With the Weekly Jobless Claims bouncing around a new 43-year low at 220,000, it's time to review the state of the US labor market.

Yes, I know this research piece isn't going to generate an instant Trade Alert for you.

But it is essential in your understanding of the big picture.

There are also thousands of students who read my website looking for career advice, and I have a moral obligation to read the riot act to them.

With a 4.1% headline unemployment rate, the US economy is now at its theoretical employment maximum. If you can't get a job now, you never will.

We may see a few more tenths of a percent decline in the rate from here, but no more. To get any lower than that you have to go all the way back to WWII.

Then there was even a shortage of one-armed, three-fingered, illiterate recruits with venereal disease, the minimum US Army recruitment standards of the day.

Speaking to readers across the country and perusing the Department of Labor data, I can tell you that not all is equal in the jobs market today.

You can blame America's halls of higher education, which are producing graduates totally out of sync with the nation's actual skills needs.

Take a look at this table of graduating majors to job offers, and you'll see what I am talking about:

Major - Job Offers Offered per Graduating Major

Computer Science - 21:1
Engineering - 15:1
Physical Sciences (oil) - 13:1
Humanities - 5:1
Business and accounting - 4:1
Economics - 4:1
Agriculture - 2:1
Education - 0.4:1
Health Sciences - 0.2:1

To clarify the above data, there are 21 companies attempting to hire each computer science graduate today, while there are five kids battling it out to get each job in Health Sciences.

To understand what's driving these massive jobs per applicant disparities, take a look at the next table nationally ranking graduating majors desired by corporations.

Graduating Majors Desired by Employers

81% - Business and Accounting
76% - Engineering
64% - Computer science
34% - Economics
21% - Physical Science
12% - Humanities
5% - Agriculture
2% - Health Science

There is something screamingly obvious about these numbers.

Colleges are not producing what employers want.

This is creating enormous imbalances in the jobs market.

It explains why computer science students are landing $150,000-a-year jobs straight out of school, complete with generous benefits and health care. Many employers in Silicon Valley are now offering to pay down student debt in order to get the most desirable candidates to sign a contract.

In the meantime, Health Sciences and Humanities graduates are lucky to land a $25,000-a-year posting at a nonprofit with no benefits and Obamacare. And there are no offers to pay down student debt, which can rise to as much as $200,000 for an Ivy League degree.

Agriculture grads usually go to work on a family farm, which they eventually inherit.

As a result of these dismal figures, the character of American education is radically changing.

With students now graduating with an average of $35,000 in debt, no one can afford to remain jobless upon graduation for long.

That's why the number of Humanities graduates has declined from 9% in 2012 to 6% today.

Colleges are getting the message. Since 1990, one-third of those with the words "liberal arts" in their name or prospectus have dropped the term.

Students who do stick with anthropology, philosophy, English literature, or history are learning a few tricks as well.

Add a minor in Accounting and Management and it will increase your first-year salary by $13,000. Toss in some Data Base Management skills, and the increase will be even greater.

And online marketing? The world is your oyster!

These realities have even come home to my own family.

I have a daughter working on a PhD in Education from the University of California, and the mathematics workload is enormous, especially in statistics.

It is all so she can qualify for government research grants upon graduation.

The students themselves are partly to blame for this mismatch.

While recruiters report an average of $45,000 a year as an average first year offer, the graduates themselves are expecting an average first-year income of $53,000.

Companies almost universally report that interviewees have a "bloated" sense of their own abilities, poor interviewing skills, and unrealistic pay expectations.

Some one-third of all applicants are unqualified for the jobs for which they are applying.

The good news is that everyone gets a job eventually. A National Association of Colleges and Employers survey says that companies plan to hire 5% more college graduates than last year.

And where do all of those Humanities grads eventually go.

A lot become financial advisors.

Just ask.

Sorry, STEM Students Only!

It started with a slow drip.

Then it became a trickle.

Now it is an undeniable torrent.

Negative economic data reports, once as rare as hen's teeth, have suddenly become as common as NRA bumper stickers at a Trump rally. The economic data flow has definitely turned sour.

Is this a growth scare? Or is it the beginning of a full-blown recession, the return of which investors have been dreading for the past nine years.

The data flow was hotter than hot going into January, taking the stock market to a new all-time high.

We only got final confirmation of this a few weeks ago, when the last report on Q4 GDP rose by 0.2% to 2.9%, one of the best readings in years.

Then the rot began.

At first it was just one or two minor, inconsequential reports here and there. Then they ALL turned bad. Not by large amounts, but by small incremental ones, frequent enough to notice.

The February Dallas Fed General Business Activity Index dropped from 28 to 21, the March Institute of Supply Management Manufacturing Activity declined from 61 to 59, while Services Activity shaved a point, from 59 to 58.

The big one has been the March Nonfarm Payroll Report - that printed a soft 103,000 - which was far below the recent average of 200,000.

As recently as this morning, the National Association of Home Builders Sentiment Index dropped a point from 70 to 69.

When you see one cockroach, it is easy to ignore. When it becomes a massive infestation, it is a different story completely.

The potential explanations for the slowdown abound.

There is no doubt that the Trade War with China is eroding business confidence, as is the secret renegotiation of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).

Decisions on major capital investments by companies were a slam dunk three months ago. Now, many are definitely on hold.

There is abundant evidence that the Chinese are scaling back investment in the US and pausing new trade deals with American counterparties. They have been boycotting purchases of new US Treasury bonds for eight months.

The new import duty for Canadian timber is raising the cost of low-end housing, worsening affordability and causing builders to cut back.

Instead they are refocusing efforts on high-end housing where profit margins are much wider.

Shooting wars with Syria, North Korea, and Iran are permanently just over the horizon, further giving nervous investors pause.

And the general level of chaos coming out of Washington, including the unprecedented level of administrations firings and resignations, are scaring a lot of people.

Since I am a person who puts my money where my mouth is every day of the year, I'll give you my 10 cents worth on what all this really means.

Two weeks ago I started piling into to an ultra-aggressive 100% "RISK ON" trading book, loading the boat with a range of asset classes, including longs in financial and technology stocks, and gold and big shorts in the bond market.

My bet is that while however serious all of the above concerns may be, they pale in comparison with Q1 2018 earnings growth of historic proportions that is now unfolding, prompted by the December tax bill.

The second 10$ correction of 2018 had nothing to do with fundamentals. It was all about hot money retreating to the sideline until the bad news waned and the good news returned.

And so it has. Forecast Q1 earnings are now looking to come in above 20% YOY. These will be reports for the ages.

My bet has paid off in spades, with followers of my Mad Hedge Trade Alert Service up 10.70% so far in April, up +17.46% in 2018, and up a breathtaking 54.04% on a trailing 12-month basis. It is a performance that causes my competitors to absolutely weep.

If fact, the rest of 2018 could play out exactly as it has done so far, with frantic sell-offs following the end of each quarterly reporting period, followed by slow grind-up rallies leading into the next. Technology will lead the rallies every time.

Which means we may go absolutely nowhere in the indexes 2018, but have a whole lot of fun getting there. If you see this coming you can make a ton of money trading around it.

With our current positions, Mad Hedge followers could be up 25% on the year as soon as mid-May.

Which raises the question of, "When will the recession really start?"

My bet is sometime in 2019, when earnings growth downshifts from 20% to 10% or even 5%.

If this happens in the face of an inverting yield curve where short-term interest rates are higher than long-term ones, and a continuing trade war AND shooting wars, and broadening Washington scandals, then a recession becomes a sure thing.

A bear market should precede that by about six months.

So date those high-risk positions, don't marry them.