by Calculated Risk on 12/04/2014 06:33:00 PM

A few employment previews:

From me: Preview: Employment Report for November (reviewing the numbers for the month)

From Tim Duy on the employment report and the Fed Ahead of the November Employment Report

As I have said before, predicting the monthly nonfarm payroll change is a fool's errand, yet an errand we all undertake. I would pick 235k with an upside risk. More important is what happens to wage growth. I expect that to pick up over the next six months, but would be surprised to see any large gain this month.

From Andy Kierz at Business Insider: It Could Take Months Before We Find Out Friday's Jobs Report Was Great

One big factor that could weigh on the jobs number is the recent tendency for revisions to the November payroll numbers to be quite a bit larger than for other months ... Sheperdson points out that "over the past five years, the median revision between the first estimate for November and the third, published two months later, is a hefty 71K. The median for the other 11 months of the year is just +23K."

If that trend continues, we could see the November jobs number increase by tens of thousands in the later revisions early next year.

The seasonal factor for November might have been skewed by the huge job losses in 2008 and early 2009, and that might be less of a factor now. But it will take some time to know!

Friday:
• At 8:30 AM ET, the Employment Report for November. The consensus is for an increase of 230,000 non-farm payroll jobs added in November, up from the 214,000 non-farm payroll jobs added in October. The consensus is for the unemployment rate to be unchanged at 5.8% in November.

• Also at 8:30 AM, the Trade Balance report for October from the Census Bureau. The consensus is for the U.S. trade deficit to be at $41.5 billion in October from $43.0 billion in September.

• At 10:00 AM, Manufacturers' Shipments, Inventories and Orders (Factory Orders) for October. The consensus is for a 0.1 decrease in October orders.

• At 3:00 PM, Consumer Credit for October from the Federal Reserve. The consensus is for credit to increase $16.3 billion.