The Employment Cost Index (ECI) has become the new black on economic fashion circles and this morning's data will likely disappoint some. While meeting expectations with a 0.6% QoQ rise, this is slower than the 0.7% QoQ growth in Q3 and what is more problematic is much of the rise was driven by 2.5% YoY rise in Natural Resources industries (which we suspect will absolutely not be there going forward given the layoffs and collapse of the Shale industry). Charts: Bloomberg