Saturday, January 14, 2012

How To Improve The Unemployment Rate - (encourage more people to give up)

I've heard a lot of Lamestream Media members almost pissing their pants for the last few weeks, gushing over the improvements in the U.S. unemployment rate. 

Yes, some people have gone back to work.  But here's why appearances are deceiving. 

The Washington drones who monitor the nation's employment stats don't count people who give up looking for work.  If you haven't applied for a job in several months, you don't count as "unemployed".  You enter the ranks of Obama's Disappeared. 

Nearly ONE MILLION WORKERS have disappeared from the work force under the regime of Barack Obama.  That's ONE MILLION WORKERS who have said "screw it", and moved back in with Mama, decided to work off the books, become a kept man, or go into the drug trade.  ONE MILLION. 

Here's a chart showing the increased number of workers in each post-recession recovery, going back to 1954:


Hey, if you operate from Chicago, where a massive number of dead people still vote, it's just as easy to assume that ONE MILLION WORKERS don't exist.

8 comments:

Hot Sam said...

The change in unemployment from November to December was purely based on more employed and fewer unemployed. The labor force was stable.

But yes, you are correct. In the past several years the labor force has declined dramatically. Demographics plays a role. There were some deferred retirements from 2008 and 2009 which occurred in 2010 and 2011. Also, school enrollment kicked up because of the weak job market, so there were fewer young people entering. The key is to look at the prime working age population.

The broader measures if unemployment which include marginally attached, discouraged, and part time for economic reasons is still high, but falling.

It's not surprising we are seeing job growth a year and a half after a recession has ended. The pace is uncomfortably slow. Also, the jobs added are generally lower wage than the jobs we lost. Not surprising, not a bad thing, but nothing to cheer about. Wages and employment are resetting.

The lamestream media has given this coverage, but in paragraph 7 while they crow about improvement in the headlines.

The strongest sector is education and health which never went negative. Business services is most improved, but 70% of those jobs are temp. Food and drink places and Food and Beverage retailers are doing much better. Leisure and Hospitality has improved. Construction is still languishing, but showed some growth. Information services is still reeling. Manufacturing is showing slow growth. Real estate and financial services are hurting for jobs. Local government is the biggest job loser. But growth is pretty broad.

I wouldn't be surprised if headline unemployment is below 8% by election day. Obama will benefit from that even if he doesn't deserve it. Still, 8% is too damned high two years after the recession ended, especially since he said it wouldn't go above 8%.

I also wouldn't be surprised to see unemployment rise when kids start graduating from their masters programs and temps don't go to perm.

Many illegal immigrants left the country, but remittances are now rising indicating improvement in takehome pay or employment. We might see them come back, putting pressure on employment.

CenTexTim said...

And as Nick points out, many of the new jobs are retail and seasonal (Christmas).

On the other hand, loss of local government jobs is a plus (not for the individuals affected, of course, but in a big picture sense).

Drops in local government revenue, whether through decreases in sales tax, property tax, or any other tax, is generally a good thing. It's one way to put government on a diet.

Dave K said...

A couple of other statistics you'll rarely if ever see mentioned:

Not in labor force:
01/1/2009 - 79,734,000
12/1/2011 - 87,212,000

Labor force participation rate:
01/01/2009 - 65.4%
12/01/2011 - 63.8%

For more fun with statistics, take a day and rummage through this site:

http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/

CharlieDelta said...

I never even started looking after I was let go from my job this last September because it's a waste of time in this pathetic broke state of Kommiefornia. Of course there is no work here. They've run all the businesses out of state by taxing the crap out of them, and are now stuck with millions of illegals and unemployed people desperate for income. It's insane!

I predicted my own demise in a post while y'all were living it up at Blownstar 2011. I said in that post that I didn't expect to have a job by the end of summer and BAM! The end of August was the end of my employment. It wasn't hard to predict since all the highway construction projects in San Diego dried up in early 2010. We were just barely hanging on for the last 6 months I was there. The last few weeks were miserably slow and I was ready to just quit. I felt bad for making what I was when there was nothing for me to do but scrounge for work.

Thank God I'm gettin the hell out of here. I can't imagine the folks with mortgages, raising kids/teenagers, tuition, car loans, etc. What the hell are they going to do? How are they ever going to survive this nightmare?

I'm glad I won't have to stay here to find out, because as a single guy with a truck that's paid for, no mortgage, no debt of any kind,and no children that I know of, I would be struggling to make the most basic ends meet, and I don't have the balls to risk prison time by slinging dope...

Hot Sam said...

I'm stuck here in the People's Republic of California, Charlie. There are pockets of resistance still fighting for sanity in state government. It's almost hopeless since more and more leftist lemmings and 40%ers who pay no taxes poor in.

Buying a house was the worst thing I did here. I pay about $9000 in property taxes for schools that suck, public employees who don't serve, roads with potholes, dirty streets, and bums on every corner. For what I pay, I expect schools producing Nobel prize winners, public employees who give me a massage while other employees are doing my work, roads smooth as glass, and a cop on every corner.

There has never been a state so rich in resources and poor in leadership, character, and common sense. It's a perfect example of entrepreneurs building wealth and jobs, and leftist vermin moving in to occupy it. They are best described as a virus or a cancer. The funny thing is that many democrats in Red states are responsible and hard working because their environment rewards that.

ΛΕΟΝΙΔΑΣ said...

Nick, You may get your wish of a "cop on every corner". The slack in many state and local govt revenues is being taken up by fines, penalties and "fees". If you do not believe it just check out the bail schedule for ALL violations and infractions in Commiefornia. Also, those "pockets of resistance" in the central valley agricultural areas are slowly being mopped up by the environazis of Sacramento and their allies in the coastal counties.
In college an economics instructor had this sage advice which we followed in 2004 and Clay will soon be joining: "When the water reaches the upper decks; follow the rats."

Hot Sam said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Unknown said...

For the category asking student to vote for celebrities who seem to be good at math, actress Kim Tae Hee ranked first with 43.4% of the votes, and Lee Seung Gi followed with 30.9% of the votes. According to the students, “Lee Seung Gi looks smart and intelligent” and “Kim Tae Hee went to Seoul National University, she is smart for real.”