gain since June 2021, though unlike then wages are now outpacing inflation.

One takeaway is that the job market is moderating, but not buckling—a message reinforced by a variety of other data, including low levels of weekly unemployment claims and layoffs. Another is that the Federal Reserve is probably through with tightening: Futures markets on Friday morning indicated that the chance of the central bank raising its target range on overnight rates at its December meeting was below 10%. The yield on the 10-year Treasury note, which briefly hit 5% less than two weeks ago, continued to retreat Friday, falling to 4.53% midmorning.

This wasn’t the sort of job market the Fed expected. When policy makers offered projections last December, they forecast that the unemployment rate would average 4.6% in this year’s fourth quarter, versus the 3.7% rate (since revised to 3.6%) they had seen in the November 2022 job report. That was tantamount to a recession forecast, though they didn’t put it that way, since such a large increase in the unemployment rate would count as a strong signal the U.S. is in a downturn. Friday’s report showed the October unemployment rate at 3.9%.

Economists got it wrong, too. In October of last year, forecasters polled by The Wall Street Journal estimated the unemployment rate at the end of 2023 to be at 4.7%, on average. They also put the chances of a recession within the next 12 months at 63%. By last month, they dropped the recession chance to 48%. Available data show that, as a group, economists have never forecast a recession before it has actually started. Now it looks as if the one time they did forecast one, they were either wrong or early.

It is easy to make fun of other people’s past forecasts, but considering the hurdles the economy has had to clear, it really is striking that it has done so well. A year ago there was some hope that the continued recovery in the service sector, and service-sector jobs, might help take up the slack as the goods sector adjusted to slowing demand. But there was also the concern that the service sector could run out of steam before the goods sector found its footing.

Another worry: That the excess savings that Americans had built up after the pandemic struck would run out, and that would cut into their ability to spend. But recent revisions to the available data suggest there was more money left in the tank than thought.

To these, add that inflation has cooled despite the addition of 2.4 million jobs so far this year, and gross domestic product is expanding much faster than economists expected. Plus, at least so far this year, the economy has made it through a regional bank crisis, a sharp increase in both short- and long-term borrowing costs, and the resumption of student-debt payments.

The jury is out on what happens next. The cooling in the job market could turn into a lurch lower, for example, as the full effect of the Fed’s past rate increases begins to take hold. Inflation, which is still too high, could accelerate, prompting the central bank to further tighten the screws.

But the chances of the economy avoiding a recession seem stronger now than they did even a few months ago. A lot of that would be down to luck, but it would nonetheless be something worth celebrating.

It’s go time for the highest-stakes mission at NASA in more than 50 years.

On April 1, the agency is set to launch four astronauts around the moon, the deepest human spaceflight since the final Apollo lunar landing in 1972.

The launch window for Artemis II , as the mission is called, opens at 6:24 p.m. ET.

National Aeronautics and Space Administration teams have been preparing the vehicles to depart from Florida’s Kennedy Space Center on the planned roughly 10-day trip. Crew members have trained for years for this moment.

Reid Wiseman, the NASA astronaut serving as mission commander, said he doesn’t fear taking the voyage. A widower, he does worry at times about what he is putting his daughters through.

“I could have a very comfortable life for them,” Wiseman said in an interview last September.

“But I’m also a human, and I see the spirit in their eyes that is burning in my soul too. And so we’ve just got to never stop going.”

Wiseman’s crewmates on Artemis II are NASA’s Victor Glover and Christina Koch, as well as Canadian Space Agency astronaut Jeremy Hansen.

Photo: NASA’s Artemis II SLS rocket and Orion spacecraft being rolled out at night. Miguel J. Rodriguez Carrillo/Getty Images

What are the goals for Artemis II?

The biggest one: Safely fly the crew on vehicles that have never carried astronauts before.

The towering Space Launch System rocket has the job of lofting a vehicle called Orion into space and on its way to the moon.

Orion is designed to carry the crew around the moon and back. Myriad systems on the ship—life support, communications, navigation—will be tested with the astronauts on board.

SLS and Orion don’t have much flight experience. The vehicles last flew in 2022, when the agency completed its uncrewed Artemis I mission .

How is the mission expected to unfold?

Artemis II will begin when SLS takes off from a launchpad in Florida with Orion stacked on top of it.

The so-called upper stage of SLS will later separate from the main part of the rocket with Orion attached, and use its engine to set up the latter vehicle for a push to the moon.

After Orion separates from the upper stage, it will conduct what is called a translunar injection—the engine firing that commits Orion to soaring out to the moon. It will fly to the moon over the course of a few days and travel around its far side.

Orion will face a tough return home after speeding through space. As it hits Earth’s atmosphere, Orion will be flying at 25,000 miles an hour and face temperatures of 5,000 degrees as it slows down. The capsule is designed to land under parachutes in the Pacific Ocean, not far from San Diego.

Water photo: NASA’s Orion capsule after its splash-down in the Pacific Ocean in 2022 for the Artemis I mission. Mario Tama/Press Pool

Is it possible Artemis II will be delayed?

Yes.

For safety reasons, the agency won’t launch if certain tough weather conditions roll through the Cape Canaveral, Fla., area. Delays caused by technical problems are possible, too. NASA has other dates identified for the mission if it doesn’t begin April 1.

Who are the astronauts flying on Artemis II?

The crew will be led by Wiseman, a retired Navy pilot who completed military deployments before joining NASA’s astronaut corps. He traveled to the International Space Station in 2014.

Two other astronauts will represent NASA during the mission: Glover, an experienced Navy pilot, and Koch, who began her career as an electrical engineer for the agency and once spent a year at a research station in the South Pole. Both have traveled to the space station before.

Hansen is a military pilot who joined Canada’s astronaut corps in 2009. He will be making his first trip to space.

Koch’s participation in Artemis II will mark the first time a woman has flown beyond orbits near Earth. Glover and Hansen will be the first African-American and non-American astronauts, respectively, to do the same.

What will the astronauts do during the flight?

The astronauts will evaluate how Orion flies, practice emergency procedures and capture images of the far side of the moon for scientific and exploration purposes (they may become the first humans to see parts of the far side of the lunar surface). Health-tracking projects of the astronauts are designed to inform future missions.

Those efforts will play out in Orion’s crew module, which has about two minivans worth of living area.

On board, the astronauts will spend about 30 minutes a day exercising, using a device that allows them to do dead lifts, rowing and more. Sleep will come in eight-hour stretches in hammocks.

There is a custom-made warmer for meals, with beef brisket and veggie quiche on the menu.

Each astronaut is permitted two flavored beverages a day, including coffee. The crew will hold one hourlong shared meal each day.

The Universal Waste Management System—that’s the toilet—uses air flow to pull fluid and solid waste away into containers.

What happens after Artemis II?

Assuming it goes well, NASA will march on to Artemis III, scheduled for next year. During that operation, NASA plans to launch Orion with crew members on board and have the ship practice docking with lunar-lander vehicles that Elon Musk’s SpaceX and Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin have been developing. The rendezvous operations will occur relatively close to Earth.

NASA hopes that its contractors and the agency itself are ready to attempt one or more lunar landing missions in 2028. Many current and former spaceflight officials are skeptical that timeline is feasible.

The Improbably Strong Economy

A lot had to go right for the U.S. to avoid a recession. So far, it has.

The lunar flyby would be the deepest humans have traveled in space in decades.