● US job growth beats expectations in Nov | Bloomberg
● Solid jobs report for Nov points to Fed rate hike | LA Times
● Summers: doubts about the US ability to absorb real rate hikes | FT
● German industrial output softer than expected in Oct | Bloomberg
● China’s plans for reducing dollar’s influence | Bloomberg
● Oil weakens after Opec fails to agree of output cut | Reuters

● The Midas Paradox: Financial Markets, Government Policy Shocks, and the Great Depression
By Scott Sumner
Summary via publisher (Independent Institute)
Economic historians have made great progress in unraveling the causes of the Great Depression, but not until Scott Sumner came along has anyone explained the multitude of twists and turns the economy took. In The Midas Paradox: Financial Markets, Government Policy Shocks, and the Great Depression, Sumner offers his magnum opus—the first book to comprehensively explain both monetary and non-monetary causes of that cataclysm. Drawing on financial market data and contemporaneous news stories, Sumner shows that the Great Depression is ultimately a story of incredibly bad policymaking—by central bankers, legislators, and two presidents—especially mistakes related to monetary policy and wage rates.
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Private payrolls in November increased by a solid 197,000 (seasonally adjusted) last month, according to this morning’s release from the US Labor Department. Although that’s well below the previous month’s upwardly revised gain of 304,000, today’s update is probably strong enough to give the green light to the Federal Reserve to start raising interest rates later this month.
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● US jobless claims rise but still close to historic lows | Bloomberg
● Challenger’s job cuts report: layoffs fall to 14-mo low in Nov | CG&C
● US Non-Mfg Index: growth moderates in Nov | MarketWatch
● PMI: Service sector growth in Nov improves to fastest since Aug | Markit
● US factory orders rebound in Oct after two monthly declines | Reuters
● US Consumer Comfort Index fell to 1-year low last week | Bloomberg
● ECB stimulus announcement falls short of market expectations | Reuters

Private nonfarm payrolls in the US are projected to increase by 193,000 (seasonally adjusted) in tomorrow’s November report from the Labor Department, based on The Capital Spectator’s average point forecast for several econometric estimates. The prediction marks a healthy gain, albeit one that’s substantially below October’s surprisingly strong increase.
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The 30-day moving average of the Effective Fed Funds rate is inching higher for the first time since early September. The revival of the upward bias for this key rate, although slight, is significant in the wake of yesterday’s speech by Fed Chair Janet Yellen, who said that the central bank is moving closer to raising interest rates later this month.
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● ADP: US private job growth adds the most jobs in 5 months | MarketWatch
● Yellen: Fed will likely raise interest rates this month | USA Today
● Fed’s Beige Book report: US growing at “modest” pace | Bloomberg
● Gallup’s US Job Creation Index Steady in November | Gallup
● Eurozone Retail Sales Fall Unexpectedly In October | RTT
● PMI: Eurozone Nov business growth accelerates as firms cut prices | Reuters
● PMI: China’s Private Sector Expands For First Time In 4 Months | RTT
● PMI: UK services growth hits 4-month high, economy to pick up speed | Reuters

US companies added 217,000 workers in November, according to this morning’s update of the ADP Employment Report. The gain—the most since June—marks a modest improvement over October’s upwardly revised increase of 196,000. The faster rate of growth offers a degree of support for the government’s numbers that show a dramatic rebound in payrolls in October. But even after today’s upbeat release from ADP, the year-over-year trend continues to slip for this dataset.
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The expected risk premium for the Global Market Index (GMI) slipped in November, dipping closer to the recent low reached in September. GMI — an unmanaged, market-value weighted mix of the major asset classes — is projected to earn an annualized 3.3% return over the “risk-free” rate in the long term. (For details on the equilibrium-based methodology that’s used to generate the forecasts each month, see the summary below). Today’s revised estimate, which is based on data through last month, fell 10 basis points from the previous month’s update.
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● US ISM Mfg Index falls below neutral 50 level | Bloomberg
● PMI: US mfg growth dips to 2-year low | Markit
● US auto sales increased in Nov | Reuters
● US construction spending rises to 8-year high in Oct | USN&WR
● Eurozone inflation remains at 0.1% YoY in Nov | MarketWatch
● PMI: Slow global mfg growth ticks lower in Nov | Markit
● Considering zero growth to battle climate change | NY Times