Did you ever get the feeling that they are just making this stuff up?

4Feb/115

Did you ever get the feeling that they are just making this stuff up?

By "they" I mean the US government, more specifically the Bureau of Labor Statistics, and by "stuff" I'm talking about what is commonly known as the unemployment rate. And the reason I think someone there is smoking crack, or something like that, is because the metrics in today's employment report defies reason.

According to the BLS the number of non-farm payroll jobs added to the economy in January was 36,000; which is a HUGE! miss from the expected number of 145,000, but somehow the overall unemployment rate dropped to 9 percent!?! How is this possible, you ask? Well it's some good ol' statistical legerdemain.

You see, the number of "unemployed persons" dropped by 600,000 last month as well; but that's not because they got jobs. They merely dropped off the statistical radar because they stopped collecting unemployment benefits (their 99 weeks were up), so we don't really know why they aren't looking for work anymore, just that they aren't. So, voila !, less people looking for work = the unemployment rate going down.

Never mind that unseasonally adjusted U-6 (total unemployed plus thiose who have goven up looking for work) surged, going from 16.6% to 17.3% . Never mind that the number of people not in the labor force has increased by over 2 million folks in the last year. Never mind that the number of "unemployed persons" has dropped by nearly a million in the last 2 months, despite less than 200,000 jobs being added in the same period of time. And never mind that the labor force participation has dropped to a 26 year low of 64.2 % . Silly wingnuts, facts, reason, and logic are for h8terz! All you need to know is that lord Obamus the great has managed to bring down the unemployment rate by nearly 1 percent since the November elections by virtue of his sheer awesomeness!!!

So remember, HAPPY DAYS ARE HERE AGAIN!!!, the President's superlative "pivot" skills have paid off, and his laser-like focus on jobs has clearly borne fruit. It's time for all you h8terz to stop talking about Obama's failed economic policies, get with the program, and start offering him praise and laud...

This concludes this POWIP PSA, you have been informed off all of the latest employment related talking points that you will hear in the coming weeks. If any new talking points arise, we will inform you as soon as we catch wind of them.

And in all seriousness, we continue to pray to God that all those truly seeking work will find some, and trust in the good Lord to provide for them as He does for us all.

Rocketman

Tagged as: BLS, Economics, Obama's failed economic policies, Unemployment Leave a comment

Comments (5) Trackbacks (1) ( subscribe to comments on this post )

Dan Collins
February 4th, 2011 - 10:29

Bureau of Labor Statistics has changed methodology, based, they say, on Census information: http://www.bls.gov/cps/

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- Bob Reed
  February 4th, 2011 - 11:35
  
  I saw the changes mentioned in the BLS report I linked. That may have been how they determined that 600k people had “stopped being unemloyed”. Here’s hoping the new information helps in future data analysis.
  
  I still feel like we’re being “bamboozled” by reporting a decrease in the unemployment rate, which, you know will be ballyhooed far and wide as proooooooooooof! that things are getting better thanks to the benevolence and brilliance of lord Obamus.
  
  I have to wonder where all of the garment rending regarding the horror of a “jobless recovery” has gone; perhaps the same place where all the anti-war rhetoric has gone.
  
  One can talk about all of the phony-baloney jobs saved and created all day long, but when 2 million people have left the work force in the last year, due to discouragement or whatever, it kind of puts the lie to all that rhetoric.
  
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  - Dan Collins
    February 4th, 2011 - 11:46
    
    Completely agreed. I think that by June it becomes apparent that Obama’s going to have a lot of trouble running for a second term.
    
    I was kind of hoping that meep could do the analysis of how the metrics were changed, and what the impact is.
    
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    - Bob Reed
      February 4th, 2011 - 16:04
      
      Maybe she’ll get a chance to check it all out. The gist of it seems to be that they are having the census bureau give them data from surveys they conduct on an ongoing basis; ones that delve further into the length of time unemployed and whether the person is even looking for a job. This is in lieu of the BLS extrapolating these figures based on other sources, such as unemployment claims and such.
      
      The big reduction over the past 2 months seems to be based more on people no longer even looking for work and therefore dropping out of the workforce altogether. For purposes of the oft-cited U-3 number, to be counted one has to be currently looking for work, or have looked for work in the four weeks prior to the survey.
      
      According to the zerohedge guy Tyler Durden, if the folks that have left the workforce, but still wanted a job were included in the figure, then the unemployment rate would be in the high 12 percent range.
      
      http://www.zerohedge.com/article/persons-not-labor-force-who-want-job-now-jumps-all-time-record
      
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Bob Reed
February 4th, 2011 - 16:40

Here’s a link to the BLS handbook of methods.

http://www.bls.gov/opub/hom/

I won’t have time to check it out until next week though.

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