Posted on 09/07/2003 2:39:08 PM PDT by Walkin Man
Edited on 09/07/2003 2:43:01 PM PDT by Admin Moderator. [history]
WASHINGTON - The economy shed 93,000 jobs in August, nearly a third of them in the well-paid professional sector, the government said Friday in a grim report suggesting that joblessness may persist despite tax cuts and lower interest rates.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics said the nation's unemployment rate declined slightly from 6.2 percent to 6.1 percent, but analysts placed more weight on actual job losses reported by businesses. Hundreds of thousands of unemployed job seekers who have given up looking for work aren't counted in jobless-rate calculations.
The Chicago "Fibune" is hard at work in it's bias-mongering I see.
Prairie
Media Employment Report Cover-up: 150,000 New Jobs Added August
The press has been saturated since Friday morning with misleading reports claiming that the number of jobs held by Americans declined by nearly 100,000 in August. However, the actual jobs statistic used by the Labor Department to measure the unemployment rate showed just the opposite - with the economy adding almost 150,000 new jobs.
The journalistic sleight of hand fueled headlines like "93,000 Get the Ax" in Saturday's New York Daily News, "Job Losses Mount for a 22nd Month" on the New York Times front page and Newsday's front page blast, "Goodbye Jobs."
While most press accounts eventually got around to noting that the actual unemployment rate fell from 6.2 percent to 6.1 percent, the information was often buried deep into the reports. The Daily News, for instance, didn't mention the improving statistic until seven paragraphs into its coverage.
Most press accounts disingenuously chalked up the discrepancy between their claims that the economy lost jobs and the declining unemployment rate to "workers who were so discouraged at the bleak job prospects that they stopped looking."
Some went even further. Citing unnamed "economists," the New York Times claimed bizarrely that the divergent statistics were due to "a surge in the number of people who, having lost their jobs, listed themselves as self employed rather than unemployed."
However, nine paragraphs into its own coverage of yesterday's unemployment report, the Washington Post admitted that claims of job losses were based on a separate survey of business payrolls, which is normally not part of the Labor Department's monthly unemployment report:
"The unemployment rate can decline as the number of payroll jobs drops because, in part, the figures come from different surveys," the Post explained. "The unemployment rate is based on a survey of 60,000 households, which found that total employment rose by 147,000 workers in August as the number of unemployed people fell by 157,000, to 8.9 million.
"The [declining] number of payroll jobs comes from the department's monthly survey of about 400,000 businesses," the Post said.
Another detail excluded from most coverage of Friday's jobs report: Blacks and Hispanics showed the most gains. While the unemployment rate for whites fell by just one percent, it declined for blacks by twice that amount, from 11.1 to 10.9 percent.
The rate unemployment rate for Hispanics fell even further, from 8.2 percent to 7.8 percent.
misleading reports claiming that the number of jobs held by Americans declined by nearly 100,000 in August.
Here is the misleading misunderstanding - "jobs held by Americans".
If it read "jobs available to Americans" the rest of the sentence would be correct, but it isn't.
Line 1 of the THE EMPLOYMENT SITUATION: AUGUST 2003 reads "Total nonfarm payroll employment declined by 93,000 in August"
claims of job losses were based on a separate survey of business payrolls, which is normally not part of the Labor Department's monthly unemployment report:
False. Both business and household surveys are part of every months "payrolls" report, the BLS actually names it's report "THE EMPLOYMENT SITUATION: - month year"
However, the actual jobs statistic used by the Labor Department to measure the unemployment rate showed just the opposite - with the economy adding almost 150,000 new jobs.
Also False. Jobs were not added. 147,000 people found work in jobs that already existed. Jobs and people who find work are two different numbers collected in two different surveys.
Businesses surveyed said (net) 93,000 postions were removed from payrolls which would no longer be filled or recruited. That's 93,000 fewer opportunities for the unemployed to find work.
However, the household survey (for August 2003) says that unemployment shrank by 157,000 (ie jobs still on payrolls were filled) and the civilian labor force shrank by 10,000 and therefore concluding 147,000 found work.
A further discussion can ensue about whether those 147,000 found good work or are "flipping burgers"
A person without a job who finds work is not "creating" a job. They're only going from unemployed to employed, but the job they filled previously existed. If that job had been eliminated, it would have appeared as a stat on the Payrolls report as 93,001st job eliminated.
There are three different stats (actually more) relating to work:
Lastly, the weekly ui claims reports are people who have lost their jobs (413,000 last week) and in the past ('90's) almost 400,000 of those would have found comparable replacement work. In the past that only took a few weeks and they found good or better jobs. These days it is taking 21 weeks and longer for those who do find work and they're having to take less pay or benefits or both.
Somewhat less than 400,000 people unemployed is about the normal weekly turnover. Below that, more people find work than lose work (growth), above that more people stay on unemployment and are out of work than find work (contraction).
Thanks for trying to pull some RNC heads out of the sand.
Being as many journalists these days are conservative, wouldn't such a coverup get exploded?
Necrophiliac Puppies????!!??
Why would you mention necrophiliac puppies??? WHAT DO YOU KNOW??? (shaking you) WHAT DO YOU KNOW???? WHO TOLD YOU????
:}
He should NOT have quoted Mr. Gephart however IMO. That cheapened the article.
He had sources. He pointed out the impact upon our economy of globalization and increased production. There were so many things I wanted to copy here I would have copied the entire article minus the Gephart quote.
I too am disappointed with the quality of the newsmax article for the reason mentioned here and in other threads. newsmax continues to be one of my favorites, however.
Maybe we'll call it the new Hoover -- I mean Bush intrastructure make work program.
Richard W.
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