Posted on 01/09/2018 5:21:20 AM PST by Oshkalaboomboom
We’ve already started to hear this lie: the US is at full employment. That nearly everyone who wants a job has got a job.
The lie started during President Obama’s second term, when the job market was truly lousy. And now that President Trump is in charge, the lie is again coming out of the mouths of economists.
Let me be clear about something. Parts of the US economy are doing better than they were post-recession. Other parts haven’t even gotten back to their pre-Great Recession levels.
And, if you believe Trump, the economy will do much better now that changes have been made to the tax system. I’ll believe that when I see it.
The job market is the trickiest part of the economy to get a handle on. The unemployment rate in the US is down to 4.1 percent, which is less than half of what it was during the worst of the Great Recession of 2009.
So, yes, that’s better. A lot better.
If you’ve been following this column for any length of time you already know the failings of the survey that comes up with the unemployment rate. The safeguards against false reporting are almost nonexistent.
You also know that the real unemployment rate — the one that includes people who have become too discouraged to even look for a job — is still at a lofty 8.1 percent.
But there’s another inconvenient number that the government produces that shows that the job market isn’t as healthy as whatever party that occupies the White House would have you believe.
This figure is called the Labor Force Participation Rate and, as of last Friday’s most recent employment report, it stood at just 60.1 percent.
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
I don’t know if it is drastic, but I did see a report in the last month or so that the welfare system paid out less benefits in 2017 than 2016.
They shouldn’t call it the “Great Recession”. They should just refer to the Obama Days, much like my old friend referred to the Hoover Days.
The U-6 number that I’ve always followed had an uptick of .1 in December, 2017.
Of course, Government has lied to me since, FOREVER, so who knows what to believe? Life in The Heartland is good. Wisconsin unemployment is around only 3%, so people in my state ARE working. (Well, the ones that WANT to and know how to and can pass a drug test!)
https://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t15.htm
Here’s by state:
https://www.bls.gov/lau/stalt.htm
A certain portion of the ABLE population doesn’t want work.
On the other hand I have seen people in wheel chairs,or others who are considered “slow”,working.
Why can they work while others get everything paid for?
If the government would stop accommodating and incouraging people to take the “freebies” when it is not truly necessary we could possibly reach full employment.
no need to doctor the numbers.
“I know people who wouldn’t take a job if you offered them one hundred dollars an hour to do inventory for a blind liquor store owner” P.J. O’Rourke
What is full employment? Well, for starters, the u-3 employment rate is a terrible measure. U-6 is better. That’s at 8.1%, down from 9.4% when Trump took office.
It’s hard to know what the employment-population ratio SHOULD be, because there will always be stay-at-home Moms (and Dads). But I’d say 90% is a good guess. If we take 90% as the goal, we got to 10.1% “unemployment” in 1999. (81.9% employment, which is 8.1% below 90%.) The closest we got under Bush was 9.8% (80.2% employment). In October, 2013, it was still as high as 14.4% (75.6%). Today, it’s at 10.9% (79.1)
8.1 in 1999; not sure how I got 10.1 in there. But at 10.9%, we’re barely more than half way back to where we’ve been.
But isn’t it lower than it was in mid summer?
... there were eight years of economic growth — many of them VERY strong — AFTER we reached 79% employment in the 1990s.
Let me correct that. Isn’t it a little worse than it was earlier in the fall?
Workforce participation rate seemed to be the favorite measure used by conservatives during the last administration.
It remains difficult to get a good job with pay and benefits especially for a middle aged white male.
>>> But at 10.9%, we’re barely more than half way back to where we’ve been.
Not likely to get back to 1999 levels. At that point, Boomers were in the prime working age population (25-54). Now each year more move into retirement.
The numbers are a smokescreen. A “job” used to be classified as 40 hours per week. Hussein changed it so part time jobs were called jobs.
And with hussein it was...everyone who wants a job has or can get a job. Really? I would like a new job but I can’t survive on part time minimum wage even though hussein said it is a “job”.. Where are the GOOD jobs?
Just because everyone is working for minimum wage in some flunky job doesn’t mean the economy is good. I truly believe President Trump understands this and will takes steps to make it happen.
Every store in my town has a help wanted, now hiring sign outside.
A person who can speak English and arrive at work each day sober is employed or doesn’t want to be employed.
Under zer0bama there was falsification of the employment numbers. They didn’t count those who had been out of work for a long time and decided NOT TO WORK. After all, the Marxist in Chief would make it easy to get social security disability or welfare. Why should the bums work. Their numbers stopped being recorded in the employment roles
This is the first time I heard America has full employment. It has however increased measurably in the past year.
No will be such thing as full employment when uncle sugar, using our money, keeps giving out ‘free stuff’ EBT cards, phones, internet, housing, healthcare...etal.
Funny how the stat readers only emerge from their dens during Republican administrations...
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