Friday’s NFP Prediction Indicators, Correlations, and What Our Regression Fit Tells Us

TL;DR: We built and tested prediction models on labor and manufacturing indicators to see if payrolls can be forecast systematically. Out-of-sample, the models collapse on levels - negative R² and very large errors - so no one should expect precision on the exact print. What does hold up is directional bias: claims and JOLTS internals consistently tilt …