Posted on 02/03/2015 10:10:41 AM PST by Reverend Saltine
Here's something that many Americans -- including some of the smartest and most educated among us -- don't know: The official unemployment rate, as reported by the U.S. Department of Labor, is extremely misleading. Right now, we're hearing much celebrating from the media, the White House and Wall Street about how unemployment is "down" to 5.6%. The cheerleading for this number is deafening. The media loves a comeback story, the White House wants to score political points and Wall Street would like you to stay in the market. None of them will tell you this: If you, a family member or anyone is unemployed and has subsequently given up on finding a job -- if you are so hopelessly out of work that you've stopped looking over the past four weeks -- the Department of Labor doesn't count you as unemployed. That's right. While you are as unemployed as one can possibly be, and tragically may never find work again, you are not counted in the figure we see relentlessly in the news -- currently 5.6%. Right now, as many as 30 million Americans are either out of work or severely underemployed. Trust me, the vast majority of them aren't throwing parties to toast "falling" unemployment.
(Excerpt) Read more at gallup.com ...
The administration doesn’t care. Lying helps it keep its power.
It’s all radical left bullshit!
“If you, a family member or anyone is unemployed and has subsequently given up on finding a job — if you are so hopelessly out of work that you’ve stopped looking over the past four weeks — the Department of Labor doesn’t count you as unemployed. That’s right. While you are as unemployed as one can possibly be, and tragically may never find work again, you are not counted in the figure we see relentlessly in the news — currently 5.6%. Right now, as many as 30 million Americans are either out of work or severely underemployed. Trust me, the vast majority of them aren’t throwing parties to toast “falling” unemployment.”
Posted on FR last May by 4Liberty
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3151710/posts
Unemployment Drops to 0% as Last Worker Leaves Labor Force
The People’s Cube ^ | May 3, 2014 | Opiate of the People Posted by 4Liberty
Comrade Barack Obama today became the first to achieve a milestone coveted by enlightened central planners everywhere when the Bureau of Laborious Statistics announced the much-followed totally-meaningless “headline” U3 unemployment rate for last month was ZERO PERCENT! This means that the glorious economic recovery he engineered after the disastrous Bush years has now attained FULL EMPLOYMENT!
It is a tribute to Professor Obama that he was able to find the Holy Grail which eluded history’s greatest economic thinkers such as Lenin, Stalin and Mao. This landmark achievement along with his establishment of free healthcare for everyone via the Affordable Care Act cements his reputation as the Greatest Leader in this or any other universe for all time.
The dramatic moment occurred at 12:03 PM, four weeks to the day after Lyman Yilk, a pipe-fitter from Bittcling, Pa, finally gave up looking for work. Mr. Yilk has been unemployed since 2005 but was on a celebratory bender since the day after Mr. Obama’s first election and did not know that the Keystone Pipeline (which Mr. Yilk was hoping to find work on) had been cancelled due to environmental concerns. When he finally sobered up four weeks ago and learned the project was dead, he abandoned his search to find a job.
Mr. Yilk was the last worker to leave the labor force and turned the lights out as he left. According to the BLS definition:
Quote: U3: Official unemployment rate per the ILO definition occurs when people are without jobs and they have actively looked for work within the past four weeks. Without Mr. Yilk, there was no one actively looking for work any longer, hence the U3 rate was now ZERO PERCENT, praise Obama!
Gloom-and-doom naysayers were quick to note that the labor force participation rate had also dropped to zero percent which (according to them) was not a good thing as it meant no one was employed. Comrade Nancy Pelosi countered their racist, straw-man argument brilliantly by observing that it also meant no comrade was any longer “job-locked” and each was free to be an artist, writer, hooker, etc, and pursue their passion.
“There is no underestimating this tremendous achievement of Barack Obama” said Paul Klugeman, an expert on hiding declines and fudging economic statistics as well being the self-proclaimed “Conscious Liberal”. “Comrade Obama has achieved the socialist dream of freeing all of The People ™ from the slavery of work and permitting them to live off of someone else’s dime as god, if he existed, would’ve wanted.”
Dr. Klugeman was asked if a problem would arise due to the fact that since no one was working, there would also be no one to pay for the benefits that all the non-workers were collecting.
“Nonsense”, he proclaimed. “The Fed will simply print money for artists and writers and hookers to use to buy things from China! What could go wrong?”
It seems so simple now, it’s a wonder no one ever thought of it sooner.
“The genius of Dear Leader Barack Obama lies in his simplicity”, said Dr. Klugeman.
We agree.
Put Hillary in office and we’ll have 8 MORE YEARS OF LIES, LIES, AND MORE LIES. In speaking of Benghazi, what about that “awful Internet video”, huh Hillary?
My response to the kooks who buy this 5% line is okay if the economy is so wonderful why is there a record number in poverty? Why are interest rates at zero still? Why is there a record number of people not working? Why is there a record number of people on food stamps? You can’t have a thriving economy and these other numbers going through the roof.
Who are you going to believe your own eyes or what the government tells you? If you believe the government you already have more problems personally than I care to even attempt to deal with.
The guys from The People’s Cube are brilliant. OTOH Øbozo is a low-wattage imbecile.
We are being grubered.
Since Republicans now control congress, why can’t some Representative draft a bill that says: “from now on, here’s how we are going to count unemployment in the USA, because the way we’ve been doing it is misleading.”
It’s really important to do it now, because when we control the Administrative AND Legislative branches (1/20/17), we need that number to be accurate (high), so that we can show huge improvements after we reduce federal regulations, spending, and taxes.
Republicans can’t complain about this stuff anymore. It’s on us to change it.
12%
The Obama regime has functionally disabled 50% of the otherwise able legal citizens. The 5.6% is just the scum on the pond of those who have already given up looking,
I doubt that even the U6 covers the “newly disabled”.
LOL!
The administration doesn’t care. Lying helps it keep its power.
That’s right. They thrive on lies and deceit.
The left couldn’t survive the truth.
Obama and his minions are masters of Taqiyya.
bttt for a later read.
heard Rush talking about this.
Too bad the media won’t take hold of this.
We are living through a nightmare: spiritual, economic, social...all is deteriorating. And Obama is helping to accelerate that deterioration.
The unemployment number was developed in the 1930's because nobody knew the depth of the depression. Adjustments had to be made, which might have made sense during the 1930's, but in today's economy, make very little sense.
(not in the book)Maybe in the 1930's it made sense to eliminate people not looking for work. There was a segment of the population that drifted and did not look for traditional employment. The West at this point is not "wild" but it is definitely not tame. But today, people not looking for work are millennials unequipped for the work force or adults that live on welfare and/or disability that are really able workers. This is clearly a drag on the economy which is not reflected in the unemployment numbers. In other words, the unemployment number looks fine, but structurally, the labor market is weak.
As as example of unemployment rate not meaning much, many third world countries have very low unemployment. Government policies create a hiring environment rather than economic efficiency. This leads to low wages and less investment in infrastructure. Policies that encourage hiring cause very unsophisticated economies.
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