Good morning.
Friday in Whitewater will be partly sunny with high of 84. Sunrise is 6:21 AM and sunset 7:26 PM for 13h 05m 09s of daytime. The moon is a waxing crescent with 36.7% of its visible disk illuminated.
On this day in 1945, the Japanese Instrument of Surrender is signed by Japan and the major warring powers aboard the battleship USS Missouri in Tokyo Bay.
Japanese Foreign Minister Mamoru Shigemitsu signs the Instrument of Surrender on behalf of the Japanese Government, on board USS Missouri (BB-63), 2 September 1945. Lieutenant General Richard K. Sutherland, U.S. Army, watches from the opposite side of the table. Foreign Ministry representative Toshikazu Kase is assisting Mr. Shigemitsu. Photograph from the Army Signal Corps Collection in the U.S. National Archives.
The national economy continues to add hundreds of thousands of new jobs per month.
Lauren Kaori Gurley reports Labor market added 315,000 jobs in August, a bright spot in the economy (‘A stellar 20 consecutive months of sustained job growth more than recovered the millions of jobs lost during the pandemic, although hiring slowed in August’):
The U.S. labor market added 315,000 jobs in August, hitting a 20-month streak in strong job growth that’s powering an economy through ominously high inflation.
The unemployment rate ticked up slightly to 3.7 percent, according to a monthly jobs report released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics on Friday, with 344,000 more people unemployed than the previous month.
The August jobs gains were the lowest monthly pick-up so far this year, but the labor market remains an area of strength for the economy, especially as the Federal Reserve raises interest rates to rein in blistering inflation.
The biggest gains were in professional and business services, which added 68,000 jobs in August, shooting past its pre-pandemic numbers. The industry saw the strongest gains in computer systems design, management and technical consulting, and architectural and engineering services, while legal services lost 9,000 jobs.
A few points that should be obvious —
These are national employment gains, where some parts of the country are doing better than others.
There’s local talk about growth, about growth in-and-of-itself, or (for the more candid) growth as a way out of stagnation. Growth, however, happens in a competitive environment between communities, where prospective residents choose a place they feel, fundamentally, is safe and clean. Safe and clean includes safe streets, clean air & water, and a confidence that officials deliver public services efficiently, economically, and humbly. No sensible person or businessperson — and almost all people are sensible — chooses a place solely because they read a press release or saw a Facebook post.
Prospects will walk about, and look at a community on their own. Marketing decides nothing; at best, it gets the city someone’s first glance. Whitewater spends too much time fussing over marketing, and not enough time acknowledging that new prospects are easily as sensible as any current resident. They can and will judge on their own.
America is a big county, the Midwest is a big region, and Wisconsin is a big place: people will pass over a community that fails in the fundamentals for a community that accomplishes the fundamentals. America is growing — to enjoy some of that growth in Whitewater means setting aside airy claims and being candid. Serious and competitive people respect candor, and will rise to a challenge. They’ll want to be part of a rebuilding project. By contrast, serious people will smile and but then walk away from the latest too-good-to-be-true marketing pitch.
Now, I’m here, and I’ll not be going anywhere else (as there is no place yet half so beautiful to me as Whitewater). Love of this small and beautiful place does not, however, induce blindness. Seeing and thinking clearly about growth means thinking about what people and businesses — the elements of growth — themselves think.
They’ll not settle for marketing; they need to be confident in the fundamentals. Whitewater most certainly can get the fundamentals right, keep them right, and through that dedicated effort enjoy the growth that other places in America now enjoy.
Penguin Gets Custom Orthopedic Boots to Help His Waddle: