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Unemployment Falls to 9.7% (Did it Really?)
From The Daily Capitalist
The employment numbers for January 2010 came out today and the headline was that unemployment dropped from 10% to 9.7%. This is a significant event because we all want to see employment grow. My conclusion from reading the report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics is that it's very hard to tell if this increase in employment is real, a temporary bump from stimulus, or a fiction arising from assumptions used by the BLS.
There are two numbers to look at. First is the Household survey which is exactly what is says: 60,000 households report to the BLS and that report yielded the 9.7% number. The other statistic is the Establishment survey which polls private industry, and that report showed a 20,000 person decline in payrolls. These two ways of looking at unemployment often differ, but, as we are assured by the BLS, they tend to converge over the long term.
The increase of overall unemployment as a result of the change in the business birth-death model (see article) was figured into the mix and overall unemployment for the April 2008 to March 2009 increased by 902,000.
Areas of shrinking employment continue to be construction, transportation, and warehousing. The big increases in employment were in temporary services and retail trade. Also, growth in health services. While federal employment grew as a result of the hiring of Census workers, total actual government employment (federal, state, and local) declined by 8,000 workers.
Here are some of the more significant statistics from the BLS report:
- The number of unemployed persons decreased to 14.8 million, and the unemployment rate fell by 0.3 percentage point to 9.7 percent.
- The number of persons unemployed due to job loss decreased by 378,000 to 9.3 million
- Nonfarm payroll employment was essentially unchanged (-20,000)
- The number of long-term unemployed (those jobless for 27 weeks and over) continued to trend up in January, reaching 6.3 million.
- Since the start of the recession in December 2007, the number of long-term unemployed has risen by 5.0 million.
- The civilian labor force participation rate was little changed at 64.7 percent
- The number of persons who worked part time for economic reasons (sometimes referred to as involuntary part-time workers) fell from 9.2 to 8.3 million
- About 2.5 million persons were marginally attached to the labor force in January, an increase of 409,000 from a year earlier.
- Employment in manufacturing was little changed in January (11,000)
- The average workweek for all employees on private nonfarm payrolls was up by 0.1 hour to 33.9 hours in January
- The manufacturing work-week for all employees rose by 0.3 hour to 39.9 hours
- Average hourly earnings of all employees on private nonfarm pay-rolls increased by 4 cents, or 0.2 percent, to $22.45
- U-6 unemployment, the broadest measure of unemployment, which includes the 2.5 million workers who have given up looking, declined from 17.3% to 16.5%, which is also a positive indicator.
Here is an interesting chart from Calculated Risk showing where employment recovery is relative to other recessions:
My observations:
These numbers are still very weak. The growth of part-time workers reflects employers' uneasiness in taking on full-time employees. Much of this improvement is a wait-and-see attitude by employers. This is also reflected in the slight improvement in the average workweek and average hourly earning. Employers push their own employees harder first rather than hire new ones during economic uncertainty.
The opinions about these numbers today are all over the board: see David Rosenberg, Mish, and the WSJ's RealTime Economics for a sampling.
Rosenberg had perhaps the most interesting comment of all today:
While there will be many economists touting today’s report as some inflection point, and it could well be argued that we are entering some sort of healing phase in the jobs market just by mere virtue of inertia, the reality is that the level of employment today, at 129.5 million, is the exact same level it was in 1999. And, during this 11-year span of Japanese-like labour market stagnation, the working-age population has risen 29 million.
This is a startling statistic and shows the problem with the boom-bust cycles the Fed has gotten us into.
This is where one needs to be cautious. I have mentioned often the business cycle process that, regardless of government interference in the economy, economies do repair themselves. Bankruptcies, unemployment, management's drive for more efficiency, and debt reduction are all part of the process that goes on and is necessary for a recovery.
It is almost impossible to tell from this data whether the employment gains are a result from normal business cycle activity or is a temporary result from government stimulus. My personal view is that it is a bit of both, but mainly from federal stimulus which will fade by Q2 2010. I have been projecting that the stimulus's impact will be transitory, and like all government spending, never creates wealth or permanent jobs. I think Q2 or at the latest, Q3, we'll see GDP settling back down to low, stagnant growth.
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Why do you assume the Tea Party has any centralized control. I know plenty of tea party peeps, and none of them like Palin. Just because Palin is attempting to usurp the movement doesn't mean she has anything to do with it. She is just a neocon trying to take advantage of it. Just because she was hired by idiots in Nashville doesn't mean the tea party protestors out on 9/12 liked her.
Also, it seems you are the one who is rather defensive. I'm quite glad you do not vote, btw...
It's been widely reported that Palin was paid $100,000. for her appearance. She looked and sounded like a fool.
Palin's approval rating is 42% among Americans, while her disapproval ratings are 46%.
I would be willing to bet that most of the 9/12 teabaggers are Palin supporters.
Why else would they invite her to keynote the convention?
Why else would Faux News hire her?
When you're invited to keynote the Tea Party National Convention, it sure doesn't sound as though (1) the "movement" is decentralized, or that (2) you're simply "trying" to "usurp" it. Rather, it sounds convincingly as though you've already usurped it, eh?
And, sir, about your voting naivete. Is it that you genuinely believe that there are parliamentary remedies to the loss of our democracy. You still cling to that belief, do you? Time and bitter experience will cure that fantasy, trust me.
Just because some group of people in Nashville call themselves the tea party convention, doesn't mean they represent the whole of the group. Some in the tea party are Palin supporters, most are not. Most convervatives don't even like Palin. What is the damn obsession with Palin? I dislike her, but why do progressives go so nuts about her?
It is very telling a dunce like her can make progressives piss themselves and cry foul.
Also, who said I liked democracy? I like a constitutional republic, where the minority's rights are protected from the tyranny of the majority. Who says I want democracy? Democracy != freedom. Something you "progressives" need to understand.
disclaimer: I do not consider myself a conservative, but rather a classical liberal.
"Just because some group of people in Nashville call themselves the tea party convention, doesn't mean they represent the whole of the group."
In the public mind that certainly would seem disputable, to wit:
http://politics.nashvillepost.com/2010/02/07/the-begining-of-the-end-sar...
And if we're to rely on your report as to the unrepresentative nature of this convention, where are the public denials, sir, the disassociations?
"Some in the tea party are Palin supporters, most are not. Most convervatives don't even like Palin. What is the damn obsession with Palin"
If it weren't Palin it would be Glenn Beck or Dick Armey. Palin is hardly the point, the point is the capture of the TeaParty "movement" by fascist marionettes of one identity or another. The Tea Parties have made no effort at publically distancing themselves from these scum. To the contrary, they appear to have embraced them!
"Also, who said I liked democracy? I like a constitutional republic, where the minority's rights are protected from the tyranny of the majority. Who says I want democracy? Democracy != freedom. Something you "progressives" need to understand."
You'll forgive me if I find myself unmoved either by your
recitation of the libertarian catechism or the sermon on what "progressives" need to understand. Your ode to a "constitutional republic where the minority's rights are protected from the tyranny of the majority" is now and has always been the only most cruel of abstractions. What began as you conceived it is now a hideous dictatorship which serves only the interests of those most able to purchase it. I'll take a little more democracy, thank you.
"disclaimer: I do not consider myself a conservative, but rather a classical liberal."
And this, sir, will give you an idea of what some of the implications of your "classical liberalism" are and what it is that they are managing to inflict upon us. From Michael Hudson:
"You have to realize that what they’re trying to do is to roll back the Enlightenment, roll back the moral philosophy and social values of classical political economy and its culmination in Progressive Era legislation, as well as the New Deal institutions. They’re not trying to make the economy more equal, and they’re not trying to share power. Their greed is (as Aristotle noted) infinite. So what you find to be a violation of traditional values is a re-assertion of pre-industrial, feudal values. The economy is being set back on the road to debt peonage. The Road to Serfdom is not government sponsorship of economic progress and rising living standards, it’s the dismantling of government, the dissolution of regulatory agencies, to create a new feudal-type elite."
You missed a comment I made below in reply to one of your other comments. So check it out.
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/unemployment-falls-97-did-it-really#com...
How did the constitutional republic create this when we haven't followed the constitution for at least 100 years? This is what you are missing, we do *NOT* have a constitutional republic anymore. There is no more rule of law, it has been shit upon and shit upon and NOW we are more democratic, than we were before. So if democracy is so good, why has it made things worse?
If you aren't a libertarian, then why do you even read this site? Your purpose here is to do nothing other than troll us and waste our time. Afraid that the message ZHers put out might get to the people? Watching guard over any and all articles which present a view you do not like? It is interesting an outsider would come here and try to fight a war of attrition in the comments. Feel threatened? What is your deal?
+1
Good post above. This Andrei is just one of the more pretentious disinformation specialists that pop up around here.
You mean there are others who are more pretentious? Damn, that's pretentious.
There's just nothing more defensive - or totalitarian - than a libertarian who's had his pseudo-religion criticized. Have I hurt your feelings, little man?
Far from hurting my feelings, all you've "done" is shown the ability to produce polysyllabic gibberish. The only "feeling" I have when reading your posts is pity due to the fact that you have dug yourself into an intellectual hole usually reserved for those in their 20's, not their 40's and above (you say you haven't voted for 20 years). Your life is pretty much wasted at this point. That you know this is true, even though you don't admit it to yourself, is probably why you insist on being, as the first poster noted, so pretentious.
"Polysyllabic gibberish" that just manages to hurt your feelings, then? Want to ask yourself why it is that you keep reading so attentively my "polysyllabic gibberish"? Now that may not be "pretentious" but it is most assuredly pitiful.
No, still not having my feelings hurt. I'm actually not sure why a grown man would ask that question of another grown man, but whatever, that's just another issue you'll have to deal with. Nor do I have to "read attentively" to see your posts are polysyllabic gibberish. All I need to do is look at a couple of the words to see if they are gibberish (check), note the average word length (polysyllabic) and I'm done. The whole process takes about 3 seconds. It's actually very efficient.
I think its called "denial", BS Inc. Its only six letters long and it takes place more or less instantaneously, even in a grown man.
Separately, that is a very astute choice of word.
Quit your verbal war of attrition with other posters around here.
You disappoint, friend WaterWings. A libertarian without an egalitariian vision of verbal wars of attrition? I couldn't imagine that my questioning has reduced you to this. :-)
The Constitution, and Bill of Rights, are especially terse for a reason.
And yet, people are still arguing about what exactly they mean.
Which is due to the distorters and deceivers: confuse the public into apathy about the clarity of their heritage and duty.
Disinformation? Palin wasn't the invited keynoter at the Tea Party National Convention in Nashville this weekend? And she didn't call for the Tea Parties to be absorbed by the GOP? Explain please, how this is disinformation. And while you're at it, please explain how it is that these imagined anti-system "populists" could feel comfortable associating themselves with her and the full metal jacket ruling class ideology she represents?
The website you plug around here consistently, www.counterpunch.org, is a goldmine of fresh thinking and paradigm shattering for the newly disillusioned. That being said, it is a lot of re-hashing and epitomizes self-congratulatory views, much like the material on www.infowars.com, without the overpowering rants and blatant marketing. ZHers are not automatically exempt. But every once in a while...
What the hell is Roberts talking about? I love his pieces, but this is disgusting. And the same shall be said of you:
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/good-morning-worker-drones-week-mayhem-...
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/two-more-senators-endorse-bernanke-form...
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/rosenberg-expect-big-time-revisions-hou...
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/its-still-not-my-fault-and-i-feel-your-...
---
Who cares about Sarah Palin:
http://politics.nashvillepost.com/2010/02/07/the-begining-of-the-end-sar...
Still waiting for an answer, WaterWings.
Exactly
Whatever merits the Tea Party movement might have, having Sarah Palin as a speaker makes me a perpetual coffee drinker. What, was Pee Wee Herman not available to speak? As an expatriate American, I have never been more embarrassed than when McCain chose that buffoon for his running mate, and never had to live down so much kidding by bemused non-Americans. If one is truly intent on hastening the collapse of the dollar and turning foreigners off Treasury purchases for the next millennia or two, even the consideration of Palin for anything other than a game show host on Fox or an Emcee on the Home Shopping Network will do the trick.
Sarah, real patriots know that Pearl Harbor is not the name of a low end jewelry chain store and the Enola Gay isn't a bar in San Francisco's Castro District.
you got junked!
just when i was falling in love, i see my master getting junked, 3 months later.
funny†
Picking Palin was the worst possible thing that McCain could have done for his political chances.
I was an Obama supporter in 2007, and even worked in a higher level post with his campaign. Then, I saw through the bullshit early and in 2008 failed to change my affiliation and ended up caucusing for Ron Paul.
I was going to vote for McCain, until he picked that idiot Palin as his running mate. Then I went from being highly energized about my choice to staying home.
If Palin becomes the face of the conservative movement, I will no longer call myself a conservative. What a joke.
"If Palin becomes the face of the conservative movement, I will no longer call myself a conservative."
That's what's happening and at ninety miles an hour, sir Bates. And not without the willing participation of the libertarian Tea Party "movement", it would seem. Not voting in present circumstance is an honest and self-respecting thing to do. The thought of being complicit in the crimes of this system simply turns my stomach.
And I know that there are many among you will go "conservative, Ron Paul supporter who supported Obama initially?"
You know, after a long reign of George Bush and the anti-intellectualism in this country during that time, Obama seemed to be refreshing and intelligent - a fellow academic. I had high hopes for him based on his intelligence and personality, until I saw just how left leaning and socialist his campaign objectives really were.
I am truly a libertarian at heart, but I thought I'd give an eloquent academic a chance at first. I don't buy into all that socialism though.
Amen.
Whatever "populist" appearance the Tea Partyites ever enjoyed just went down the drain with this Nashville Convention disaster. Now they're planning a political arm, one they claim will be the equivalent of MoveOn.org and aimed at electing "conservative" politicians! And they actually advertise themselves as "anti-system"? What a sorry bunch of poseurs. Sounds like Sarah Palin was just the right choice to be their lead speaker.
Rant on, Obamaton.
There are many Tea Parties; it is essentially a leaderless movement with no one agenda. The fact that the major parties would attempt to co-opt their message should surprise no one. Judging by your hysterical frustration we can assume you are a frustrated Coakley voter.
No supermajority for you.
"There are many Tea Parties; it is essentially a leaderless movement with no one agenda."
A headless movement, I'd concede, but diffuse when you're holding a "National Convention"? Please.
"The fact that the major parties would attempt to co-opt their message should surprise no one."
Take the "attempt to" out of that sentence and I'd say you're getting somewhere.
"Judging by your hysterical frustration we can assume you are a frustrated Coakley voter."
To be sure, "hysterically frustrated" enough not to have voted in twenty years, good man. Might I encourage a similar sanity in you?
Perfect example of progressive dipshittery, as mentioned above.
"Die Fahne Hoch"? Nazis were progressive leftist socialists, dumbass. BUT, BUT KEITH OLBERMANN TOLD ME RIGHT WINGERS LOVE HITLER HURRRRR
edit, cause it just occurs to me: it's the mainstream of the progressive movement, not libertarians, that are trying to extend Constitutional rights to the, as you say, "veritible zoological garden of critters." See, for example, Cass Sunstein.
Now, on with Zero Hedge's second-favorite topic: Leo K bashing.
I'm not sure what your post is supposed to say. I am not versed in retard.
"Nazis were progressive leftist socialists, dumbass."
Now have I gone and offended little fella's delicate libertarian sensibilities? Poor baby. And the Nazi's "progressive leftist socialists"? About as well reasoned as anything else you've excreted here, filth. A suggestion for you: Find a hole, perhaps something quite local and personal, and stick your head into it.
Hitler claimed the only difference between Nazism and and socialsm was the anti-semitism. He had to be different, you know those big egos always get in trouble.
I'll believe that when you produce the quotation and the attribution. You're talking to an historian of that era.
The "socialism" in National Socialism was never taken seriously in any Marxist sense by Hitler. Like the filth that run our government today, Hitler wished not to alienate influencial corporate interests, Krupp, Farben et al, whose financial support he needed to become Chancellor. While there were proponents of such ideas in the NASDP, people like Otto Strasser, they were purged and expelled after 1926. Strasser himself became a kind of Nazi Trotsky, exiled from Germany during the entire period of the Third Reich. Where they existed after Hitler's accession to power, primarily in the SA, advocates of the so-called "second revolution" were liquidated in 1934 during the notorious Night Of The Long Knives. Now that is not to say that Hitler didn't have a gruding respect for the Communist Party toughs that engaged the SA in street battles during his rise to power, he did. But that's a very long way from an embrace of their ideas.
Hitler was a Socialist, by John J. Ray (M.A.; Ph.D.)
http://jonjayray.tripod.com/hitler.html
[Note: Not surprisingly, F.D. Roosevelt found in Mussolini's policies part of his inspiration for the semi-socialist "New Deal", and referred to Mussolini in 1933 as "that admirable Italian gentleman".]
Socialism and Fascism
http://www.lawrence.edu/sorg/OBJECTIVISM/socfasc.html
(Note: Dr. Leonard Peikoff reaffirms this point in his book, The Ominous Parallels, in which he does draw comparisons of modern-day America to Nazi Germany.)
Defining Evil
http://97.74.65.51/readArticle.aspx?ARTID=2259
It is not possible to argue that each individual should sacrifice for the whole of society, and yet expect each individual to know what "society's good" consists of, without having a dictator to tell them and ‘direct’ them.
(BTW, three quarters of the people who were involved in Germany's environmentalist movement later joined the S.S.)
Honestly, the biggest lesson anyone should take from the late, unlamented 20th century is that when you couple state collectivism, in whatever its form, and head it up with an individual possessing the will to power, Very Bad Things tend to happen.
One of the awful ironies of the last century is that it saw the European colonial system come crashing to a halt, on the premise that individual freedom and the right of self-determination should be a global concern; yet it turned out to create some of history's most genocidal, tyrannical rulers, often in the very same countries that were condemning "western" imperialism to begin with.
"One of the awful ironies of the last century ..."
And that largely because the damage done by the imperialism was so extensive that the only leadership strong enough and well enough organized to oppose it convincingly was totalitarian. It was hardly enough to erect puppet "democratic" governments just as you planned to exit. As much is happening today in Iraq and Afghanistan and with predictable outcomes. There is a point at which you can't rely on paying off an adversary. The whole spirit behind that kind of thing is utterly unworthy.
Thank you very much.
And your thoughts on the discrepancy between household and payrolls survey? What are your forward indicators for employment? Very curious to read your response.
The growing massive discrepancies between either one of these surveys and real income tax withholding data is a shrill wake up call to change the method.
Charles Biderman on Fox Business News
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vq-ZD7zSPj0
some of his comment from above video:
Based on real time payroll data from income tax collections:
Wages and salaries are down 5% YOY.
Estimates over 100,000 jobs lost in January 2010.
Take home pay is down 10% YOY.
TrimTabs: Here's Why The Real Jobs Loss Number Was 5x Worse Than What The BLS Reported
http://www.businessinsider.com/trimtabs-heres-why-the-real-jobs-loss-number-was-5x-worse-than-what-the-bls-reported-2010-2
some data from this article:
Job losses from April 2008 through March 2009 were revised up a whopping 930,000, or 23% from their earlier revisions. In addition, the BLS revised their job loss estimates for 2009 up 617,000, or 14.8%.
Trimtabs was already reporting 5.3 million vs BLS 4.2 million in 2009.
So, the BLS revision moved its data much closer to TrimTabs’ original estimate.
IN SUMMARY, BLS WAS WRONG ALL YEAR AND ADJUSTED, THEN CAME IN LINE WITH TRIMTABS. So, I trust TT. I like to trade on data that is real-time, not subject to massive adjustments.
Where can we see the same data that Biderman sees? Why waste one more minute with BLS and its antiquated surveys?.
I agree. TrimTabs always knocks the BLS and they are probably correct. ADP numbers also conflict with BLS. I've stayed away from this controversy because I'm not versed in statistics. It's complicated with population changes, birth-death, statistical sampling, and all that. I think what is important is the extent of unemployment (best measure is U-6) and whether it's going up or down. Thanks for this, Girl M.
I read that TrimTabs summary on BI. Biderman is spot on.
But when you are dispensing propaganda, the last thing you want are the facts...
What say you President Barry O-Hoover?
Thanks a million for posting this url girl money.
Excellent article, but it leaves me pissed off
and speechless.
Fraud, corruption and incompetance, we are so screwed...
Interesting stuff, and thanks much for providing it. Glad I found this site. A quick example of why I don't trust much of anything the government tells us. This morning I filed for my partial unemployment payments for the previous two weeks. I've been on a Three day work schedule since the second week in January.
Today I filed for the previous two weeks work. Anyone who has been unemployed or has filed for a partial know you must file for benefits every two weeks. Yet here,s what I got today after filing for the previous two weeks.
Your claims for Pennsylvania Unemployment Compensation (UC) benefits have been accepted for the week(s) ending on the dates shown below:
1/30/2010
2/6/2010
If you are totally or partially unemployed during the subsequent two weeks, you may file claims for those two weeks during the period 2/21/2010 (Sunday) through 2/26/2010 (Friday).
Check out the weeks they say I can next file a claim for. Notice they missed the week Feb. 7 to Feb. 13. which is this coming week. So my actually weeks to file for next time would be Feb. 7 to Feb. 13 and Feb. 14 to Feb. 20.
I'm betting this same information has been sent out to all those who have filed for benefits online. And this is our government at work. How can we trust anything they tell us especially when it has to do with actually using their brain.
@foxmuldar
PLEASE IMMEDIATELY VERIFY WITH PA UNEMP, but...
I don't see a gap.
If you are totally or partially unemployed during the subsequent two weeks,
(ie, the two weeks subsequent to week ending 2/6)
you may file claims for those two weeks during the period 2/21/2010 (Sunday) through 2/26/2010 (Friday).
in other words, your filing window lags a week behind.
Not sure what you mean. I believe Household covers all employment whereas Establishment only deals with private employers. They each have different sampling methodology and population asssumptions. I don't profess to be an expert in their statistical methodology.
As to forward indicators, you will see a series of articles soon on my take on current conditions. But as I say at the end of this piece, I see things flattening out with longer term high unemployment. How high? Don't know.
Thanks for the comment.
so basically the nunber come out and the sheep read the bogus crap like blethering idiots .
taking false numbers to come uo with false assumptions ... then making a opinion puff piece about the unemployment numbers .
1.36 Million Jobs Knocked off December Payrolls; Depression’s Job Loss Increased by 19%
- January Unemployment: 16.5% (U-6), 21.2% (SGS)
- Serious Jobs and Unemployment Deterioration in Months Ahead
"No. 276: Reporting Focus: January Employment and Benchmark Revision "
http://www.shadowstats.com/