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Ignore the Unemployment Rate (One of the most misleading numbers shaping our economy)
Wall Street Journal ^
| 02/07/2014
| By Zachary Karabell
Posted on 02/07/2014 8:57:58 AM PST by SeekAndFind
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To: jeffc
Well wait for it. It’s clear we are working our way down to full employment——the Kenyan will tell us when we get there. Just a few million more layoffs ought to do it?
21
posted on
02/07/2014 11:05:25 AM PST
by
cherokee1
(skip the names---just kick the buttz)
To: SeekAndFind
Our local news reported that unemployment is under seven percent, though one may drive around and see 20-30 percent of office, retail, and industrial space empty, for sale, or lease.
22
posted on
02/07/2014 11:10:33 AM PST
by
rey
To: SeekAndFind
102 Million adults are NOT employed.
146 million Adults are employed.
Guess the real percent of adults unemployed.
DemocRat NO care will destroy another 2 million jobs soon - per the CBO.
23
posted on
02/07/2014 11:18:49 AM PST
by
george76
(Ward Churchill : Fake Indian, Fake Scholarship, and Fake Art)
To: SeekAndFind
Unemployment rates are down but FUNemployment is at an all time high.
To: george76
RE: 102 Million adults are NOT employed.
146 million Adults are employed.
Guess the real percent of adults unemployed.
____________________________________________
That would be 248 potential workers in the US workforce. If as you say, 102 Million people are not employed, the REAL unemployment rate would be about 41% !!
BTW, where are you getting your numbers from?
To: SeekAndFind
26
posted on
02/07/2014 1:40:51 PM PST
by
george76
(Ward Churchill : Fake Indian, Fake Scholarship, and Fake Art)
To: SeekAndFind
Birth & Death adjustment is extrapolation of past data. It tells them about expansion of the work force.
27
posted on
02/07/2014 4:43:20 PM PST
by
entropy12
(If you did not vote, you helped elect the community organizer from south side of Chicago.)
To: Mad Dawgg
Obviously they can not survey every business, so it is just a statistical sample extrapolation.
Like I said, the only accurate count of jobs + self employed is how many people are paying social security tax. All earned income is subject to SS tax. Then divide that by adults of working age counted in the Census data and you will know the true picture.
Admittedly that number will show high unemployment because some people do not want to work at a job. But those people certainly should not be excluded from the ranks of unemployed.
28
posted on
02/07/2014 4:48:56 PM PST
by
entropy12
(If you did not vote, you helped elect the community organizer from south side of Chicago.)
To: SeekAndFind
Job openings - Non-farm
To: 1rudeboy
The most critical and important point I want to make is the unemployment published number excluds anyone not actively looking for jobs because they have given up any hopes of finding a suitable job. I have read and heard there are 92 million adults without a job or self employment.
30
posted on
02/07/2014 4:51:54 PM PST
by
entropy12
(If you did not vote, you helped elect the community organizer from south side of Chicago.)
To: entropy12
Ok, so stop talking about unemployment compensation (and State agencies).
For example, I'm not eligible for unemployment comp, and if I lose my job I will be counted (if the survey-taker calls me).
31
posted on
02/07/2014 4:54:43 PM PST
by
1rudeboy
To: ek_hornbeck
“A “recovery” where people with skills work at Wal-Mart isn’t much of a recovery.”
A recovery where people with skills can’t get hired at Wal-Mart is even less of one.
32
posted on
02/07/2014 6:30:43 PM PST
by
RipSawyer
(The TREE currently falling on you actually IS worse than a Bush.)
To: 1rudeboy
What are the chances you will be called?
Unless you are actively registered with some gov’t agency as a job seeker, no one in the gov’t knows you are unemp-loyed nut looking.
Why do you think those unemployment numbers get significantly revised after a month lapses? Because they were severly extrapolated and are never accurate.
Just count how many are paying social security tax. Every single soul who has a job or self employed pays that tax. Everyone else is unemployed. Why do they have to be actively looking to be counted? Because it makes a rosier picture than it is.
33
posted on
02/07/2014 10:32:26 PM PST
by
entropy12
(If you did not vote, you helped elect the community organizer from south side of Chicago.)
To: SeekAndFind
Can you or someone please enlighten me on what this birth/death data is? I keep reading about it but dont understand what it means... I know it is an estimate, but what is it an estimate of and why cant we count on it?
The Birth and Death numbers are a guesstimate of how many jobs are created and lost as a result of businesses opening and closing.
A mathmatical formula, supposedly based on the recent past, is used to guesstimate the number.
You can read more about it
here.
The Birth and Death number is applied to the non-seasonally adjusted number and run through seasonal adjustment to get the headline number of payroll jobs created.
I have not been able to determine if the non seasonaly adjusted numbers in table
B-1 include the Birth and Death numbers or not. BLS documentation tends to fall in the category of 'hiddrn in plain sight'.
Note The Birth and Death Model only applies to the Payroll data collected from business.
34
posted on
02/08/2014 1:39:22 AM PST
by
khelus
To: Mastador1; SeekAndFind
Re:For every one job open, I would say there are at least 10 candidates applying for it.
If only! I have been involved in one testing situation where I was testing against over seven hundred other applicants for ONE position, and that was just the testing phase prior to their deciding who to actually interview. On average the number of people I have been competing against for a job has been over a hundred and never less than fifty, and once again thats after the initial qualification weed out to go to the testing weed out prior to interview.
Your higher numbers are more realistic based upon what I have experience in the tri state area.
35
posted on
02/08/2014 1:43:39 AM PST
by
khelus
To: entropy12; OneWingedShark
Re:All depends on the meaning of word UNemployment....BJC
Yes, the number is a joke. They count only those receiving unemployment and those actively seeking jobs by registering with state agencies. On top of that they superimpose birth/death data to further massage the number.
The only correct number can be found by looking at how many are paying social security tax, because every single soul who has a job or a business must pay that tax. But that would be too much transparency and too much embarrassment so the govt wont tell us.
Actually the BLS has made it more complicated than that.
There are two surveys: one of households and one of businesses.
The household survey produces the unemployment rate. It does not count those collecting unemployment each month nor those registered as looking for a job.
The number collecting umemployment is used however once a year for an 'annual benchmark adjustment'.
The main manipulation of the household data is through seasonal adjustment and manipulation of which bucket you are placed. A great way to suppress the unemployment rate is to remove more and more people out of the civilian labor force.
The payroll survey produces the number of jobs created. The raw data is run through the Birth and Death model and seasonal adjustment to created the 'headline' number of jobs created.
36
posted on
02/08/2014 2:20:29 AM PST
by
khelus
To: ek_hornbeck
TRe: he real problem is that the number, originally designed for limited purposes, has come to assume totemic status. Focusing so single-mindedly on this one employment figure has made it impossible to have a cogent discussion of labor in the U.S. and to design meaningful responses to our varied economic problems.
An even bigger problem is that the official unemployment rate is a big underestimate. Everyone acknowledges that it doesn't count those who have given up looking for jobs, but it also fails to account for the vast number of underemployed: skilled workers and even professionals who are stuck in dead-end, near minimum wage (and often part-time) jobs in retail or elsewhere in the unskilled service sector. A "recovery" where people with skills work at Wal-Mart isn't much of a recovery.
Appplause
37
posted on
02/08/2014 2:24:45 AM PST
by
khelus
To: entropy12
Let's back up a minute. Your statement, that "[t]hey count only those receiving unemployment and those actively seeking jobs by registering with state agencies," is incorrect.
It's fruitless to discuss how the number is inaccurate until you acknowledge it.
38
posted on
02/08/2014 6:53:44 AM PST
by
1rudeboy
To: 1rudeboy
I should have said “Those are the ONLY accurate data the government has at their disposal.” Everything else such as surveys, extrapolation based on past data, seasonality, etc are subject to very high errors.
Just stop giving us these phony unemployment numbers which are always revised and even then they are not necessarily correct.
Just give me the exact count of social security tax collection data every 3 months. It is 99% accurate. And we already know last Census numbers for able bodied adults in the population.
DO not get hung up on my statement. Get with the crux of the problem, which is phony numbers given out by our government. Stop looking at trees and get lost in the forest. Build more maturity of thought. It is childish to pick on “statements” and miss the central object.
39
posted on
02/08/2014 10:18:47 AM PST
by
entropy12
(If you did not vote, you helped elect the community organizer from south side of Chicago.)
To: entropy12
I don’t think you understand. If the object is to convince people that the government releases phony or otherwise inaccurate numbers (yes!), then you will get nowhere with them by arguing facts that are demonstrably false (no!).
40
posted on
02/08/2014 10:29:37 AM PST
by
1rudeboy
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