Search






Jeff's Amazon.com Wish List

Archive Calendar

November 2024
M T W T F S S
 123
45678910
11121314151617
18192021222324
252627282930  

Archives

Unemployment Rate: 8.9%?

Doubtful. I mean, sure, if you reduce the size of the work force as a constant, as the Department of Labor had been doing, the unemployment rate will eventually drop.

Meanwhile, in a world constrained by the laws of physics, Gallup finds a different trend.

The MSM, naturally, will report the former number and largely ignore the latter. As they begin their latest push to re-elect a Marxist to the presidency of a capitalist nation.

FOR FREEDOM!

10 Replies to “Unemployment Rate: 8.9%?”

  1. Joe says:

    Is PPP doing the numbers for this.

    Transparency!

    Oh, and Fuck Michael Moore.

  2. bh says:

    Doubtful. I mean, sure, if you reduce the size of the work force as a constant, as the Department of Labor had been doing, the unemployment rate will eventually drop.

    Yep. (You can change the time scale down to two or five years at the top right of the chart.)

  3. Bob Reed says:

    Lies, damn lies, and, well, statistics. Most of the mushy middlers don’t even understand what goes into the number anyway; it just magically appears every few weeks! They’ll neither consider, nor will the media report, that the work-force-participation is the lowest since 1984…

    And feel better about having voted for Obama, natch.

  4. Bob Reed says:

    OT:

    By the way bh,

    I saw the excerable Howard Dean and WI state senator Snider on TV last night, Snider by telephone. And it seems that the latest version of the meme being pushed is that the “fleebaggers” are doing no more in WI than the Rethugs! in the US Senate did for the past 2 years in the various instances where they filibustered Obama and the Democrat’s legislation. I nearly puked…

    I figure this must be circulating up your way, and might suggest as a rebuttal to point out that the filibustering Senate Rethugs were actually there to do so, taking part in the process, which is where the fallacious analogy of the meme breaks down.

    Maybe you should circulate this counter-point amongst your GOP pals, if they haven’t already come up with it, or a more effective rebuttal, already.

  5. Joe says:

    Here is another numbers lie: That social security and medicare can survive…

    Karl Denninger over at the Market Ticker makes the same points I’ve made myself time and time again: Social Security is not an asset, but a tax; there is no “Trust Fund”; and the Federal Government can stiff you on your SS benefit any time it wants to (which, the way things are going, will be sooner rather than later). Denninger explains much better than I can how and why Social Security (and Medicare to an even greater extent) is completely broken in principle.

    I do disagree with Denninger’s statement that “[w]e can fix Social Security in part by indexing the retirement age upward.” This is not a “fix”, but simply pushing the failure further on into the future. Calculations of this type depend on the idea that we can accurately predict the economic future on time-horizons of decades, which we pretty clearly cannot. Mutatis mutandis, increasing the retirement age for SS will make it solvent for a longer period of time…but only if the future unfolds exactly as we expect it to. And only if the demographic makeup of the US stays in a net-positive growth curve. And only if our GDP and inflationary pressure doesn’t change dramatically. And…well, you get the point.

    If things do not pencil they do not pencil.

  6. bh says:

    Yeah, I’ve been hearing that talking point floated quite a bit lately, Bob. The response I’ve heard is very similar to your recommendation. “One filibusters from the floor of the Senate, not across the border while dodging police.”

    I don’t think they’ll get much traction with this line. It’s a spin too far.

  7. McGehee says:

    Fuck Michael Moore.

    I saw Jabba the Filmmaker in the local red-light district carrying a sign that said exactly that.

    No takers.

  8. Squid says:

    As they begin their push to re-elect a Marxist to the presidency of a capitalist nation.

    Begin? With respect, I think they’re about two years into that effort already.

  9. Jeff G. says:

    Begin? With respect, I think they’re about two years into that effort already.

    Yes. That was supposed to read “their latest push”.

  10. Bob Reed says:

    “Push” or “putsch”..?

    Because either might work.

    Or, scratch that; 2008 was the “putsch”, the MBM is trying to cement the Euro-ization of the US by helping in his re-election. Besides, as the old cliche goes, “you dance with who brung ya”. Once he’s out, a lot of their shenanigans will become evident to even the muddy middle.

Comments are closed.