Tariffs, Layoffs, Have Consumers Depressed
March 31, 2025 By Las Vegas Private Lenders LLC
Consumers are feeling the funk and it’s not yet Liberation Day (April 2). The University of Michigan index came in at 57 this month, the lowest level in three years, marking a decline from 64.7 in February and 79.4 a year ago. Two-thirds of consumers expect higher unemployment in the next year, the highest reading since 2009, reports the Wall Street Journal.
“There’s a very broad consensus that the outlook has weakened compared with February,” Joanne Hsu, the survey’s director told the WSJ. “Consumers are worried about a whole bunch of things at this point,” she added, citing downbeat survey responses about employment, inflation and personal finances.
Elon’s DOGE boys are running with chainsaws and big, small, reciprocal, or whatever kind of tariffs look eminent. David Ricardo’s comparative advantage is getting no trunk at the White House.
High Tower Las Vegas and RCG Economics, in their latest Fact Pack! put some numbers to the consumer doldrums.
U.S. employers announced 172,017 layoffs in February, up 245 percent from January and the highest monthly count since July 2020. More than one-third — 62,242 across 17 government agencies — can be filed under Elon Musk’s quest to reduce the federal workforce.
Payroll processing giant ADP reported that private sector hiring grew by just 77,000 in February, with the most job cuts in retail (38,956) and technology (14,554) in reductions.
Total nonfarm payroll employment in the U.S. rose by 151,000 on net in February, and the headline (U-3) unemployment rate increased slightly to 4.1 percent, per the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Employment trended up in:
- health care (52,000)
- financial activities (21,000)
- construction (19,000)
- transportation and warehousing (18,000)
- social assistance (11,000)
Federal government employment declined by 10,000, the number of unemployed Americans was 7.1 million — including 1.5 million long-term unemployed workers (those jobless for 27 weeks or more).
RCG’s John Restrepo makes the point that babymaking has gone out of style, shrinking the workforce. Bring on the robots.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics projects the civilian noninstitutional population age 16 years and older will increase by 16.4 million to 283.3 million in 2033, nearly 5 million less than the increase that occurred over the 2013-23 decade.
While Carol Ryan writes in the WSJ that home sellers may have to lower their prices, data from the Las Vegas REALTORS® (LVR) show the median price remaining at an all-time high at $485,000. This matched the all-time high set in January and is up 5.4 percent from $460,000 in February of last year.
Mike PeQueen and Restrepo write:
By the end of February, LVR reported 5,229 single-family homes listed for sale without any sort of offer, up 50.6 percent from one year earlier. The 2,025 condos and townhomes listed without offers in February represented a 74.6 percent jump from the prior year.
LVR reported that 31,305 existing local homes, condos and townhomes sold during 2024, up from 29,069 such sales in 2023 but down from 35,584 total sales in 2022 .
Getting depressed consumers to bite will take lower prices.
