On the other hand, uncertainty about the employment outlook diminished significantly in September, after rising slightly in August. This improvement reflects the much better-than-expected non-farm payrolls gains in September, which highlighted the strong resilience of the US labour market, after a series of reports pointing to a gradual yet unmistakable slowdown.
In the Eurozone, the European Commission’s economic uncertainty index remained broadly stable in September (black curve), masking sectoral differences. In the services sector, uncertainty fell slightly (green curve) while it remained stable in industry (grey curve). However, consumers’ uncertainty picked up again sharply (blue curve), as did retail uncertainty (yellow curve), while it continued to trend upwards in the construction sector (red curve).
