greatest shore squeezes ever. stick with me. i'm jim cramer. see you monday! the markets may be closed but "squawk box" is open for business! >> tell me what i need to hear. >> we're counting down to a crucial employment report that could have far reaching implications for the economy. and the presidential election, top economic minds areall here this morning to break down every detail leading up to the release at 8:30 a.m. eastern. >> i want the job. >> a special presentation of "squawk box" starts right now.

good morning, everybody. welcome to "squawk box" on cnbc. i'm becky quick along with joe kernen and andrew ross sorkin. it is jobs friday. the major markets are closed in observance of good friday but here we are open for business. there's some limited trade willing taking place this morning so let's bring you up to speed. here's what's open. you got the dow, the s&p and nasdaq futures, all open until 9:15 eastern, treasuries open until noon eastern, treasury futures until 11:15 a.m. the currency futures open until 11:15 a.m. >> there is more revamping for blackberry research in motion. the vice president has departed and senior vice president alan brenner will be leaving the company shortly. this is what the ceo calls a strategic, comprehensive review. after layoffs of 2,000 workers this week, scott thompson tells yahoo! employees he's emphasizing moving forward and

getting stuff done. hale be holding an all-hands staff meeting on tuesday to talk about its strategy. >> and samsong posted a record first quarter profit of $5.2 million. we're watching the futures in this early trade. you see they are up absolutely. dow futures up by about a point and a half, nasdaq is relatively flat. this is all as we wait on that all-important jobs report. >> joe, i know you're happy to be here. >> i don't mind being here but it's weird i thought. we'll talk about it. this is why we're here, jobs in the market. whenever there's an employment friday, we look forward to it and it's weird to have it fall on a day when there's no trading. our guest house is rebecca patterson, a cnbc "money in motion" contributor. that airs of friday at 5:30 and.

also with us michelle girouard, who is many times in studio. today we're on remote. santelli got up at the normal time for us. >> he convinced the cme to let him in. he had to do some begging and pleading. >> we need him here because we have to keep things fair and balanced because steve liesman -- >> i come in on a day like this and he just start off with -- i didn't start with him. i didn't start with him. >> sorkin has is it a zweater? >> it's a casual friday. >> i mean, it got a collar, it got a zipper. >> it like a zip-up sweater. >> it's not the change. you now how people are in prison

for a number of years and they finally get out and they're on the outside and they realize i liked prison, i like the way that it, is i like the rules, i like the routine. this morning there was light when i was driving around and there were cars everywhere and then i went to get coffee and there was a lien waiting to pay and there were other people at the gas station and there was light and i realized i'm look that little guy -- >> i thought it was so civilized to see the sun in the morning. >> you call that sweater civil sized? >> i went out to dinner last nice. >> you're like the guy who got out of shawshank. >> when it really dark in the morning and no one sells up and you have the whole world with yourself and your thoughts and you come in here and it quiet, you get a jump on the rest of the day. i didn't know. also, i get to sleep in until

5:00. i'm awake at 3:30 thinking why aren't i up? to me i'm looking forward to monday. >> i loved a little light this morning. >> i'm looking forward to saturday. >> you got in five minutes late because of traffic. >> it was five minutes more traffic. >> jeeves liked it. >> you just sat back anyway. now does a misdemeanor get me back into jail? you have to do a harmless felony. the little guy finally hung himself. anyway -- what do you have a preview of? you don't think 7.9 is possible? i think obama wants 7.9. >> i don't think they want 7.9, i think they wanted it in august. there was a good piece in the journal that nobody wants good numbers now. there is a lot to talk about this morning. i want to talk about some of the this evenings in the jobs

numbers here. what we're shooting for here is the fourth month in a row, if we can post a fourth month job began in excess of 4,000. here's the number everybody is looking for. the estimate is 203. that is the private sector. we had actual of 227. we're looking for an 8.3 unemployment rate. csny said we have all been here before. we have been here before. this is the unemployment rate. >> credit suisse, new york? >> exactly. >> look to the left. all those number up above 2 hoon,000 and then the decloon right there and look to the right and it looks very similar to where we were, 3 above 200,000. and what are the issues that happened last year? we had the tsunami, the debate over the deficit, talk about

timing, all that stuff. if you could go to the next screen. tsunami, oil price spike, debt ceiling debate, euro crisis. let look at the positive toward this 200,000 number. claims, oil indies have been higher, what are the negatives? gdp is a big negative. oil prices given, housing, nfib. wasn't sure what to do with the weather. we'll talk about that in a second. watching unemployment rate is a key to fed policy. a rapid decline would spook the markets into worrying about an earlier end to accommodation. >> we're both looking up george whitman's character in

"shawshank redemption." his names was brooks. >> we'll be watching the unemployment rate and anticipation date as to whether the better job market prompts more people to look for work. and on the weather, some say it has induced payrolls, but a lot of people say a lot of job hits have been in services and why would you have services sensitive to weather? are the longer termin employed coming back at the same rate than those who have been on the unemployment line for less time? >> i'm higher than the consensus. i keep waiting for the pullback from jobs because of the weather. >> you think the pullback is happening now? >> no, i don't. but because i don't i'm probably wrong. >> if we didn't have a big pop

in jobs, right. the seasonals will be looking for a big influx into the workforce for a certain sector and it wouldn't show up. the lack of that creation above the threshold would create a negative and that's within of the things -- >> if you believe the adp numbers and continue to watch jobless claims, even though yesterday's jobless claims aren't in today's numbers, you've never seen that sort of a never mind. >> everything's points in the right direction. if we get it today, it's probably construction, maybe 10,000 jobs. so not a huge influence but it could bring us back down. last three months we've averaged 245,000 jobs a money, jp morgan is thinking today 215. getting this number spot on right is luck. and the adp report is good for the trends.

it's luck. you guys tweet about it. have you gotten it right? yeah? >> the adp has been on top. the decline in government firings has been helpful. the household survey has been running 1 million ahead of the payroll survey, which more people rely upon. >> i think the government point is a really important one. even if we start getting a pullback as the weather help fade, the government layoffs are a finite event. at a certain point local and state governments say we've downsized, we're where we need to be. that all else equals will be a job support going forward. >> rick, hopefully you were taking notes on everything steve said. michelle, do you have any additional nuances to all that? >> no, i think -- the point that was made about the fact that, you know, all the labor market

indicators pretty much that we watch don't suggest any imminent pullback. the weather in march was even further above normal than it's been in the last three months. we're moving in a time when seasonals are starting to go in the other direction so everything steve said was true. everything that we look at suggests that this number should be probably, you know, in line with the recent trend. there doesn't seem to be as much down side risk as up side risk given the fact that often of the other labor market indicators have weakened. >> rick, you've hit it but lately you've been low on forecast, right? >> yeah, this one is very difficult for me. i look to our neighbors to the north at what a tremendous job creation they had yesterday at 83,200. for the towns have a comparable number, most people i talked to say you multiple canada by five

or six. you'd have to be close to 500,000 jobs just to get the same kind of feeling about the strength of the market as canada did with their 3,200, the fourth best month of job creation in 30 years over there. for me what is difficult is are they leading us or catching up? i'm thinking they're playing a bit of catch up. i'm going to go under 200. i'm going to go 195,000. >> weren't 80,000 of those jobs building that pipeline? well, i'll tell you what, a lot of it was manufacturing. we could debate all day as to the process of how government gave way is to foreign countries, american car companies but the end people have to buy cars. there's going to be so many units sold annually around the globe and canada is benefiting

from a great deal of that manufacturing. i think things are getting better and i think canada did no program. so it's a very interesting controlled experiment. you know, when politicians in this country are going to line up one way or the other as to how much the government involvement or the fed has helped with the current correction and possible upswing, i look to our neighbors to the north who did nothing. >> the central banker of canada called all five banks in and basically told them what to do and that was the end of that. >> the mortgage arena is different. i'm not going to play the unemployment rate. give me a pencil. put me in a dark room. i could tweak a couple a couple of tenths and get you any

unemployment rate you want, joe. >> did you guys see the ones everybody tauted last money went down? >> oh, yes, we did. >> the one that everybody made a big deal with, went up to 9.1, it fell to 8.6 i want to say. plus gallup after making a huge deal, they announced a seasonally adjusted number. >> the reason everybody was hyping on that before, it's the man different.

people grabbed it and ran with it without doing their homework. >> i think there's an interesting point coming out of the conversation which is there's a lot of wiggle room in the numbers today. over the last ten years we've had ten payroll reports on shortened holiday trading days and on average the market reaction to those payroll reports is about 30% greater than the normal reaction, even on average the surprises have been smaller. we don't know what the number will be for sure. history tells us we'll have an outsized reaction, even if we don't have a big surprise. that's a very good reason to keep an eye on what we get at 8:30. >> thanks so much, guys. if you have comments, question, shoot us an e-mail.

up next, we're going to talk about who is hiring. the ceo of careerbuilder.com will clue us into which areas of job markets are growing and which areas are hurting. and we'll have the jobs data and tell what you it means when they open for business not today but on monday. "squawk" returns after the break. >> monday on "squawk box," the impact of the march employment report. our guest host will be stanford economics professor and former treasury official john taylor and bob doll and former white house chief economist. don't miss "squawk box" starting at 6:00 a.m. eastern starting on monday. monday. rards, you skip the counters, the lines, and the paperwork. zap. it's our fastest and easiest way to get you into your car. it's just another way you'll be traveling at the speed of hertz.

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that was a nice shot of times square on a jobs friday. we are talking jobs and our next guest this morning says that hiring plans are getting back to prerecession levels. matt ferguson, ceo of careerbuilder.com, part of our

partnership with ypo, the young president's organization. good morning. we're playing the game all morning. let's start. what's your number going to be? >> good morning, andrew. i would say my number's going to be above the 225 from last month. i think things have continued to improve. i know the consensus is lower than that but i would say it will be above a 225 number. >> wildly higher? you want to pick a number? give as you neighborhood? >> if i had to pick a number i would go as high as 240,000. i think things continue to improve, not significantly. the numbers that i'm watching that are still very concerning i think rick a few minutes ago referenced the, you cipation ra. the long-termin employed number remains very high well above 5 million. i don't think it's going to be like last year where we'll drop back down. the larger issue is what are we going to do with the people who have been unemployed for a long

period of time, who are still looking or drop out of the labor force. >> walk us through some the industries where you're seeing some job growth now and tell me the industries where you're seeing it lacking. >> first quarter, jobs on the site were up 17%. areas where we're see significant growth, manufacturing, finance were up 30% when you look at year over year. skilled labor is up, you know, about 20%. i think i've seen i.t. not go down but the rate of increase year over year dropped but it had a strong year last year so that's not surprising. health care hasn't grown as much as we've seen in the past. that's surprising to us. our surveys are strong. our survey group were up 33% and projected 30% to higher. while that's lower than the

actual in the first quarter that, is typical. the number usually comes in significantly higher when we see it. i think all those are good signs for the next several months in the labor market. >> matt, it's rebecca patterson. good morning. >> good morning. >> you've got access to some wonderful data with your company. have you been able to take a look at it and see how it correlates, the relationship there between actual payroll trends and what you get through the data you see privately. >> of course our numbers are job openings so that's what will be happening in the future. we've been pretty good at projecting the improvements in the labor market. there's not a real tight correlation but if you see jobs in our site continuing to gupo , you'll continue to see improvement in the job creation numbers notice future. would i would see if the first quarter would be suggesting we would be producing numbers when we get to the fall, well above 250,000, maybe about 300,000.

>> are you seeing an unusual number of jobs offered that are part time as opposed to full time? and how do you see the health care law affecting job creation? >> the second one is very hard for me to answer. i think there are some fundamental secular things driving health care, just an aging population, an increasing demand for skilled positions in health care, regardless of what happens with the health care law will continue to drive labor demand there. part time is big and continues to be very large. i think what i see is a tendency in companies to bring people on through temporary relationships with staffing firms more so than they would at this stage of the cycle in previous recessions and other times when the labor market is growing. there's still some concern and doubt about the future that causes that. but that's probably the tendency around part time. it's more that the relationship on the temp side because they have flexibility in their labor force. >> matt, thanks so much for

joining us this morning. we will see if your predictions turn out to be right in just about an hour. >> thanks a lot. >> up next, how this jobs report could shape november's outcome. eight long way off. two washington watchers talk about the race for the white house and more later, mark zandi, diane swonk and austin goolsbee give us their economic predictions. we'll rie we'll be right back. >> time for our affliction trivia question. what brand of underwear does marty mcfly wear in "back to the future"? rtgage? quack! or child care? quack! aflaaac! and everyday expenses? huh?! blurlbrlblrlbr!!! [ thlurp! ] aflac! [ male announcer ] help your family stay afloat at aflac.com.

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now the answer to today's aflac trivia question. what brand of underwear does marty mcfly wear in "back to the future"? the answer: calvin klein. >> aflac! >> calvin klein. welcome back, everybody. if you are just tuning in, you're watching "squawk box." the major markets are closed in observance of good friday but we are open for business here today. there is some limited trading taking place this morning and we get the jobs number, too. let bring you up to speed at

what stands now. open we have the dow and s&p and nasdaq futures. they're all relatively flat. the real activity will take place at 8:30 when we get the jobs report. the treasury futures are open until 11:15. ng metals, union equities, they are all closed. we have a great show lined up for monday with full reaction to today's jobs report. john taylor will be here, robert doll will be here, douglas do holtz-eakin sounds on and constance hunter is our guest. the fun begins at 6:00 a.m. eastern time. joe will be back to his normal, chieff cheerful self. >> i'm fine. i'm cheerful. it was a rough ride in. >> you like your routine. >> i like it dark.

i like it dark and empty. >> leave the closet door open. >> you have the world to yourself. you have the world to yourself when we're coming in, when we get here at 5:00 a.m. we've been doing this seven years. >> six or seven years. >> that was our sentence. and then i got paroled and now i'm going to commit a mi misdemeanor. >> what was your crime? >> i don't need to do anything really -- >> can i help you think up who you want to do something against to get back in? >> i could probably slit someone's tires. >> i don't know if you saw the news but denniss cou koslowsky was up for parole got declined. >> and charlie manson, if they deny him this time, it's another 15 years. so he will --

>> they're not going to give him parole. >> no, they won't. he's an old man. he's 77 years old now. that was before your time. you never read "helter skelter" or anything. >> i'm aware of him. >> there's a picture of him on drudge today. >> let's get back to the jobs report. it is expected about an hour from now. how will today's numbers affect the upcoming election? jared bernstein is with us and tony, both gentlemen are cnbc contributors so we can make them come in this morning. they say nobody wants a good number here this morning. is that true? >> tony and i were talking about

that. that is too clever by half. i think the important this evening from the perspective of not just the white house but in fact the job market and the economy is that while one month does not a trend make, four months does. so as steve said earlier, we post a number that's at expectations, north of expectations, then can you really i think make a strong case that there's a solid trend embedded in the job market around the 200,000. i think what you'll hear the white house say is steady as she goes, no fast enough, that kind of messaging that we've heard in recent month. >> how does the republican camp play that, tony? what are they looking for? >> i'm in the private sector so i want to see lots more job growth as quickly as possible. we know what's going to happen here. if we pay attention to what's going to happen with participation rate and steve has talked about this a lot, as we see more workers comes into the

workforce, if that number gets to where we need it to go, it's a really good sign for the economy that's going to make the unemployment rate number look really bad during that period. but we need to get there as a good sign for the economy, that people are going to get back into the labor force. we can't treat that as a political issue. we need to stand thatunderstand good sign for people coming in. if we don't see worker participation increase, we have to worry about those who are not back in the workforce and are seeking jobs. >> if you were involved with the republican campaign, romney's campaign, what would you want to see? >> they have a lot to talk about still. we keep talking about the rate of economic activity, right, but we're not really looking very closely at the levels of economic activity. and the same thing with jobs. we keep focussing on monthly job creation. we want to see that number get stronger but the levels are

really bad. that's reflected in the rate and it's reflected in the other measures of unemployment. it's hard to say this is a very good economy. it's not what i call a whole foods economy yet. it's still supported by a lot of fiscal spending and zero interest rates and whatever quantitative help we're getting on the monetary policy side. we don't have that economy that's organic, sustainable, growing on its own. we're seeing signs of that but it's not strong enough yet. that's a message republicans are going to have to make that is correct this isn't a economy that's running on its own. >> i like that whole food economy. that's great. >> one of the reasons the numbers have been a little better than anticipated and steve was talking about this earlier, too, is the local governments have not been firing as many as had been expected or as they had been up to this

point. what do you think explains that? local governments are usually funded by property taxes. is it that housing prices have leveled off? is there some goosing going on ahead of elections? >> no, i think it has something to do with the fact that their revenues have begun to come back. these folks have to balance their budget, they can't run deficits. one of the reasons behind all those cuts month after month was really just a very much a fiscal budget issue. the revenues have slowly begun to improve with the economy. to some extent they've cut to the bone, as some have mentioned earlier so there's less wiggle room there. however, that's one area that i continue to see as a down side risk. it has improved but we haven't seen consistent positives at all on the state and local. i think last month it was down about 6,000, which is better than the 10s and 20s it was posting. by the way, my own model has

that at about zero this month. if i'm right, that will be a little bit better. >> so when we get to november, december, hopefully jobs are doing better by then but we've got a bunch of tax breaks expiring, payroll taxes expiring, a greater fiscal drag next year. do you think we have that whole foods economy in time that we have the sustainability to get that one out there so that we can offset that when the fiscal drag kicks in? >> there's no way this economy could offset a hit to the magnitude of 3.5% of gdp, which is what's basically baked in the cake if you look at the sequester and sunset tax cuts. nobody would let that happen. i live in a town of great political dysfunction so i don't take a great deal of comfort in that. but, yeah, i think that the whole foods kind of roughage in

the system sort of thing is definitely in the mix now. most economists, and i'm one of them, believe that there are finally some hints of self-sustaining recovery here. the question is what kind of hit could we take from the head winds, whether it's oil or fiscal drag. i would discount europe more than the average -- >> we are seeing some of that but there's still a lot of tentativeness out there among people who are looking to hire because of the things that we are talking about at the end of the year and some of these potential shocks, whether it's energy. there's no data point that says this economy is going to take off. there a lot of data points that say, you know, that we could continue, you know, moving forward at a decent rate but no one is predicting, you know, gdp growth to blow out to about 4%. >> can i -- can i add one data

point to the mix? productivity growth has been around 1% on trend. add that to the labor growth and you doesn't need a ton of gdp growth to get the kind of jobs we've been seeing. >> jared, tony, i want to thank you both very much for joining us. tony, you absolutely get credit, i'm going to tweet that about your whole food economy. that is all you. >> thanks, guys. >> republicans are going to say things could have been a lot better, your life could be a lot better. i'm not sure what the democratic rejoinder is to that, though. what do they say in response? >> i don't know. >> play the music. that's what you do. >> they're wrapping us. >> if you have an answer to that question, can you shoot its to us. e-mail us at squawk@cnbc.com. up next, tweeter is also in the

headline. >> the sweater. >> and this special edition of "squawk" returns after the break. luckily though, ya know, i conceal this bad boy underneath my blanket just so i can get on e-trade. check my investment portfolio, research stocks... wait, why are you taking... oh, i see...solitary. just a man and his thoughts. and a smartphone... with an e-trade app. ♪ nobody knows... [ male announcer ] e-trade. investing unleashed.

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♪ a beautiful day in the neighborhood ♪ >> they're doing that to me because of my sweater. welcome back to "squawk" on this friday morning, a jobs friday morning. we're just ahead of the march jobs report, which is an hour away. in the meantime, here are some of your morning headlines. twitter in court this morning trying to fight off spammers. it's suing five web sites which it says are creating tools for spamming users with ads and links containing viruses. also today the coast guard has sunk a japanese ship. you've sunk my battleship, i've always wanted to say that, that has been wandering aimlessly across the pacific ocean since the tsunami last year. the so-called ghostship was in waters of alaska.

they decided to sink the ship so it wasn't endangering the shipping lanes. >> coming up, where the best job prospects a and more predictions for today's big numbers. what it means for the markets when the traders return on monday. "squawk box" will be right back. zap. it's our fastest and easiest way to get you into your car. it's just another way you'll be traveling at the speed of hertz.

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as we await the march employment report, let's find out who is hiring. ted gillam, you told us long ago, when temporary starts going up, it's like these companies are dipping their toe in the n h water, they need a little bit more, they're not sure. eventually they convert and it's all played out just like you said, right? >> this is the best way to get a permanent job right now is to get a temporary contract assignment, prove yourself and that converts into a real job. that's accelerated over the course of the last 18 months. >> do you think managers did that, they were still nervous about europe, about the overall economy here, about some of the things we always talk about and then demand picks up to the point where they say, all right, i feel better, europe looks a little better, i'm going to make

it permanent? is that it? >> i think the biggest thing is they've not been allowed to hire. they've had hiring freezes in place and they get to the place where they can't get the work done with the complement -- >> product has been rung out like it has with many of us here at the table. >> they have to get the help, the person proves themselves, now the company is more comfortable with the outlook for their individual products or service, forget about the economy, it's what their business is doing and they say let's take those three, four people and bring them on full time. especially in areas where we have less supply and qualified talent. if you look at engineering, i.t., finance and accounting, still relatively low supply. even given demand it's 2%, 3% unemployment in those markets in most skill sets. if a company can find the right talent in that skill set, they don't want to let it go. >> english lit. going home.

these other things there's a shortage, right? >> absolutely. >> what were you seeing? >> never mind. >> i'm looking up some movies while you were talking. >> what did you find out? >> just heard of james whitmore. >> i was trying to figure out if i've seen a "twilight zone" episode. i've been recently rewatching them. >> this whole idea that productivity is a job killer is absolutely wrong. >> is it bunk? >> in the short term it a job killer, if people are losing their jobs, it's false productivity. productivity is output for hours worked. you hire more workers to do the exact same process. short-term. >> short term. >> productivity increases our standard of living and ultimately leads to more higher,

not less. >> i think the productivity cycle has been working. if you look where jobs have done best throughout the recession it's been health care and i.t., companies continue to invest in i.t. trying to drive the productivity. other wh the demand is there, those jobs go to india and china. >> those are come being back to america because while our wages are higher, our productivity is higher as well so the gap is actually smaller. >> first time since the 1990s we've seen a couple of months of manufacturing jobs picking up back in the states. >> and it's in the service center, call centers and service operations, more of those operations are growing here. >> i don't know what i'm talking about because i'm an english literature major. >> i would have thought you were a russian major. >> if you came from russia, you'd want to get the english language. >> the transition from -- >> if you had! you seem to be really good at english. >> i think he's got some mad

skills and we could found him a job in finance and accounting in a company where his russian would be helpful. >> i was the on person over there who could quite an english sentence and calculate a percentage change. not many people could do that. >> he's a renaissance man. >> you put away some of that potato liquor also, didn't you? >> vodka? totally immune to it. >> all right. tig, thank you. coming up, we'll talk weather and the masters. we'll explain right after the break. and a big hour to come on squawk. we have former senator jim talent reacting to the jobs number that is out at 8:30 this morning. "squawk" will be right back. >> monday on "squawk box," the impact of the march employment report. our guest host will be stanford economics professor and former treasury official john taylor. we'll break down the trading week with squawk market master bob doll and the political impli

implications of the jobs report with former white house chief economisting douglas holtz-eakin.

♪ it's a beautiful day in the neighborhood, a beautiful day for a neighbor ♪ >> we're watching two major

developments. the introduction of andrew's zweater. >> i don't get the josweater jo. >> it has a zipper. >> no, no, it was an animated -- >> wow! i have an idea, every payroll from now on andrew has to wear a different zweater. >> maybe short sleeved. >> what about scarborough. scarborough is wearing one of those. >> someone else wrote in they thought it was a zuckerberg hoodie. >> i could start wearing a hoodie but there are issues around that. >> someone said don't get him upset, next time he'll show up with a hoodie hoodie.

. >> you look behind where they play the masters from and it's literally a hundred yards back and there's trees, it seems as if you've got like a 20-yard area to shoot through. we saw phil yesterday in some places where they had 15, 20 places looking for the ball, never did find it. >> but they were really good with the short game. >> they were, they were. a lot of euros up at the top right now. lee westwood has to win one of these days. >> lee westwood, i saw the shot he would have gone ahead with. he missed it and soap he's still i guess tied for first. >> 18 is one of the hardest holes there, and henrik stenson had some issues and got an eight, which is double you're supposed to get. >> what is the chance tiger is going to win? >> tiger's in great shape but

he's driving the ball poorly. >> is that all mental? >> when you're swinging that hard, to hit one straight, eight miracle these guys hit them so straight all the time. it doesn't take much to mess it up. it going to be a great day today. i think it starts again -- i thought we should have had randall back on this morning and luke donald, there was a fax, they were faxing the scores for one of thinks scores and it was a smudge and it got entered wrong. >> and he signed a card -- >> he's number one in the world still. all these young guys, any of them could -- >> bill came back. he's 2 over. he was 4 over at one point. he was all over the map, too, where he was hitting the ball. >> it's early. >> but luis -- >> i'm still rooting for the comeback of tiger. >> i don't know how we're going

to handle up a this news today about the zweater. i want to do it in russian. >> is a zipper sweater. it's not just a statement. get that out of the way! you can't see -- there it is. >> sometimes and drup's fashion as soon as is unquestioned. >> who said that? >> tyler. >> tyler what? >> i'm not going to -- >> he clearly has taste. >> coming up, mark zandi, diane swonk and austin mark zandi. and are high gas prices hurting jobs? the director of motor fuels for the national association of convenience

we're just half an hour away from the march employment report. diane swonk, mark zandi and

austin mark zandi ready to go. welcome back. our guest host, rebecca is helping us count down to the jobs report. how much time do we have

rebecca? >> i stand corrected. >> she's helping us. just keep -- the major markets -- >> wait, don't say this, the major markets are closed. the bond market is open. >> currency. >> currency markets are always open. >> yes. and muhammad is in the after glow of mets win. there's 162 games. he's so excited that they won one, which is nice. it doesn't take much to please him. here's what is open. the dow, s&p and nasdaq futures until 9:15 eastern. would you mind counting us down to that, too? >> sure. >> treasuries until noon eastern, treasury futures until 11:15. regular tradings until currency. energy, metals, u.s. equities and european equities are all closed. let's get a check, though, on u.s. equity futures. can you see not much. >> they're picking up the recycling, though. >> waiting for the jobs report.

>> have to put the recycling out. government is not closed. i think. >> are banks open? >> maybe everybody was wrong on my block. >> don't you hate that? >> i think it's not a government holiday, right? >> the markets have decided to be closed for the most part minus the bond market and the currency market. the rest of the world is working. >> who picks up your trash? >> the post office is working today, i think. do you put it in a chute? >> you don't take out the trash in new york city. i'm just saying. it just occurred to me, right? you might step in dog crap if you walk outside. >> do you put it into a chute? >> we don't put it in a chute? >> no, we put it in a garbage can. >> and then they take it out.

>> the rest of the country is watching saying i think those people in new york city are different. >> oh, they do know that. they do. they pay their athlete as lot. >> among the stories that we are following on this jobs friday, it is official. a federal judge has approved a $25 billion mortgage settlement with five top banks. at issue, allegations of foreclosure abuse, misconduct in servicing home loans. the banks did not admit to the wrong doing. and yahoo!'s ceo has his outline for his vision after 2,000 employees be let go. core media and communications, platforms and data are the platforms going forward. >> here what's the see the street expects, the non-farm

payroll to grow about 203,000, the unemployment rate to stick at 8.3%. and hourly wages -- >> we been at 8.3 for three month. >> staying steady. >> it would be the third month. >> hourly wages expected to ride by 0.2%. let get a preview from austin goolsbee, a professor of economics at the chicago school of business. good morning to you. diane swonk, chief economist and mark zandi chief economist at moody's and wrerebecca, our chi analyst keeping an eye on the clock for us. we already have santelli's predictions. let's go around the horn if we could. mr. zandi, sir. >> what was santelli's prediction? >> 195. >> oh, he's taking a risk.

i'm with the consensus. i think 200k on payrolls on and 8.3% on employment. the wildcard is whether there's going to be some payback from the warm winter weather. by my calculation, the warm weather added about 100k to payrolls between december, january and february. that's going to come out at some point. i don't think it's going to be march because that was also warm but april and may will be weak months. but this month, 200k. >> miss swonk? >> 187. we're splitting hairs here. i think 190 something on private. but 8.3 on unemployment rate and same uncertainty about when the weather is going to come out. i'm not sure march was the warmest weather. it's colder here now. i was just in france, too, that's an interesting place to be. good food.

they're more messed up than we are over there. it's not to come home and realize our problems relatively speaking aren't bad. >> this is getting boring. mr. goolsbee make it interesting. >> what did you say santelli predicted? 195? >> he's at 195. >> zandi at 200, swonk at 187. >> i thought to myself this is the first time i'm coming in under santelli. i'm going to start banging my face on the desk. i don't think it's going to be more than 180 or something like that. to me ultimately the job growth number is determined by how the gdp grows and i think we've had three or four very strong months but those all reflected the up tick in the growth race and i'm afraid the growth rate is slowing down a bit. almost everybody is saying that. eventually that's going to show up in the jobs numbers. they're not going to get

terrible but they're just not going to be what they've been for three or four months. i'm previodicting it starts thi month. >> do you want to take a crack, though? >> i think they've got it wrong. i've been working on whether or not the number could be potentially much higher and i'm thinking like a 209 number for the following reason. >> wow. >> i think everybody underestimates the power of not firing. the way this economy works, tell me if i have this wrong, you're hiring 4 million people and 4 million people are losing their work. what the data shows, guys, is we're not firing. so all of that hiring that even existed beforehand multiplies in its importance. and i'm thinking you could do a higher number because the firing stopped. >> but the layoff rate, the layoff rate is incredibly low, steve. it's at a record low, right? so to get that 290 or 300 plus,

you need a better hiring rate. that's the key here. >> so he's taking it if you can get it. and if we get it, won't we all be hallelujah. >> the problem is if we get 290, it might be too good. my fear would be if we got 290 or 300 today, even though certainly net-net it great news for the economy, i think people would be nervous that means the fed backs off even more and we could get a rate hike sooner. i'd be careful on that reaction. >> the fed would love to be in a position of having to do a rate hike sooner. having a better economy is not bad news for anyone and 290 is enough to cut it. you know austan, is this enough to cut it to bring down the unemployment rate? it will not bring down enough fast enough. we always want to celebrate a better number. >> if we were putting in numbers like that on a sustained basis, it will bring down the unemployment rate. >> you have to have -- go ahead.

>> as diane has pointed out a couple of times the last few months, think think one thing to keep an eye on is the difference between the two surveys. you saw in the adp numbers on wednesday again a very strong small business number. >> yes, 100,000. >> the small business creation, if it's happening, finally, it would be showing up in the household survey before it shows up in the survey of businesses. the last several months you've seen way big are numbers on the household survey than the establishment survey and so that's worth keeping an eye on. >> hmm. >> how about rick? >> where is rick on all of this? if we got 290 would you be happy because then the fed would back off a little bit sp. >> when i look at numbers, i really look at it from a market perspective. i don't really care if the fed is happy or not. i think it's ludicrous when i see big bond funds that have positions because they think they know which is the next

focus group for purchases to the fed. this is very counterproductive. >> expand on that, that's a very important point. i think you're talking about there a lot of guys that are out there that are long mbs and they have been backing out of that, even though we haven't had a huge change in mortgage rates but there's a lot of fruning on mbs that now is coming off. >> yeah. when i look at a market, the old day if trading company xyd did all their fundamental research, looked at there charts, i think mortgages based on duration, whatever's going on, this is going to be where it's at, housing is going to pick up, that's the sector i'm going to pay most attention to with my investment dollars. but now that's not the process. i think the fed is going to do that, they're going to buy this, buy most of thesish ushs can't buy anymore agencies. to me it's a horrible environment to be in. it's for all the wrong reasons.

canada, making a lot of jobs. are they catching up to the u.s. or giving us a leadingnd case? if it's a leadingnd case, it's very good news. second thing, look at warm weather climates like california, texas that did not see the big drop in initial claims like the other states which augurs that weather definitely pulled things forward and third but not least is the notion of productivity, small businesses, temporary workers, most of this really is very optimistic down the road. i could care which political party is happy. i'd like to see jobs. and i think they're improving. all we're debating is the extent, the depth and how much warm weather is distorting it. >> rick, stay right there, everybody stay right there. we're going to continue this jobs discussion in just a few moments. >> beer bellies do not -- >> what are you reading? you're reading the new york post on the jobs friday? >> the daily news. >> it makes you overall fat. it doesn't really reside in your

stomach. you want me just to focus on only the jobs report? >> yes. it's a special edition. >> gas prices higher. john eichelberger is vice president of the national convenience stores. he'll join us next. >> how far, rebecca? >> it is 8:11ish. >> you're looking at live shot of the official labor department clock. >> that's what we care about. my watch doesn't do any good. >> "squawk box" will be right back.

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welcome back to "squawk box." a high unemployment rate and pain at the pump putting a squeeze on the american consumer. the effects are being felt in america's convenience stores. for an inside look of what the small stores are saying, john ike engberg, you guys will probably know before anyone what the new $4 is. is the old $4, is that still it

or is it $4.50 now? we talk about it a lot. >> i don't know what the number is but it's not the same as what it used to be. we looked at our performance last year and performance this year, gas prices are a lot higher but our sales inside the store have increased. and so far this years most of my members are telling me sales inside the store are going up. the price we're seeing at the pump aren't having the same effect at consumer buying locations as they have in the past. >> if we forget that, just like we forget about pharmacies and they call it front of the store sales, how important that is, it's not necessarily just what the pharmacists are putting in the little pill bottle. and the same with you. is it more important or less important for what actually gets bought in the stores, the convenience stores? >> inside the stores is where our members make all their money. the gas pump actually generates about three quarters of our total sales but is responsible for less than one third of our

total profit. the gas price is the indicator to the customer to try to draw them to our lowcations. we make our money by selling coffee, sandwiches, stuff like that. >> is it the speed of the move, is it people seeing that price tick up every day that starts getting them nervous? >> it's a combination. price the $4 a gallon in 2008 had a significant effect of what consumers were doing in our stores with their overall purchasing behaviors. when that price is moving up on a daily basis, that gets our attention. we've done it to ourselves. we put our price on a 20 foot sign on the side of the street, which is great because customers can shop for the best prices at 45 miles an hour, never slowing down. that makes them sensitive to the best price. >> you'd see people driving less so they come in -- that might

hurt when they come in, how often they come in and how much they buy in the convenience store. it would be a double whammy. >> the number of miles traveled stays relatively stagnant and they're going to have to buy the same amount of goes to get where they're going. as the price goes up, their disposable income gets restricted. rather than buying at the pump and coming in the store, they buy at the pump and leave. we actually convert about 20% of our gas customers to buy stuff in the store. any change in that behavior, the customer having a couple extra buck to come in the store has a significant effect on the retailer's ability to make a profit. >> are there any areas in the country where you're not seeing the improvement in the in-store -- are there places where housing are more important than gas prices? >> i'm sure there are. i haven't seen regional breakdowns yet. i look at the national average. there are regions where

retailers aren't doing near live well as others. >> you think about 4.50? chicago i think was 4.60 or something. >> i think there are a couple markets in the area pushing mid 4s. the national average is right below $4 a gallon. luckily we're going through the spring transition. the refineries have already changed to producing summer grade gasolines. that's going into the market. so hopefully we're going to see stabilization in terms of costs associated with producing the gasoline. we can't do anything about crude oil prices, which are driving most of the prices but the manufacturing side, hopefully we're seeing the end of the increase of the cost of production. >> $3.90 doesn't reflect 103, does it? >> it's difficult. it's really difficult. can you try to draw a comparison between -- >> it could be higher, couldn't it? >> it could be. it all depends on what's going on in the market.

there's a heavy influence on whole sale prices of gasoline. >> do you everything being sold in the convenience stores or can you only talk about gas? >> i can talk about other things. depends what you want to ask me. >> what are you trying to sell vanilla ice cream for now, eichberger? >> whatever the customer will pay. >> you know about the pod shortage, don't you? have there's a vanilla pod shortage and vanilla ice cream is going to soar. >> you sound a lot like "trading places" guys. >> we're all going to scream for ice cream. you're going to have to have a chocolate ice cream sundae. >> no! >> the pods could see ice cream prices soar because the pods are grown mainly in mexico, india and madagascar and there's no pods. >> you're going a little far

afield of my expertise but we'll try. >> next time you're on, you know what i'm going to ask you, right? find out what the average price is in those 7-elevens. you're the first guys to gouge, right? >> oh, come on, really? >> you're the sponsors of the quicki mart gougers. >> we're channelling "the simpsons." i'll try to find out who is kornikor cornering the vanilla pod market. >> and how about those hot dogs? those aren't even real. >> we'll see you next time. thanks, john. when we come back, we'll get final predictions from our panel before the jobs report. up see the clock right there, 8:21:37. don't go away.

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box." we are just minutes away from that jobs report. let's get back to our panel this morning. we have most of our predictions. the believe the low is austan goolsbee at 180,000, steve you're the high at 290,000. >> i'm the high? >> you're the high. you know what, we'll go by the price is right, the closest

without going over shall be the winner. >> can't go over? that's not fair. it should be absolute. >> you're at 290. >> i'm on a limb. talk me done! >> rebecca has not given us her pick. where are you? >> i'm about 215 and looking at that unemployment rate at 8.3 but 8.2 wouldn't surprise me. >> your reasoning is weather? anything else? >> no. we saw jobless claims so the average was unchanged on the month. i don't see a lot of up side room for a huge positive surprise, sorry, steve. but i don't see a huge weather effect drawing us down either. >> i've been good the last two months so my average can suffer a bad month. >> i can do 288 and completely

overrule you. >> you made up the rules! >> one other statistic, hours worke worked. we should watch that carefully. if we get an increase in hours, which are already quite high, that would be quite positive. >> so what does that mean? >> i don't think there will be a change. if it does, it will be very encouraging. >> the conversation we had earlier where gas prices didn't have an effect. low gas prices with unseasonably warm weather, we had the mitigating factor which we didn't have in 2008, we didn't have to pay a lot to heat our homes. that left a buffer to be able to spend. >> okay, guys. we'll will be back in just a moment. coming up, we are just minutes

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all right, welcome back, everybody. we are just seconds away from the march jobs report. we've been watching the futures this morning and they are just about flat ahead of that number. we joined from the labor department now with those numbers. >> up 120,000, march non-farm payrolls increased by 120,000 jobs, the unemployment rate, 8.2%, average hourly earnings, 0.2%. obviously the jobs numbers well below expectations, looking for in the neighborhood of 203,000 jobs. private sector employment increased by 121,000. there were no revisions in the february private sector report. the january private sector jobs figure revised downward by 8,000. the overall revisions, january minus 9,000, february up 13 so the two-month overall revision a net increase of 4,000 jobs. what happened as far as job growth in march, manufacturing

up 37,000, food and drinking places plus 37,000, health care plus 26,000, professional and business services plus 31,000. the big job loser in the month of march, retail down by 34,000, transportation and warehousing lost 9,000 jobs. also we had a 7,000 job loss in the construction sector. total unemployment now at 12.7 million, 5.3 million or 42.5% out of work six months or longer. the total unemployment rate, 14.5%, down from 14.9% the previous month. back to you guys. >> all right, hampton, thank you very much. can you see the market reaction to this. let's get straight to our panel. >> someone still has friends at the white house. >> right. >> someone still talks to the white house, goolsbee. >> goolsbee knows what's going on. let get to rick. the picture with the futures, they're down about 55 point.

that doesn't tell the whole story because fair value is up 22. >> it's unbelievable. these markets and equities are unbelievable. the dollar index went from virtually unchanged to down 22. the long bond right before the number was released jumped from like 335 to 341 and now it's dropped down to 327. the ten-year went from 220 up to about 222 and then i saw 208. so now we're at 210. but there's something important here. scrape away all these kind of thin trades, lower yields which is significant considering the last couple weeks, lower stocks and a lower dollar to boot, the last one is a bit of a surprise. >> and when you talk loper on those stocks, i keep watching, it looks like we are down triple digits for the dow futures.

they're only open for another 45 minutes, not even. >> yes, down 98. they're about ready to test triple digits. but they did go in the triple digits. 12,880 is where it's trading down 98, 69 was the low. and i just saw it down 100 flash. but viewers, listeners, you don't want to look at this sarcastic process but i think where the markets actually close will give you a pretty good idea what we may be looking at on monday. >> let's go over to austan goolsbee. >> he didn't know anything. >> he was the low of our entire panel here, 180. austan, what do you make of what you heard at 120? >> the market would tell you you lost. >> he was still over. nobody won. >> i guess that's true. but i'm going to stand by winning, even though i haven't seen the report because that the unemployment rate went down is very likely to mean that the job creation in the household survey

is way above the payroll survey -- >> no. >> which is what you think. >> let me give you those numbers, austan. work force declined minus 164, employed down 31,000, unemployed, though, did decline by 133,000. i think that helped a little bit. those unemployed, 27 weeks or longer down by about 120 or,000 and 14.5% to 14.9. you didn't get job growth bu you did get decline in the unemployment. >> to me weather and seasonal is all in this data. it's in retail, construction. if you look at the retail numbers -- >> that's just not consistent with the reality of what's going on in the retail sector. >> i'll tell you where we had perhaps a big weather effect.

i think one of the places we night have gotten fooled, we were doing 50,000 a month in temporary. we failed by 7.5 in temporary. i'm guessing a lot of the weather-related hiring could have shown up -- >> web rebecca, is this what yo were thinking. >> we were thinking weather would take off about 10,000. i'm surprised with the retail sales. retail earnings have been picking up. it's a mismatch. i think diane makes the right point. we probably borrowed from the future. the other oupoint i wanted to me was not only was leisure up high because the weather was nice, that might have borrowed from the future, we had 20 some odd thousands in health care, over 60,000 last month. that's a major slowdown in health care hiring, 40,000 right there. that wasn't the biggest boost it could have been. there has been a major slowdown

in spending on health care that not many are talking about. that's a sector we really need to watch. it's been a major sector providing jobs even through the recession. >> what would explain that, diane? >> a couple things are happening. one is we're seeing some actual efficiencies gained in the health care sector through reform. in the private insurance sector, there's a lot of changes. people increase the co-pay by $5, they go less. some major ceos in -- i can't say the name of the store but drugstores you go to as joe pointed out, you know, it's what you sell at the front. people are not picking up by as much as 50% of their prescriptions right now that they're filling, as much as 50%. they're cutting prescriptions in half. so we're seeing a major cutback. some of it residuals related to long-term unemployment being so high and people that are on

long-te long-term unemployment not being able to spend as much on health care. health care consumption is one of the areas we've seen a major slowdown and it's the first time we've seen it in decades. >> other weak parts of this report here, the aggregate weekly hours index falling bnt 0.2, the manufacturing index falling by 0.5. we have the 0.2% rise in earnings per hour so that's decent. mark zandi, how much does that change the gdp index? it was up 0.5 in february, down 0.2 in march. what's the overall gdp effect, march? >> come close to my forecast, hours worked would have increased at a 4.0% annualized rate. it feels like it going to come

in at 3, 3.5%. it's still strong so productivity growth will decline but that takes a big chunk out of the growth. >> what's your gdp, mark? >> this feels like to me seasonals and weather. retail normally hires 20, 25k per month. there's no reason given everything else we know about retail why they shouldn't be doing this. they subtract 35k. that's a very long swing. i'm trying to find silver linings in the data. it's obviously not positive. one other silver lining is you'll notice the job losses in state and local government is starting to moderate. i think that's a real trend. there are moe layoffs coming but the worst of the layoffs are behind us and that's also going to be a very significant positive going forward. it's a big negative becoming less of a negative. >> that's something that mark pointed out last year that, this is where the change was going to come, state and local

governments have got i don't know their fiscal houses in order and not cutting the draconian cuts that we saw, particularly in teachers and stuff like that. we will have some postal workers, most of them will be retired out and some federal cuts will start to swap out for that. but we're not going to have the major 25, 30,000. >> you raised your hand, rick. first time i've ever seen you do that. >> there's fascinating this evenings going on here. we're at a 208 ten-year. if you look at the equities and maybe i'll be wrong on this but i'll still throw it out there, it looks to me like they found their gps and i think becky is right, the futures will be down triple digits and maybe go through it. the dollar index looks as though it wants to stay down.

i think the wild card is actually how much closer to 2% we get the ten-year, which is now at 208. >> but how are stocks reacting? stocks don't seem to be gloming on to that idea of being happy about that. zandi, i have to push back on you. when i look at things -- >> go ahead. >> i got to eat crow because i was on the way wrong side of this thing. >> go ahead. >> no, you go ahead. you go ahead. >> you going to push back, steve? >> fire away. >> when i look at things that are leading indicators, every month i come up and say if the jobs does this, we have this temporary, weekly average, that kind of stuff. it doesn't speak to a very healthy market. i understand the seasonal part but that comes only from the payroll side. other stuff inside it doesn't bode well i think. >> but, steve, that comes after a string of months of all those leading indicators going

straight up through the stratosphere. and we all know the weather -- austan is right. gdp growth is not consistent with 200,000 job gains in every single month. so, you know, it's not going to be a straight line. but to me everything in this report, given everything we know, is consistent with -- is not consistent with the idea that we're creating only 120k jobs a month. >> i think the manufacturing number is notable, too. you said the hours worked was down but it sounded like manufacturing had a huge month, 40 something thousands. >> and all the employmentcom pon nts are good. >> and the manufacturing pay also helped to raise the average hourly earning. the composition we get every month, those are higher paying jobs. you know they're looking to hire and train more, looking to community colleges to do that. it's one of the things you really worry about when you have europe slowing down and the residual effects.

the expert numbers haven't looked as good as they had and that's something we really want to hold on to. >> and i think that's going to be a big focus next week as we get the data from china for the month next week, including retail sales from china. i think if we got better numbers out of china next week, it would take a lot of sting out of the report for the u.s. >> rick, it's about 80,000 short. it is the fed's responsibility, jobs, right? that's a double mandate. i think qe3 to get that 80,000 next month, don't you think we need to fine tune this a little? this is 80,000 short. >> you're saying that with sarcasm, joe. >> you're never going to take the notion of qe off the table. >> we're 80,000 short. we have to do certainly! >> i think he's making calls right now on the speed dialer. >> the micromanagement of the fed isn't going to go away but i will tell you this, mr. ben

bernanke is going to be sweating like a cubs manager after, you know, september because the closer we get to the election, i think if the economy is doing better or worse in either case, it's going to put some pressure on ben bernanke. and i think this is going to be interesting to watch. >> the pressure is already there. we talk about the labor market. >> and factors the underpinning strength of the canadian report, the politicians are going to catch up to the public on this one. >> rick, on the manufacturing, let me just point out the linkage between the u.s. and canada and the auto industry is pretty strong. i used to live in detroit. i used to be an auto analyst. that strength there is very, very closely tied. you can tie it right to ontario. >> for some reason, we have to tack a break. we do. we constantly, we're out of time. wee went over. >> panel is sticking around.

>> i want to talk to diane about what happened in paris. i don't care what the economic fact, you can't have a bad time in paris. >> no, i had a good time in paris but -- >> first, the employment effect on the election. former senator jim talent will join us. he's a mitt romney supporter. and we'll talk with representatives from both sides of the i'll. "squawk box" will be right back. zap. it's our fastest and easiest way to get you into your car. it's just another way you'll be traveling at the speed of hertz. and now i build them. i am a bigger is better kind of guy. i absolutely love building locomotives. i knew i wanted to design locomotives

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welcome back to "squawk box,". >>. as we come back with that disappointing number, the 120,000, the 200,000 the street was looking for. you can see the disappointment in the futures. the dow futures down more than a percent. the futures are only open for less than a half an hour at this point. 9:15 is when the trading stops. rick says the tick you see at the end of the futures trade today is likely what we're in for on monday and that is a disappointing number for any of those futures. the ten year the yield is back ant 2.08%, the lowest we've seen since march 13th with the talk the qe3 going around. >> what will they say about the

a-2? as long as that keeps coming down -- >> labor costs increase is something of a concern. paul goodman writing in the "new york times" today that the problem is the fed is not doing enough, not that it's doing too much. >> when is the last uptick in the rates? >> it's been a while. >> that's something, isn't it? >> except for the fact of how you get there. >> they don't know. they doesn't knn't know the nua. >> the fed knows it. you lost 164,000 from the workforce and the employed only rose -- down by 31,000, unemployed also falling by 133,000. >> i'm sorry, we have to extend -- >> no, i don't want to -- >> we have four minutes.

if governor romney were president, what would he have to say about the jobs numbers? joining us former united states senator jim talent, a senior adviser to governor romney's presidential campaign. what are we likely to hear, senator? >> i think we're all a little disappointed. i mean, i thought the numbers would be a little bit better and it's barely enough to keep up with population growth. but this has been the pattern. we're several years into the recovery now. we should have very strong gdp growth and very strong unemployment growth and we haven't and it's because the president's policies have suppressed the growth of the economy. it's hard to see it any other way. >> did you see all the hoopla yesterday that democrats are trying to tie paul ryan's budget to mitt romney and he called it marvelous but there are some differences. would romney be comfortable running on a paul ryan-type budget? the "new york times" called that

budget grandma and grandpa are going to be in the hunger games if that happens. >> governor romney is comfortable running on his budget and his budget proposals, whichies offered in a more detailed way than anybody has in a long time. it includes entitlement reform entitlement reform across the board, with the makes the program stronger and more sustainable and including getting the spending under control, which is part of the reason why the economy is not growing. it's lack of confidence and let's face it, people ought to have a lack of confidence when you're going to see the debt bubble in just four years. >> other people say, senator, this is not the type in a tepid recovery to be cutting back on spending. they point to europe, look at austerity, look at what's happening there now. there's no growth if you don't -- is government spending ever good for growth? >> it hasn't been good the last four years. the president said his stimulus package was going to get us below 8% in the first year. we're not below 8% now.

look, this -- with a recession as sharp as this one, historically, we should have had a strong recovery with strong employment growth. and we haven't. government, including the spending, is the problem. if we'll reduce that, reduce the burden, lift regulations, cut taxes, we can expect to see economic growth as we've had in the past. >> yeah. that's the -- steven made -- >> that's the romney platform. >> steven made this point a lot. it used to be everybody arguing the counter factual. so now it's -- the republicans are going to have to make the case that even though jobs are getting a little better and we're down to 8.2% and the gdp is back from where it was, you're going to have to make the case it would have been even better if some of these things haven't been done, right? >> that's the case the president made. he said it was going to be better. again, if you're satisfied with 8 plus percent unemployment and

an economy that grew 1.7% last year -- if this was a recession, it would be okay because you could expect we're going to go into recovery. this is a recovery and it matters to people who are looking for work that can't find it. that's governor romney's concern. >> great. senator, thank you. we appreciate it. see you later. >> have a great holiday. >> you, too. thanks. coming up, our jobs panel has time to dig through the employment report. we're going to get some final thoughts coming up next. all in one account. keep watch on the markets. or use our exclusive tools to help find ideas.

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we're back. let's get the final thoughts from our panel. i want to go to you all because i wanted to talk politics in just one moment. now, when you think about the summer, when you think about projecting forward where these numbers ultimately bare out,

also, by the way, notice some of the headlines even on this number now, people are talking about 8.2%. that's because that's in the four -- it's lower. people are going to think this is better. my question to you politically is how does this all get handicapped? >> i think it ought to be people a little bit of a dark sense of forebo foreboding. it is all going to hinge on the growth rate. if the growth rate stays modest the way it has been for the last month or two, then the jobs performance is not going to be good and it's certainly not going to be something that people are going to be feeling great comfort on as we go into the fall. if the growth rate kicks back up, then you likely would see continued improvement in the job market and then i think it would help. but right now, i think we're in that middle range. >> you're so right on this, austin. this is sort of what you sounded like the last time and you stuck with that. here is my question. it has been coming down.

do you think it is a problem if the president doesn't get -- when he took off, it was 7.8%. do you think it needs to be below 7.8% to help him? what if we had four years where it was opening print the entire time? is that a problem? >> it's certainly not good, but i think the most important thing the data tends so show is what's happened in the last six months, what's happened in the last year, what's -- >> austin, we're going to take that answer to the bank but we have to run. i'm sorry that we asked you the question without an opportunity to give you a full answer, but our thanks to the entire panel. it's been a lot of fun. rebecca will be with us for the rest of the show. thanks, guys. >> when we come back, we'll get the outlook from both sides of the aisle. republican congressman kevin brady and democratic congresswoman jan schakowski. to keep the car you reserved or simply choose another. and it's free. ya know, for whoever you are that day.

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>> fine. >> good morning and welcome back to "squawk box" here on cnbc. >> it's in my contract that i'm really not -- i already put that in there. i can't really talk after 9:00 a.m. >> all right. andrew and i will take it over. i can do hand signals. i'm joe kernen along with becky quick and andrew ross sorkin. steve liesman is still here. >> as are you, still there. >> and santelli is here to balance things out, as well. >> balance how? >> between you and him? >> yeah. i need someone. >> i'm not -- >> yes, you are. >> i'm qe3 and not qe3. >> rebecca is here. >> if you're just tuning in this morning, let's bring you up to speed. hampton pearson joins us from the labor department.part hampton, just pretend year doing

it again. hold on. five, four, three, two, one. >> hampton, the necessary b we see please. >> up 120,000, way below the consensus forecast for growth of about 203,000. 8.2% unemployment rate. that's the lowest unemployment rate since january of 2009 when it was 7.8%. 0.2% average hourly earnings. over 12 months, 2.1% year over year. remember, in private sector job growth up just 121,000. the overall revengz for january and february, january down 9,000. february up 13. so a net increase of 4,000 jobs over what had previously been reported. march job growth, manufacturing as well as services and drinking establishments, both had gains of 37,000 jobs in each of those sectors. health care, plus 26,000. professional and business services, up 31,000. the big loser in march, retail.

down 34,000 followed by transportation to warehousing which lost 9,000 jobs. construction down 7,000. long-term unemployed, 5.3 million, 42.5%. out of work six months or longer. one surprise to the positive, if you will, the u6, the total unemployment rate, dropped to 14.5% down from 14.9% in the previous month. >> you just said it. so the lowest rate since when? january of 2009. >> which happens to be inauguration day was in january 2009. >> i remember that. >> 7.8%. so republicans, i would be -- that would be something i might be pointing out if -- we may get down to 7.8% the month of the election. and that would mean four years of -- and the other thing is,

how many jobs will still be missing based on what we lost in the financial crisis? it would be millions that are still gone, right? >> yes. >> in 2006, it was like 4.6%. >> the economy has added 858,000 jobs since december. >> we've lost what? >> we've added 858,000 jobs -- >> but how many to get back to where we were? >> how many did we lose through the entire -- >> we're still down like 3 -- >> 2.8 million was the number of lost jobs. >> we still have five to go, right? >> who do you attribute the job loss to? where are you putting it blame, joe? all the blame goes to obama? some of the blame goes to obama? >> i'm not blieming. i'm talking about where things were. we had four years to make it back. >> this is how he talks after 9:00 a.m. >> i think we need to thank hampton. i want to know if you can create a correlation between the crimes, construction and retail

and the retail -- >> sloou absolutely. >> in what? >> in drinking. there's a big increase in drinking jobs and you see the decline in construction and retail that -- >> is that a -- >> kelly evans has been pouring over the jobs report and she joins us now with some interesting findings. >> yes. >> what have you found? >> i think what the jobs report, it's interesting to look below the surface and you look at whether that headline number was a fluke or whether the rest of it supports. this is one of those months where the details were weak to the same extent of the headline numbers. if you look at the household survey, there you saw an outright decline in employment for march, so a loss of 31,000 jobs. so there were some underwomening signs threout the report. the average workweek declierd by one tenth of an hour. which is the equivalent of losing something in the range of 200,000 to 300,000 jobs. we know private sector job growth was underwomening and the

labor force participation declined. that said, it wasn't uniformly negative. there were actually some better signs in the report, too. this is why you see the initial market react teeing off a lot of what i just pointed out. but there were some reasons why we can look at this and not think everything is lost. one being a rebound in average hourly earnings. they're still up 2.1% year on year, with better than the 1.9% we saw the last two months. revisions pushed january and february higher. and a big drop, something on the range of half a million. there were more people who left the labor force. >> that includes people working part-time for economic reasons. >> exactly. and that drop in the labor force participation, troubling not so much because people couldn't find work, they stopped looking. >> all of this sort of raises the fed question, kelly, which is what is the fed looking at? what is the likely policy

reaction? i think what they're interested in, among other things, is lack of the labor market. the whole u-6 was created under the clinton administration as a reason to convince greenspan not to hike rates, to show the fed there was more slack in the labor market -- of course, it's coming back on a democratic administration as a sign of how bad things are. but, kelly, your take on whether the administration is seeing enough slack. >> what this means is that last week after having seen everyone revise down their projections for qe, everyone saying potentially we're got to not see this happen, you pointed out, vincent reinhart. now do they have to do a 180 this week? it gives the fed plenty of room. >> but my take was that the fed would follow the unemployment rate. the 8.2% -- and you try to think about how the argument going around the table. somebody says 8.2, you can do all this ballet around the

unemployment rate. the other way to do that is just to say the rate is what it is. and 8.2% is the right measure. directionally, it's coming down. >> it has come down, but it's probably true that given that growth is not necessarily supporting the level of job growth that that improvement starts to level out. we saw such a big improvement in the unemployment rate over the last few months. >> pretty good number, 8.2% for italy. it's a pretty good number for france. >> do you remember we had that discussion about -- you thought it was a medical condition. it sort of is, right? >> it's kicking in right now. i'll be right back. no. >> that's the thing bernanke is worried about. that our unemployment rate takes that permanent increase like europe did or as europe did in the 80s. when you say -- you make that joke about it's good for europe. that's bernanke's exact concern. he's written a paper about this

saying, part of the problem was the european central -- but the lack of central banking response back in the aids. >> and the bond response today i think is the right one. here all in risk management mode. bernanke isn't looking just at today or the next election. we're going to have tighter fiscal policy, limiting droeth, not plenty of jobs growth with that in place. he needs to make sure we get the whole foods economy before that kicks in. and so i think the fact that the market is putting in a greater probability of qe3 today is the right reaction and i think bernanke will be happy about it. >> we said it a million times. it was awful. think of the stimulus, 800 billion. think of the extraordinary steps the fed has taken for the last four years to get all of that to get to 8.2%. now, we can argue -- do you think when we talk about the actual blame for the financial

crisis, we were just touching on that again because it was a retire administration, but you would be hard pressed to pen down actual policies that directly resulted in the financial crisis. you wouldn't say it was the tax cuts or -- bush wasn't the first guy to deregulate or do you -- >> what i think, joe, is that it's really bad for me to be in the two shot with kelly. i'm going to kel let kelly answer the question. you guys, please go to the one shot. >> hold on. there's a regulatory argument that -- >> there we go. there you go, kelly. >> and i thought larry -- >> and there's a fed argument, too. there's a greenspan argument, too. >> there's a greenspan argument and a regulatory argument. >> you have argued that the fed was remiss because it controls the banking sector. that's where the lack of regulation was. >> and the preference for debt in the tax code over equity. >> there's a lot of fathers.

>> to be allowing wall street to have higher leverage ratios. >> right. but if all that -- okay. bush was in office when it happened. so let's blame him. we also, then, this sticks to oba obama, too, that he hasn't been around that for the past four years. but if we're going to have these tenuous cause and effects, both presidents, let's say they both own whatever happens -- >> look, we can't attribute any of this to policy. >> carter, 70% of homes, that's what we wanted to get to for home ownership. >> i thought you couldn't talk after 9:00. >> this is what happens. this is it all built up. i only have two-and-a-half hours to get three hours in. >> that's true. we have to jam a lot in. kelly, thanks for joining us. the futures are near their lowest levels. dow is down near 165 points below near value and trading their stocks in about 3:15.

when we come back, we have the political impact of today's jobs report. two congressmen squaring off right after this. . the lines, and the paperwork. zap. it's our fastest and easiest way to get you into your car. it's just another way you'll be traveling at the speed of hertz. [ kareem ] i was fascinated by balsa wood airplanes since i was a kid. [ mike ] i always wondered how did an airplane get in the air. at ge aviation, we build jet engines. we lift people up off the ground to 35 thousand feet. these engines are built by hand with very precise assembly techniques. [ mike ] it's going to fly people around the world. safely and better than it's ever done before. it would be a real treat to hear this monster fire up. [ jaronda ] i think a lot of people, when they look at a jet engine, they see a big hunk of metal. but when i look at it, i see seth, mark, tom, and people like that who work on engines every day. [ tom ] i would love to see this thing fly. [ kareem ] it's a dream, honestly. there it is.

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a special session of futures is about to close. you've got 15 seconds left to get your trades in. right now, you can see those dow futures are down about 130 points. fair value was up 2 22. the futures indicate on monday morning, they would open down by 150 points. >> do they not know it's 8.2%? >> 8.2%, the unemployment went down. but the jobs creation number was 120,000, much less than expected. a lot of people stopped looking for work and that's been a concern, too. we go from wall street to washington right now. how will today's jobs number, all of this going to impact capitol hill? let's ask two top members in the house of representatives. kevin brady and jan shan cowsky. what do we take away from this number? >> first of all, we've had two years of consistent jobs, growth, 9.3 million jobs created

in the last 12 months. having said that, i noticed in your discussions that you have not talked at all about public sector jobs and the kind of austerity budgets that the republicans have wanted to impose on us and the major cuts have actually resulted in a bleeding of the public sector jobs, police and fire and teachers, all those employees have lost their jobs. but i still think that looking overall on the highest rate of growth in the last six months that we've seen in four years in jobs i think is still generally definitely in a positive direction. >> congressman brady, how would you respond to that? >> well, look, any month we have jobs is -- we'll take that month. but it's not that this month numbers are disappointing.

the whole recovery has been disappointing. we've got millions of americans who can't find work. the president has a huge jobs pass between promises and reality. and if you think about his leadership, we actually now today, after four years in office, there's fewer americans working than when he took office. and think about that. you know, despite the stimulus, the bailout, cash for clunkers, $5 trillion in deficit spending, unprecedent the fed support, this president is -- water on jobs and that spells trouble for him. >> why don't we cut through talking points at this point and take realistic looks at the numbers that came out today. congresswoman schakowsky, the number of 8.2% is a decline in the unemployment rate, but the reason we got there is because 164,000 people stopped looking for jobs. how do we fix that? >> yesterday, the job seekers numbers decreased. the un -- number of people

seeking unemployment benefits, i thought as of yesterday was at a four-year low. >> jobless claims dropped, as well. but there are also people who dropped out because they can no longer qualify for those unemployment benefits. >> yeah. but i understand the disappointment. i think everybody is probably hoping for the 200 plus. but i think we're going to see ups and downs. but the very idea of suggesting that barack obama did not replace the 8 million jobs that were lost because of the policies of the bush administration, the collapse of the economy due to the blind eye to wall street and speculation and all those things, i think that the progress that we've made has been significant. we were at a 10% unemployment rate. not the fault of barack obama. there was a zooming unemployment rate. and so, you know, while, of course, we want to see greater employment, there's all kinds of

factors. you've been talking about the weather, etcetera, but i think we are clearly moving in the right direction, the unemployment numbers indicate that. >> congressman brady, a quick last word on this. do you believe that the fed will have to get involved at this point to try and bring more jobs back in? will we need another quantitative easing? >> no, i hope they don't. in fact, i think they try to do too much. i think they make up for some of the failed leadership we see in the white house and i think they're adding uncertainty to the market. you listen to job traders. they don't cite the fed's action. they're cautiously optimistic i think about the economy. what they're wary of is washington. they are concerned about discussion of higher taxes, discussion of -- they're seeing much more regulation coming their way and, yes, the president's health care plan does create a block for new hiring right now. that's where i think we need to focus on. >> congressman brady, congresswoman schakowsky, i want

to thank you both for your time today. >> thank you. coming up, wall street veteran ed yard. we're going to get some final thoughts before we close the day out and one more prediction about monday's trading. stay tuned.

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off camera, steve mentioned the worry would be this can be a replay of last year's -- >> it was the double dip in 2011. it was the soft patch and -- >> we didn't have a tsunami this year. >> the year is not over. a lot of things can still happen. but, obviously, everybody is looking for trouble. i think the widespread view starting the year was that this would be the third year of living dangerously and it would be a repeat of 2010, 2011 with the year starting strong and then getting weaker in the middle of the year and if we're lucky, ending on a stronger note. >> it's three years in a row, right? >> yeah. that's what i meant. 2010. if i didn't say that -- >> yeah, you did. >> but, look, the peril employment of over 200,000 a month, i think you have to average it out, seasonal

distortions have occurred. consumer confidence has really been strong. there's a weakly measure that soared for the past few weeks. the monthly numbers have -- >> retail is down, though. >> retail hiring was down, but retail sales have been up. >> how do you explain that? >> i think they hired earlier because we had warm weather. they got the spring clothes earlier. i live downtown by a bunch of those shops and they're crowded. they hired earlier to deal with it. capture the sales while they can. >> stockses have been on fire. those stocks have been extraordinarily strong. and i think what ininvestors are sensing is that the consumer really is in good shape. i think the confidence measures, they're not seasonally adjusted. when you ask people how are you feeling about things, that tends to affect the employment situation. i think the employment situation is better than what we just put on today's numbers and i don't really pay much attention to the latest number, anyway. i wait for the revision. >> right. >> and we'll see. >> well, the revisions can be huge. i think you're absolutely right. the last couple months, we had

revisions up almost 100,000. >> the politics situation, can you ever tell somebody that their job situation is better or wars than it is? we can have all this discussion, people don't know what's going on in your life. i think the argument is going to be, things could have been much better. >> what if someone told you that 50% of the stock market loss was totally loose money? would that change your view? that's a scary thought, though, that a lot of this is orchestrated. >> i mean, you know, being a strategist is actually pretty easy. >> you don't really care, right? >> it's just two members. and earnings have been holding up pretty well. >> so you don't think it's the fed, then? >> no. look, you can't dismiss any of

this. i mean, my underlying investment philosophy is it is what it is. >> but the training will continue? >> i believe so. >> but the training wheels won't come off until the job growth is enough. >> we want to know what domestic is, right? we've decided on a system whereby a committee determines the correct monetary policy because the alternative gold is one where there's absolutely no control and it makes us tighten in the worst time, okay? so you're looking for a benchmark here. they went to zero. they needed new tightening -- i'm sorry, new easing and they went to qe. so what is the benchmark? >> well, look, we were just talking about the past couple of years. i look at 2010 and the fed says, you know, the economy is slow to the middle of the year. in 2011, it could do it again. they've got hundreds of economists working for them. in 010 it slowed down because there was an expiration of tax credits to buy houses and appliances at the end of april.

>> guys, we're going to have to leave it there. ed, thank you for coming in and rebecca, thank you for joining us. rick is going to wave, but the futures are closed at this point. you have those dow futures down by 143 points. that sets us up for monday. make sure you watch squawk then. stay tuned for news updates on cnbc throughout the morning. the bond market is open. we'll see you right here on monday, 6:00 eastern. zap. it's our fastest and easiest way to get you into your car. it's just another way you'll be traveling at the speed of hertz.