32,000 Jobs Created in July (UE Rate Down at 5.5%)

CNBC | August 6, 2004

[RWR8189]

32,000 jobs were created in July. The unemployment rate down at 5.5%

Details to come...

ouch

[lelio]

Unemployment went DOWN! So what are YOU talking about?

How is the unemployment rate calculated?

[Dave S]

The unemployment rate is lower now than when Clinton was re-elected.

But his competition was Bob Dolt who was going to take us back to a past that most voters werent old enough to remember.

[ClearCase_guy]

UE rate probably went down because the labor market got smaller. If we were adding 200,000+ jobs, the UE rate might gone fractionally up, and that would be a good thing.

So, we add 32,000 jobs and UE goes down. But (you say) if we were adding 200,000 jobs, UE might have gone up.

Paul Krugman? Is that you?

[michaelt]

Oh please - a death blow?

If the August and September numbers are similar, then this July number will matter as one of a series (although there are many many other things which will also decide this race, some of which we don't even know about yet).

If the next months are better, July will not matter. This one month by itself is meaningless.

[soundandvision]

And deeply troubled.

[familyofman]

"The expert econonmists were expecting 200,000 plus jobs. Why are they most always wrong?"

My theory is their models were built on old assumptions and have not been updated enough to take into account the 'real' economic world we are living in now. The impacts of illegals, outsourcing, record trade deficits....these factors are not probably being weighted properly in the models.

[RWR8189]

The rate near 9% is the "U6" unemployment rate, and that was never used as the official rate. The rate we use is the U3 rate which declined to 5.5% today.

It is interesting to note that the U6 rate was 9.7% in July 1996, and it is 9.5% today.

[Tribune7]

BTW, I've read where the real rate is around 9% if you count it the same way they counted in the 60s . . .

I don't know if it would be fair to do that. There was a lot less women in the workforce in the 60s.

[cohokie]

What is totally whacked is the household survey says we added 629,000 jobs ... why is there such a huge difference

[Dave S]

Do you remember the dealie about the welfare check....are they now REQUIRED to file applications for jobs?

What does that have to do with the cost of beans in Mozambique?

[mastequilla]

The unemployment rate seems to lag (for whatever reason) the number of jobs created, by a couple of months.

The unemployment rate indicates the number of people looking for jobs, not the number of those without work. Once you stop looking, you are no longer considered "unemployed". So, when the economy begins to grow, more folks without work begin to look for it, leading to a potential jump in the unemployment rate.

[Truth29]

Why are the experts wrong? There was an article within the past few days that stated that there are large BLS adjustments twice a year in the current data and predicted that the current report would be very low. I will see if I can find it and post.

[RightthinkinAmerican]

Right. Kerry's camp refuted an expected 15 point bounce as "the Bush people creating unrealistic expectations" so it would look bad when he "only got 5 to 8 points". Now, you buy into the same thing in reverse. Remind me, did Kerry get an 8 point bounce?

[NC28203]

Actually, the unemployment rate in October 1996, just before the election, was 5.2%. This was down from 7.3% when Clinton took office. The President's 5.5% compares to 4.2% when he took office. There may be little difference between 5.5% and 5.2%, but in the minds of the voters it may come down to "are you better off today than you were 4 years ago." For a small percentage of the population the answer would be no. Given that W lost the popular vote and squeaked by with the electoral vote, that small percentage of people could play a large role. Especially, if they are in key swing states.

[Coop]

No he didn't get an 8-point bounce.

Now ask me if I expected an 8-point bounce for Kerry or 240K jobs to be created.

[xzins]

It probably means that about 4.5-5.0 is full employment.

5.5 Unemployment is historically very low in the modern welfare era.

[PersonalLiberties]

If 1 job was created in a month "jobs are being created!"? lelio


Of course not silly. There would have to be at least two for "jobS" to be created.

[silverleaf]

It means 120,000 people need to figure out how to create themselves a job by going to work for themselves.

[WatchOutForSnakes]

It isn't just one month or one number. Look at the trend. And it won't improve as long as the oil prices stay high. I'm not saying it's Bushs fault, I'm saying all of these things coming together are, like it or not, VERY BAD news for Bush.

[RightthinkinAmerican]

Dead-on.