Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen: Recession risk 'not completely off the table'

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen says the Biden administration is still not ruling out the risk of a recession, even amid a strong labor market with historically low unemployment.

"It's not completely off the table," Ms. Yellen told CBS' "Face the Nation" in an interview that aired Sunday. "But we would expect, with the job market as strong as it is now, to see a slower pace of ongoing job gains."

The June jobs report released last week showed that the U.S. economy remained resilient despite persistent but cooling inflation, with 4.4% wage growth, a .1% unemployment decrease to 3.6% and 209,000 jobs added.

Although the number of new jobs was below estimates, the strong labor force buoyed expectations of another interest rate hike from the Federal Reserve to further combat inflation.

Ms. Yellen said Americans should soon expect to see far fewer new jobs becoming available.

"Prime age labor force participation is at the highest level in several decades, so we've seen this strong job market attract workers back to it," she said. "But as that stabilizes at a high level, we should expect the monthly job gains to be coming down toward a more normal level."