Bill Wilson, ALG:
Since Barack Obama assumed office, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the total population over age 16 has grown by 5.845 million to 240.5 million, and yet, since then, the civilian labor force has actually shrunk by 349,000 — from about 154.2 million to 153.8 million.
This is a startling contradiction, and it is at the heart of why the unemployment rate is much higher than the 8.5 percent being reported.
The problem is that the measured civilian labor force participation rate has fallen from 65.7 percent to 64 percent since Jan. 2009, reflecting people who have lost hope and simply stopped looking for work. If those people were still counted, the actual civilian labor force would be 4.176 million higher than is reported at about 158 million.
Based on this analysis, the number of unemployed is actually closer to 17 million instead of the 13 million reported jobless. That is simply astounding.
Instead of 8.5 percent, the effective unemployment rate should be closer to 10.9 percent, and the underemployed closer to 17.4 percent, or 27.3 million. This is what we mean when we say that the unemployment rate is no longer a valid economic indicator.
[…]
To get the economy moving again, the government needs to slash corporate tax rates, which are the highest in the world of advanced economies. It is imperative that the regulatory overkill come to an end. The dollar needs to be strengthened to lower costs and stabilize energy and food costs. The debt needs to be paid down and retired, and the budget balanced. Onerous federal securities laws and state-by-state blue sky laws need to be repealed that make it cost-ineffective for new businesses to raise capital.
In short, it must become competitive to do business here in America again. And that will probably not happen so long as Obama is in office. It is clear the nation needs new leadership that is intent on actually creating jobs and restoring hope, instead of ignoring the despair of Obama’s lost labor force.
Not surprisingly, the ObamaCons are gaming the unemployment numbers, and with the help of a compliant and complicit legacy media, they are creating and normalizing the narrative of a slowly healing economy under Obama’s steady hand — a complete and utter lie being manufactured into a conventional “truth” through a cynical propaganda effort coming from the White House and being perpetuated by an activist mainstream press bent on protecting its progressive champion.
However, as Jim Pethokoukis points out, for ObamaCo to try running a re-election campaign on a carefully constructed mirage is risky:
Those headline economic numbers are terribly misleading, hardly reflecting the devastation most Americans still see every day. An 8.5 percent unemployment rate? Please. If the size of the U.S. labor force was as large as it was when Barack Obama took office, the unemployment rate would be 10.9 percent. But since so many people have gotten discouraged and stopped looking for work– and thus disappeared by government statisticians — the jobless number has been artificially depressed. A better gauge of the jobs picture is the broader U-6 rate, which includes part-timers who would rather have full-time jobs. It stands at a whopping 15.2 percent.
Then there is that 200,000 number. As Goldman Sachs points out:
Part of the strong gain reflected a 42k increase in employment for “couriers and messengers”, which likely reflects temporary employment for holiday gift delivery persons. A similar spike occurred last December and was reversed in the following month, indicating that the payroll statistics are not properly seasonally adjusting for this type of hiring. Taking this into account, December employment growth was still firmer than the preceding two months, but the underlying trend is likely still below 200k.
And even 8.5 percent is way off from where Team Obama said the unemployment rate would be if Congress passed the $800 billion stimulus […]
[…]
[…] as it is, this may well be the zenith of the Obama recovery, what with Europe weakening and massive policy uncertainty here at home — including massive tax hikes scheduled for 2013.
The “beauty” of Obama’s campaigning strategy is that, if the economy craters, it is not his fault. Bush, Wall Street, selfish millionaires and billionaires, a political conspiracy to thwart him, racism — these are all to blame. If the economy improves, it’s because of him — and his willingness to fight a recalcitrant, politicized congress and take bold steps to get American going again, because, well, “we can’t wait” (unless there’s a tee time available; in which case, what’s another four hours?). If the jobs numbers don’t reach the magic 8% unemployment, even with all the tinkering (Matt McDonald at Hamilton Place Strategies notes that to reach that point, the economy would have to grow at 4.8% and yield 254,000 jobs monthly between now and the run-up to the election, a clip we haven’t seen since 1999), Obama will simply point to the slow decline in rates he’ll be able to massage out of the data and then lie directly and without reservation to the American people.
Because he’s all in — and as the last few days have shown, he has no fidelity to the Constitution, and in fact looks for ways to actively subvert it in order to assure power and control, and the continuation of the leftist project to reduce the role of representative government and build a technocratic Utopia run by a centralized bureaucracy and a permanent power elite.
For the children.
Well, for his children anyway.
But not the British children.
VDH thinks Obamas election strategy will be rope a dope.
Washington, Washington…
[…] for Obama during this election year, the crappy economy is a win/win. Jeff G esplains it: The “beauty” of Obama’s campaigning strategy is that, if the economy craters, it is not his […]
They can trumpet the “improvement” in their “economic indicators,” but the economic indicators on my block show a lot of guys out of work and barely scraping by. When half your neighbors, friends, family, church members, etc. are all looking for work and selling off assets to buy food and fuel, it’s hard to accept the rosy news out of Washington.
I know plenty of people whose grown children have moved back in with them, and not out of choice or laziness on the kids’ part. I know plenty of people who are working two crap jobs for less than they made at their previous job, and yet feel lucky because they have enough income to make the mortgage payments. And many, if not most, of these folks are not going to vote for the incumbents who set up this environment, now matter how often they’re told that Obama & Co are doing a heckuva job, or how many times they’re told it’s all Bush’s fault.
In this, as in so many other areas, we have the advantages of “truth” and “reality” and “objective evidence” on our side. Concepts we need to do a better job of explaining to our friends in the so-called mainstream.
Debate idea:
“Mr. President, how do you explain the fact that there are 6 million less jobs in America since you brought your hope and change? And then, please explain why your unemployment number doesn’t match the number of people out of work. Never mind, I’ll explain it for you: You’re not counting all the people out of work to get to your unemployment number. It would be like not counting your putts and saying you shot a 68. That’s cheating, and no golfer worth his salt would do it. So I guess I answered it myself.”
That night, you can bet your ass there’d be an endless stream of talking heads explaining that putts really shouldn’t count, and that according to Arnie Palmer, Ike took a mulligan on the 14th at Andrews one time in 1953, so what’s the big deal anyway? RAAAACIST!
Interesting group of pieces at Washington Monthly all around the idea “What If Obama Loses? Imagining the consequences of a GOP victory.”
From the end of one is this little bit of projection.
Even if they then lose, their antigovernment agenda will live on.
There’s that word again. Someday, I’d like to see at least one of the national scribblers demonstrate an understanding of the distinction between “limited government” and “anti-government.” I’m anti-corruption. I’m anti-nanny-state. But I’m not anti-government. In fact, I’m a staunch defender of a couple of documents that spell out in plain terms a handful of things for which government is a necessary evil. Granted, the documents were written more than a hundred years ago by guys who never heard of an iPhone…
Anyways, I’ll give the scribblers their first pop quiz for free: the bomb-throwers and anarchists were part of A) the 2010 Tea Party demonstrations on the National Mall, or 2) the 2011 OWS felony camping trip from hell? Show your work.
I bookmarked this so I could remind myself everytime these new numbers come out.
You are who they say you are Squid
and you’ll like it! if you know what’s good for you.
Are full time college students still counted as employees?
Bit harder to fudge this number.
He’s losing another force also.
I wonder when the polling firms will get around to adjusting their samples.
“I wonder when the polling firms will get around to adjusting their samples.”
Ha! You kidder.
I did not specify a direction.
In that case, we may as well assume they already have adjusted, in the direction of a lie, of course.
And more tweaking by them will be needed as the year unfolds.
If the Tea Party is an anti-government mob, is it safe to call the Occutards a pro-government mob?