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What Happened The Last Time The Unemployment Rate Dropped This Much
One of the biggest accomplishments of the president, in his own words, is managing to push the official (U-3) unemployment rate, from its post-Lehman high of 10% hit in October 2009 to only 6.6% as of January 2014 as Friday's jobs report revealed. This rapid drop in unemployment - call it the "Obama Recovery" - caught none other than the Fed completely unaware, whose 6.5% unemployment rate tightening threshold is now in tatters, as it the credibility of the Fed's forward guidance as the Fed will have no choice but to scrap all unemployment QE ending, rate hiking "thresholds" at its next FOMC meeting.
So what happened to the unemployment rate that it dropped so fast it surprised and embarrassed even the "venerable" Federal Reserve, which had initially expected a 6.5% unemployment rate some time in 2015. To get the answer we go back in time to the last (and only previous) time when the US unemployment rate dropped from roughly 10%, which was in June 1983, to 6.6%, which took place three and half years later, in December 1986 - let's call it the "Reagan Recovery" in short.
Here is how the old normal compares to the "New Normal."
- US unemployment dropped from 10.1% to 6.6% between June 1983 and December 1986: an interval of 43 months.
- US unemployment dropped from 10.0% to 6.6% between October 2009 and January 2014: an interval of 52 months.
So far so good: one can expect the "Obama Recovery" from the Great Financial Crisis to take a little bit longer than "Reagan's."
But what about the internals. This is where things start getting weird.
First, we look at the number of actual jobs added (according to the Establishment survey) from the 10% point at the peak to the 6.6% at the bottom. What we find is that despite the US workforce being over 30% larger today than it was 28 years ago, it took far less actual jobs created to drop the unemployment rate by 3.4%. Specifically, while the "Reagan Recovery" resulted in the creation of 10.5 million jobs, the "Obama Recovery" achieved the same low unemployment rate with only 7.5 million jobs added.
The difference between the Old and New Normal is even more acute when one looks at the change in average monthly job gains over the "recovery" period: as noted, in 1986 the duration of the rate drop period was 43 months, where currently it has taken 52 months. This means that the Obama recovery has resulted in just 145K job additions on average per month while the unemployment rate has dipped from 10.0% to 6.6%, compared to the far more impressive 244K - and indicative of a real recovery - that marked the 1983-1986 period.
However, nowhere is the distinction more acute when comparing the two "recoveries", then when one looks at the underlying population and labor force trends.
First, here is what a normal recovery looks like: during the Reagan Years, the Civilian, Non-institutional population - or the total number of Americans eligible for work whether they are part of the labor force or not - increased by 7.4 million, while the labor force increased by 6.7 million - as close to a linear relationship as possible, and also a correlation which any rational person would expect.
So how about the Obama recovery: well, we find that between October 2009 and January 2014, the civilian, non-institutional population rose by 10.4 million, to be expected considering the far greater general population of the US - it is also a number which, on average, increases by about 230K or so every month. So what about the labor force? It is here that things get zany (as we predicted they would many years ago), because it is here that the Obama Recovery has somehow only managed to add a paltry 1.7 million people to the workforce: from 153.8 million to 155.5 million!
Of course, the above unleashes the avalanche of "demographic" excuses which we have all grown to know and laugh at, because when economists can't explain something, they promptly fall back to patently false "justifications" - recall that as we explained the collapse in the labor force has very little to do with demographics, something which the BLS itself thought as recently as 2004 when it projected a rising labor force participation into the coming years only to readjust it lower in the coming years.
The real reason for this ongoing collapse in the labor force, is the same that the CBO used to explain why - in politically correct terms - Obamacare will adversely impact the labor force over the next decade: Americans will have to earn less to get full coverage, or said otherwise, they are less incentivized to work more. This is precisely the US welfare state at work, and when one extends the Obamacare "rationale" one sees that the administration's core goal is to make increasingly more people reliant on handouts than on labor, as we explained in "When Work Is Punished: The Tragedy Of America's Welfare State" in which we showed why "for increasingly more in America, it is more lucrative to sit, do nothing, and collect various welfare entitlements, than to work" as can be seen in the "welfare cliff" charts below (source).
Alas, that is the real reason why the labor force collapse continues and will continue even as America enters its next recession. Or depression.
So what happens when one renormalizes the unemployment rate calculation and uses a 30 year average labor force participation rate as a constant instead of a variable to be plugged by the BLS to goalseek a desired result? This happens:
What the chart above shows is that the "real" unemployment rate in October 2009 was 11.2%. Where is it now? 11.1%.
And there is your "Obama Recovery", when stripped of all the fancy veneer and TOTUSed propaganda, right there.
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When those who should have known better (voters), or at the very least paying attention, dropped the ball and fucked things up for the rest of us. They instead played tribal politics and pretended there was a political choice. -- Accounting101
Propaganda was just as prevalent then, as now. All propaganda has to do is create doubt. Because doubt can be turned into fear... and fear becomes a manichean devil.
Man, that cold weather really messes things up! And the snow!
Where the heck is that Global Warming they've been promissing us for years. The sooner it gets here, the sooner the jobs will roll in.
Global warming already came. Global boiling is here. Global simmering is next.
The Obomber political machine is so smart; however, the more they trumpet the lies as success, the more they own the bad stats.
Yen Cross - I bought my first property in 1984 or 1985. 11.375% start rate ARM with 5% lifetime cap.... oofa
QQQ just look at all the equity you've gained.(vs inflation) /s
I remember buying my first new car in the 80's. Something like 14.7% @ 60 months. Cost was $14-15k, downpayment was trade-in and a few hundred bucks. 20% down.
Long story short, the late 80's early 90's weren't favorable to R/E equity.
I remember having a $5k 12month CD that paid 8% que Archie Bunker Those were the Days......
" Those were the days" :-)
Would it be safe to assume that with interest as high as it was in the eighties, economic growth was less dependent on credit? What would those interest rates do to consumption and all the rest today,even not considering gov debt.
Yes ! Winner, winner chicken dinner! Oldwood nailed it!
Risk was fairly PRICED!
The 'quality' of jobs created was not sufficiently covered. I'm sure the Reagan recovery had many more full time jobs with good average wages and the nobammy 'green shoots of shit' was mostly low paying part time jobs with no bennies - then nobammycare compounded the effect by destroying more jobs.
It was covered previously numerous times, for example here.
Tylers,
One of my pet peeves lately is the improper use of the word "then" when "than" is called for.
However, nowhere is the distinction more acute when comparing the two "recoveries", then when one looks at the underlying population and labor force trends.
It's not just Zero Hedge, I see this mistake about five times a day reading comments and other sites stories.
The correct use would be: "Beth gives better blow jobs than Lisa. However, if Beth is not available, then Lisa would do just fine."
Then/than and when, are an constant argument, when/where the present and future are concerned. It's that plural/singular thing.
Please don't start using 3-rd person jibberish, like "Phone Clown" does on his daily BTC rants.
http://bitcoin.clarkmoody.com/
The improper use of "a" and "an" is less irritating, but still irritating.
If you're in doubt, use "a" when the next word begins with a consonant, and "an" when it begins with a vowel.
Than consider this a acknowledgement from me.
Perhaps an , short on-line (online) course would help? Give us some good vernacular 'Golden Buddha.?
No problem.
You're "an" asshole.
You're "a" douche bag.
The question is, are you "a" bigger douche bag "than" you are "an" asshole?
Search your conscience, "then" decide.
The " Name Calling" generally implies you've met your match?
You're just "an" roaming memory that will never rent space in my mind!
I apologize.
When you suggested that I was using 3rd person jibberish, I mistakenly thought that you were insulting me.
I was referring to " fone star". I even sent the http://bitcoin.clarkmoody.com/ Real time chart to tease him.
I've no qualms with you. Be well.
https://www.youtube.com/user/weihrauchfan1999
For times that you want to tease him when he is not on ZH...
Let's analyze -
Or....
Which is better?
It depends upon the utility.
I like the first unless you are talking about that chick in Goldfinger.
Maybe he's increasingly more of a douche bag, then in the future he will be exponentially worse than he was the day before. Ther'll be a repetition of this cycle until he reaches peak doucheyness. (look that one up-urban dictionary).
(Ther'll Be) Peace in the Valley lyrics performed by The Jordanaires
Their, they're, it's two to much too quibble about.
Or other things like using 'my bad' or 'I'm good'
Bad what? Good what?
Various ways of using done
Since we're peeving. My own is with the endemic use of "increasingly more", with "more" being redundant.
This may just be an Americanism though, like "burglarised" or "could care less".
Are you sure that 'increasingly' isn't predundant?
Since a rate of change in Growth, as it is an EXPONENTIAL FUNCTION, also increases, then, when writing of the Second Derivative, it is not only proper to use the phrase, "increases more", but it is DEMANDED.
Some concepts are more easily stated in a Mathematical Statement than they are stated in English.
Demonstration:
y = Aekt (Typical Exponential Curve)
dy/dt = Akekt (Rate of Change in Growth Curve)
d2y/dt2 = Ak2ekt (Rate of the Change in the Rate of Change in the Growth Curve)
Now if you understand the Calculus and when you read the phrase, "Increasingly more" then you understand that it addressing the Second Derivative.
Perhaps it is a failure of YOUR comprehension of the topic addressed when the phrase is used.
(The phrase is generally used in discussions about Exponential Growth...)
Well, this is a fancy mathematically descriptive analysis of what I observe and exploit in a Petrie dish everyday. The frantic demand for nutrients while massive exponential growth explodes. Then the inevitable slowing and decline occurs on cue. It repeats itself the same way on a predictable path. This is my reality and I am thankful it has kept me seeing how the world works no matter how we pretend it isn't true and will not affect us.
Miffed;-)
Don't get me started on these rookie mathematicians Miffed. How's that canoe pilot doing?
Rookie??? Rookie??? Who are you calling rookie???
LMAO.
You owe me an appologie. Tall Tom<> Canoe driver
I am sorry...I thought it was ALL ABOUT ME.
LOL
Now what in the hell is this canoe driver?
Tom, I only wish I had your mathematical talents. I dragged myself through biological based calculus with reasonably good grades but looking at Mr Miffed's engineering calculus was indeed humbling. This is your forte. I always was envious of spatially adept people who excelled in physics. I panicked when my Organic Chemistry professor refused my request to have marshmallows and toothpicks during exams. Generally I can grasp mathematical concepts but the nitty gritty uses of equations often had me spinning. I respect your gifts, especially when mine are so lacking.
Miffed;-)
I am not that good but I can hold my own. I ran into a wall with the Advanced Calculus. I am still struggling with understanding the Complex Number as an expression of an Exponential (Logarithmic)l Function. That is a redundancy as a Log is an exponent.
Euler was great. e(pi) * i + 1 = 0 There is such an elegance in that equation.
Thus I am destined for mediocrity.
Okay when you start talking about imaginary numbers and complex logarithms my brain spins. I probably needed to do acid in college to expand my mind sufficiently to grasp these concepts. I don't think mediocrity is a fair descriptor. I would use brilliant, abrasive, strong willed, moral, nihilistic, confident, professorial, supercilious and proud. However, I believe these are descriptive towards your purported facade. If I were to hazard a guess, I believe it shields a caring individual full of profound depth and spirit safely hidden behind the great OZ.
Miffed;-)
14g of mushrooms did the trick for me. couldn't envision the 4th dimesion until that day.
Freeze Dried?
Wow you must have been frying.
Did you see the Universe in Waves? For me on the first venture I traveled from the Macrouniverse down to the Microuniverse and was able to see Grey Matter with the Electrical synapses fire off between Neurons. I now know where the imagery of the Documentary Films of simulations came from. (The films did not exist when I first saw the imagery.)
Once I rose above the noise and confusion
Just to get a glimpse beyond this illusion
I was soaring ever Higher
Then I flew too high.
Kansas ~ Carry on my Wayward Son
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o3T7-VbfYLU
I saw and felt my synapses fire.
Miffed...
You might want to add impatience and anger to the core attributes as that is which manifests in the facade attributes. I think that you are getting to know me all too well, Miffed. I am doing the best that I can to correct it. Of course impatience and anger are irrational responses. It is a process.
For example what set off the start of this dialouge was that I was irritated by a post which ridiculed the phrase, "increasingly more".
The proposition that it was somehow inappropriate suggested that the antagonist was ridiculing those whom use it as somehow being inferior in their understanding of the proper use of English.
As I have used that phrase many times when writing about Exponential Growth then I was offended.
Before writing this I looked at the original post and someone "Downvoted" it? Now I found that ridiculous as what I stated were Mathematical Truths as well as providing clarification about the phrase. Of course that is also an irritant.
So my response to the initial post was a statement that suggested that, instead of my supposed "illiteracy" perhaps it is the antagonist's innumeracy which accounted for the failure of the antagonist's understanding of the term. Of course that is the Downvoted post.
Maybe a better way for the antagonist to learn is that they first ask for clarification before offering unwarranted criticism.
But I really cannot expect that from most. Actually it is irrational to expect that as it would be irrational to expect that a First Grader can solve an Algebraic Problem. They are not capable.
But it is, after all, Fight Club, and I can wield the English Language as a sharp weapon. Furthermore as I have previously written ZH is not a "Popularity Contest".
Truth and "Popular Opinion" sometimes are not agreeable. So I am learning to consider the source and laugh it off.
I know that they do not know what I know. I also know that I do not know what they know. Unless I can walk in their shoes I will not know what they know...and likewise. I do my best to be empathetic.
So yeah I often come across as abrasive, haughty, and proud when I read the injustice of undeserved criticism, dircted at me, or, directed at others.
This is in no way a justification but more of an introspection.
At times I just hate being a Human. I am so imperfect.
Thank you for that window, that perspective.
Are you sure that you did not miss your calling and practice Psychology?
Sorry to interrupt, but I think you should know that there's a down vote troll or two working zh tonight. Seeing a lot of great comments getting red for no reason other than to piss in the cereal.
Point noted. Thanks.
It was just an example of an irritant...which Downvoting Trolls are.
If they will debate it would be nice.
I can empathize. I spent forty years living in anger and hostility. I have no patience and frustrate extremely easily. For a mother this is a terrible thing. Fortunately my husband has infinite patience, carried my slack and saved our family. I disagree they are irrational in themselves. Only when taken to extremes and damage others can you claim such. When used in a controlled balanced manner, anger can be revelatory and enlightening.
Perhaps you are judging yourself too harshly. I ran from this for so long and did everything I could do to suppress it to no avail. Then one day I decided to stop running and explore its depths. I entwined myself in it, lived it breathed it, followed it to its core. What I found was not pleasant but only until I could see it fully could I finally excise it. It is like removing a cancer. I still feel the scar of it still occasionally but it is much muted and easily dispersed. May I humbly suggest you consider this. But beware, you may travel to interesting places, some not pleasant.
Irritation is simply a sign of an emotional abscess. You may ignore this but the pressure and heat from it will constantly remind you of it's existence yet again. Know as well, the identified irritant rarely is the true issue. It is a harbinger, a herald to Truth Within. It is beckoning you to follow it and find something about yourself you may not wish to face or relive. It will take incredible courage and strength to answer it's call. I know this from experience.
Do not hate your Humanity. Au contraire, imperfection who we all are. To hate your humanity is to hate God because you are hating the God that is in you, me and all here on earth. God, mercifully, doesn't want perfection from us. Where would we be if He did? Celebrate, laugh and revel in your foibles. All we need to do is our best, Love ourselves, God and others,be authentic and live with integrity.And be joyful because that is the infallible evidence of the presence of God!;-)
I am not sure if I would make a good psycologist. My gifts lie in sensitivity and empathy, especially those in pain. Sometimes in a crowded room I can pick them out through a strange intuition and are drawn to them. I ran to science to discipline my chaotic mind and it saved my sanity.
There. My gift to you. A taste of who I am.
Miffed;-)
Yen, you've got to clue me in on the canoe driver pilot guy and his comment to you in the past. I'm lost. Believe me, he is not Mr Miffed. He's asked me who he is and I really don't know. Point me straight! ;-)
Miffed;-)
This phantom person just iMiffed.nterjects his opinion. I thought he's Mr. Miffed.
That's about it Miffed. uses name "canoe driv
I absolutely guarantee he isn't my Mr Miffed. I do admit he used to pilot our canoe when we explored quite a few rivers in the Pacific Northwest. However that is only because when I took the stern and tried to turn us we spun 180 and nearly capsized. Similar occurrence when we sail. I now only handle the Jib so we all can have a pleasant voyage.
Miffed;-)
Handle the jib? I know this is not a family site, but please...
I will have to interject for Miffed's honor here. I only have the one persona. Miffed can quite well defended herself verbally or with her .40. I do shoot a bit better than she does but she is far quicker with her wit. She also handles the jib quite well and often much to my pleasure.
Mr,. Miffed? I'm perplexed< What about my Mongoloid children?
You have mongoloid children? Where did that come from? I think I missed the memo.
Miffed;-)
Easy with the gun talk, Mr. Just tryin to keep the site clean :)
As I have written before Miffed...Exponential Growth leads to Exponential Collapse.
Your description reminds me of a my experience in a Temporory Position with a Pharmaceutical Manufacturing Company...that was fun.
mine is with, "Exactly right".
Well that is partially right...
Tyler: I agree that you have sufficiently covered it elsewhere.
One thing is for sure, we can't use the term "Critical Thinking" and BLS in the same sentance.
A woman that lives on my street has 5 kids... 4 from different men. She just had another baby 2 weeks ago. One person who lives across the street from me has men purposely impregnate her and shares the welfare money with her sperm donors.
I know what you're thinking, but trust me, I do not live in a ghetto... I live in a upper-middle class neighborhood. These dirtbags have it all figured out... they squeeze and scam the system for every free penny they can get. There are many on disability too, even though I cannot find one thing wrong with them.
"The fish rots from the head."
How does anyone rationally adapt to a fundamentally irrational system? After organized crime takes control over the government, in order to privatize the public money supply, then everyone else is stuck adapting to live WITHIN that system. The "Free Shit Army" developed within the context of a Century of the legalized counterfeiting of the public money supply by private banks. More than 90% of that money made out of nothing, as debts, went into subsidizing the Warfare State, while less than 10% of that went into subsidizing the Welfare State.
As Charles Hugh-Smith concluded in this article:
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-02-06/mafia-state-mind
"Once the mafia state of mind has seeped into every nook and cranny of the society and economy, it's not even recognized as corruption: it's simply the way the system works. ... Once you realize that the mafia is a state of mind, you recognize just how thoroughly it has corrupted and criminalized our entire society and economy."
That is a pathocracy, from the Greek pathos, “feeling, pain, suffering” and kratos, “rule:”
A totalitarian form of government in which absolute political power is held by a psychopathic elite, and their effect on the people is such that the entire society is ruled and motivated by purely pathological values.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=91wuk_mWEYQ
The Pathocrats
HOWEVER, THAT IS ONLY THE PSYCHOLOGICAL ASPECT OF THOSE PROBLEMS. The evolutionary ecology aspect is that money is measurement backed by murder, BUT, that connection is as deliberately denied and suppressed as it is socially possible to do, in the general sense that the economy is as divorced from the environmental ecology as is possible to maintain, because the REALITY is that the best organized gangs of crimimals control the government, as the biggest form of organized crime.
The deliberate divorce between the debt controls and the death controls is reflected in the ways that the reproduction of human beings is separated as much as possible from the production of everything else. Of course, those impossible ideals backfire badly in the real world. Thus, to prevent the suffering of poor children, Welfare State provisions are put in place that eventually create even more suffering for more poor children. However, that situation is only one, relatively minor, aspect of the bigger picture regarding the Warfare State, which is that the BASIC SOCIAL PYRAMID SYSTEM IS DEBT SLAVERY, BACKED BY WARS BASED ON DECEITS.
Overall, the Welfare State's absurdities are trivial compared to the Warfare State's absurdities. However, BOTH trace back to the source of those problems, which was that success in warfare was based on deceits, which then enabled successful financial systems to be based on fraud. Neither of those problems, nor the basic role of people being "employed" within the economy (within the ecological environment), can be properly addressed unless the roles of the murder systems are integrated into the money systems. What American society represents is how "the fish rots from the head," where the banksters successful corrupt the government, which then enables all the rest of the deceits and frauds to run amok. Inside of that established context, people are making their own localized "rational" responses to a system totally dominated by the triumph of organized crime controlling their government, by adapting to that situation with their own localized kind of organized crime, exploiting that system, in their own little ways.
As the limits to growth become more objectively real, during the next few decades, the ability of the established systems to mentally separate the murder systems from the money systems will become harder and harder to maintain. In that context, ideally, we should democratize the necessary death controls, so that there is a greater use of information, and higher consciousness with respect to operating systematic artificial selection systems, within the context of natural selection pressures.
That is the true context in which the falsified "employment" and "economic recovery" numbers are operating, with the manifest absurdities of those numbers becoming more obvious to anyone who critically scrutinizes them. The fundamental problem is the Neolithic style of civilization, being pumped up and up and up in size by technologies which are trillions of times more powerful and capable, BUT, which primarily serve the interests of covert organized crime, whereby the pyramidion people do their best to keep everyone else ignorant and afraid. "The Free Shit Army" results from the majority of people, generation after generation, adapting to live within a social system controlled by organized crime, which is able to be run by professional liars and immaculate hypocrites with respect to everything that it is actually doing.
The only genuinely good solutions require that there must be better death controls. However, obviously, in the real world, we are rushing faster and faster towards the worst possible death controls, entering psychotic breakdowns, since the actual selective forces have made and maintained society to be controlled by the maximum possible deceits and frauds, which resonate all the way throughout every level of its resounding absurdities, such as women having more children, so that they can get more welfare payments.
Upper Middle Class... what is your definition?
I guess that Upper Middle Class means GHETTO in his eyes. That does not happen in any advantaged neighborhood where I have frequented.
He is just attempting to insult the "well off" as he is not reached that.
He might be in the 100 mile wide ghetto of metropolitan Phoenix, Arizona.
I've read about a lady collecting food stamps while she lived at a multi-million dollar beachside home. How? She didnt' own the home, her boyfriend did. I read about another woman collecting food stamps only a year after winning tens of millions in the lotto. She was on food stamps before and just kept collecting. While these are two episodes that made the papers, one has to figure its happening exponentially more and not being reported.
Well I read about this Bombing at the Boston Marathon. I have read about a Bombing at the World Trade Center.
While these are two episodes that made the papers one has to figure its happening exponentially more and not being reported.
They just do not want to alarm the public. /sarcasm.
WHY DOES ONE HAVE TO FIGURE THAT?
There is this Wealthy Couple who live in La Jolla, CA. They support their DRUNK BEACH BUM SON. Anyway THEY hooked this guy up with Food Stamps which he spent on Steak an Lobster Parties. He was driving his PARENTS SUV. It was made for a Television Broadcast on the local Fox News Station.
It was a Slam Production on Wefare Abuse....made to promote HYPE.
So I simply CALLED THE DISTRICT ATTORNEY'S WELFARE FRAUD HOTLINE...TO REPORT THE SON AND HIS PARENTS FOR CONSPIRACY TO DEFRAUD.
I hope that things are working out well for them.
Of course FILING FALSE REPORTS WILL END UP WITH YOUR PROSECUTION AND IMPRISONMENT.
Hey guys somebody in Auschwitz building 201C has a potato.
So his entire weekly EBT amount on steak and lobster parties?
I guess he bought one steak and one lobster.
Fairly tales.
Its true, I read this awhile back. I just googled "EBT surfer" and this was just one of the articles:
http://dailycaller.com/2013/08/10/the-new-face-of-snap-food-stamps-buy-l...
You are oblivious and clueless.
Really?
Here is the Fox News video.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=__cahZprhFE
I can source what I write.
You???
Who is clueless, pal?
Your Red Team/Blue Team BULLSHIT just demonstrates that you are Programmed and Controlled.
Why don't YOU WAKE UP.
The freeloaders in my neighborhood are afraid of me. It's hilarious. The more successfully you are the more they hate you. It's a perk. Rub it in, keep kicking ass.
There's a Somali bitch in my neighbourhood cut from the same cloth as the one that lives on your street. Only difference is she has 10 kids, the youngest being about 2 years old. Oh, and she does live in an apartment that consists of social housing units. I know here in Canada welfare will only go so far. Once you hitting a ceiling in benefit payments, you're shit out of luck on any extra dependants you decide to sire in the future. You're gonna have to spread the monthly payment more thinnly. Case in point, during the warm months her kids run around the shared courtyard (usually the eldest 6 or so). However, come winter time, she can't afford to get them all winter clothes, so you don't see them when it's cold and snowy outside. I see the kids going off to school sometimes in the mornings. 7 of them walking together all holding hands forming a chain. LOL. I was on my way to work last fall and a couple of contractors were doing some improvements in the apartment building she lives in. This particular morning they were working in her unit (groundfloor). 2 guys standing outside waiting for the 3rd guy who was carrying a new fusebox. As I approached the unit, the dude carrying the box arrived at the front door. All I hear is "Pete, do you have that part?". "Nah, it's in the van. Man.................I'd give anything not to have to go back into that fucking apartment!". "Yeah, well............I know, let's just get the job done and get out of here."
We should let folks use their EBT cards as collateral for mortgages.
They already can
New Mortgage Rules Another Empty Obama Promisesnip
"About the only thing the new rules require is income documentation and debt limits for borrowers.
But they at the same time let borrowers count welfare payments as qualifying income and exceed the 43% debt-to-income threshold if they get their loan guaranteed through a government mortgage agency.
Since Fannie, Freddie and FHA now control 90% of the mortgage market, that won't be hard to do."
You know chit is bad when sarcasm is real!
The real unemployment rate is closer to 23% according this:
http://www.globaldeflationnews.com/jobs-report-underwhelms-treasuries-fa...
So, glad democraps running show and just giving away welfare...will work for me soon too. Have few million in the bank and just kick back and sign up for free obamacare and welfare and live the high life supplemented by democrap welfare programs.
A trillion per year given to Banksters and a skosh less than a Trillion for FSA.
Where is the Beef?
So you will compromise Moral Fiber for gain? That is good to know. I will be seeking people out whom have done that, Post Collapse. They are no better than a Central Banker or a politician.
As I sharpen Cold Steel...
Well....tax season.....I shit you fucking not.....this was advised to me :: "Well sir, since your take home was $29,000.00 this year you won't be getting a refund this year. Next year if you would like to get a large return you have a few choices....have a child, buy a house, car, and go back to school with loans." Thanks TurboTax where would America be without such sound advice?
Fucking christ time to figure out a way out of this banana republic. Thanks Russian diplomat for your funny image of the Obamas...(http://thefinereport.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/obama-banana.jpg)
317,500,636 - people in the USA.
247,696,000 - people of working ages in the USA - roughly.
91,800,000 - people not in the work force - roughly.
10,200,000 - people on unemployment - roughly.
So we add 10.2 million to 91.8 million and get 102 million people out of work, with a population of working aged people at 247,696,000......wouldn't the unemployment percetage be roughly at 41.5% of the working age population? Where is 6.6% from?
This is all roughly done so feel free to destroy this completely.
Think of all the barefoot housewives who dont have to work because their husband's (quaint old idea, a father for your children) wages have been rising so fast.
11 million on disability. Don't know how many teachers, fire firefighters, cops, and other federal, state and municipal workers under the age of 65 who are retired. Bet it is a shit load. Then there a few lucky SOB's who could do it without the government pension.
Oh, and the hidden economy in drugs, prostitution, handy man.
*Didn't downvote this. I guess I didn't figure those shadow areas which probably absorb a huge chunk of those numbers in all honesty.
So then would you say high 20% area or maybe low 30% area in reality?
This is the Grestest Depression with modern safety nets. I would buy 25%.
I can't wait to hear them spin this shit with the FOMC.
Who will come out the bigger turb Obumble Admin or the FED.....
I rarely pinch off just one turd.
Gross/ Sick mind needs MOAR charts!
lol
Obama is trying to get the Reagan pop, but no one will let him start a war....
Reagan FINISHED wars. The Cold War was finished due to Ronald Reagan. What actions did he take? Grenada? That took...a day or two.
He used Drug Money to fund the Sandinistas? (Well actually that was VP GHW Bush.)
Slick Willie reaped that benefit.
WOAR destroys the Economies of the belligerants. Stopping them allows Economies to Boom.
I guess that I forgot Libya. That took a week of Bombing Tripoli.
I noticed that after the Bombing in Lebanon the USA just left.
But you trash me for writing inconvenient truths???
What part of this story am I missing???
the part where reagan comes in just as paul v. has raised interest rates to their all time highs and reagan (bush, clinton, bush) gets to ride them down in the benign part of the deflationary cycle. obama gets handed the shit stick after the economy hits the end of the credit supercycle. he is an incompetent and a war criminal, a shyster and a liar (calling him a monster insults j.w. gacy) but he got the shitty economy to work with (and blew it, badly).
so what you're suggesting here is, 'poor barack'...sheer lunacy
your summary of what occurred is insanity. perhaps you should read this...
http://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2014/02/03/supply-side-economics-paul-cr...
i dunno-i think the USSR died under its own weight-it was a failed system-that JUST HAPPENED to collapse under Reagan......yes, i know he was Superman, sat at the side of God almighty etc etc etc...but he was really just a befuddled old fart, who nodded out durring meetings
We are the ones we've been waiting for
Yes I have been waiting for us to pay for my chit. I wanna b a captain in the FreeShitarmy!
http://ourfiniteworld.com/2014/01/02/why-a-finite-world-is-a-problem/
The disposable income for an single parent [chart] caught my eye<>
I don't really think most of us at ZH needed this article this should all be well known facts by now. This info needs to be spread elsewhere.
The US economy is simply no longer globally competitive, except across a very narrow strata of high tech /highly innovative businesses. These businesses will keep driving the earnings of the top 5%, but we can expect U6 to keep steadily grinding higher. Result is an extremely polarized society......with many unpredictable consequences......most of which are likely to be quite negative.
Have you noticed the availability of the free courseware? institutions like MIT are making the contents of courses available on their website. It is called the Open Course Ware project. After seeing this two things occurred to me. First of all, most of this information would give you all you need to complete a Bachelors or even a Masters in whatever subject you study. Second, why would they give away this information when their business model is the sale of education? In effect they are giving away the goose that laid the golden egg? I think someone wants people to have something to do in a time of duress.
They are not giving away degrees. Without a degree you can not get a job.
One very , very large problem is the incredibly inept and incompetent set of workers we have between the ages of 22-34 or so. I have dubbed them the gimmedats. Books smart but street stupid. Unable to problem solve, properly deal with adversity or be given a task; take it and run with it until resolved is the MAIN problem with the dropouts. IMHO.
These jagoffs are simply incapable of working in a technological society that requries all the above attributes. I have seen countless numbers of these clowns come through our office over the past 12 years that it scares me just how inept they are -- and then they BITCH that they are let go or get bad reviews and end up quitting when they don't get their big raise and are told they are on an action plan cuz they suck at their job.
We aren't competitive because THEY aren't competitive. period.
They are maleable. If after a month you still have a lump of clay on the wheel you need to work on your technique.
Hey Tyler, here's a couple of things you forgot to put into your analysis of the Obama "recovery". 1.) What are the kind of jobs being created in this economy? What companies are creating those jobs and are they here in the USA or abroad? 2.) Concerning immigration, how many of those jobs are filled by H-1B, H-2A, I-129 or any other weird visa classification under the usuall excuses. If companies need foreign workers, why are our institutions of higher learning considered to be the best in the world when theses companies are claiming that they cannot get the employees they need and yet we have millions of surplus workers? 3.) Remember, Sarah Palin alerted us to the death panels in Obamacare. How many of the over fifty crowd will pass away bvecause they do not merit medical treatment? Just asking.
Rejoice! You have been liberated by the Red Army!
I think the world of you, as well atomizer!
I'm sorry it took a week to get back to you!
TPTB gave the key objective of maximum employment, stable prices and moderate long term interest rates. Obamonomics does not exist and should not be flattered with a name; it has no policy other than the transfer of wealth from those who have any left, to those who realize they can make a career out of welfare (mobocracy). There is no central planning under Obama, no goals to seek, to targets to hit; only vague ideologies and pithy rhetoric.
TPTB made a false assumption that monetary policy actually can impact unemployment at any time, regardless of the accumulation of past interventions in manipulating market prices. This is patently absurd. Printing money cannot affect the level of output in the same way that changing the way a company is financed cannot change the sales of products/services of a company. Monetary settings are an outcome ex-post and have no "causal" impact (correlation is not causation). If monetary settings had any causal impact, the level of economic output, inflation and employment could be selected at any preferred level. Hence, central banks are keepers of record and certainly not shapers or controller of output, rational activity or employment.
The unemployment rate can be influenced by incentives (set by other taxpayers via a government) that encourages certain types of people not to work. After all, who wants to work with someone with a propensity to be a thief or a cheat or a leech. There are companies that have "adapted" to mobocracy (welfare democracy) like wal-mart, general motors, mickey d's. These companies resemble the workforce they employ (by paying minimum wages) to the extent that their employees are hired directly from the welfare/criminal pool or "turned" into welfare recipients so that the companies can pretend they are competing fairly. I saw a headline the other day that said that employment laws that used background checks discriminated against criminals and blacks. Well d'uh. Giving in to crime is easy. Working isn't. Thats why its called work and not crime.
On another point of the article, the particpation rate used in the graphic is a medium term number (34 years). But if you go back even further and take a 25 year period from 1951 to 1976 from here http://data.bls.gov/pdq/SurveyOutputServlet you will find that the particpation rate was a lot lower at around 60%. That kind of misses the point. What should the participation rate be? 65% is an old normal, but shouldn't 75% or 80% be a goal for a political party. Why aren't people working (other than criminals, mobocracy game players and the inform). Perhaps its because mobocracies, like this one, encourage welfare dependency, crime, sloth and apathy by penalizing effort, ambition, success and honesty.
There were many less women in the work force in 1951. Now that labor laws have made enforced anti discrimination laws to open up the labor market, there is a much larger labor pool.
The point is there are many ways to look at unemployment. I prefer to look at only the participation rate and a trade balance for success of a country (not traditional economic measures like CPI, CPI ex, GDP or UE3 or others, these are propaganda and manipulated). I prefer also to look at the income bracket at which people pay anet amount of taxes, since this a the future ability of the country to invest in itself. Deficits are anathema to me. Government is about removing debt, not creating it and removing barriers to happiness, not about creating debt or welfare slaves.
TPTB set the Feds goals whilst endemic racial and sexual discrimination were in place in the wider economy. The available labor pool is different now and the new normal of a mobocracy (welfare democracy) is a crime as pervasive as cronyism on FIRE sectors. We the people would prefer to keep liars, cheaters and leechers out of the work force. Companies don't want them either.
Just sayin
You can't depend on liars' statistics. Reagan created the fiction that unemployed workers become invisible if they are out of the work force too long. That is how Reagan cut the unemployment rate in the 80s, a numbers game. Reagan allowed big corporations to loot their pension plans by saying the plans were overfunded and, before long, many employees no longer had defined pension plans. The corporate strategy of using the U.S. Bankruptcy Court to get rid of pesky pension liabilities started under Reagan and has continued unabated since. Obamacare is the latest iteration of a president claiming to solve a problem and instead making the problem much worse. Meanwhile, the Feds continue to keep silent on why Guy Scarpa, Jr. was given a 40 year sentence for pot distribution after he gave the FBI evidence in 1996 detailing al Qaeda's plans to use passenger jets as missiles to attack U.S. cities, information he got from Ramzi Yousef while Scarpa was a confidential informer for the FBI. The prosecutor who got Scarpa sent to Supermax, Valerie Caproni, is now a federal district judge, appointed this year to the bench by Obama. 9/11 wrecked the U.S. economy and those responsible for hiring Osama bin Laden have gotten away scot free.
Smells about right to me.
OBL had NOTHING to do with 911....and OBL actually DIED in Dec 2001 That capture and BURIAL AT SEA! FFS, was a dog and pony show...too bad about Seal Team 6, who were 'dissappeared' by a tragic 'helicopter crash' in Afghanistan... educate yourself-the governments "Official Version" is like all the other lies they tell us. Try the Mossad and a very compartmentalized group of WH insiders such as Cheney, et al; Bhenito Bhutto said the same on the David Frosts show before she was assasinated running for prisident. Without breaking stride Frost went on to show pictures of cute doggies and cats viewers had sent in-he very nervously changed the subject, ignoring her astounding comment!
"Alas, that is the real reason why the labor force collapse continues and will continue even as America enters its next recession. Or depression."
The "real reason". <Sigh>
So the real reason people drop out of the workforce is because the system set up to keep them afloat when there are no jobs is FUBAR? It certainly is that as this chart shows. But beneath all the details is the larger truth: people drop out because of a lack of jobs that pay enough to live on, which in turn is due to a lack of aggregate demand in the economy. This post feels like an effort to evade dealing with that fundamental issue.
There are so many reasons people drop out of the labor market. Many give up looking for work and drop off the statistic because looking for work is very hard work, it costs money, and over time it grows more psychologically devastating, exhausting and depressing while hope fades. They'll scrounge odd jobs under the table, until their health fails. You'll find them on couches, in garages, basements and attics, tent camps and under bridges all across America.
Then some escape into the welfare system, but it's not simple math. Many do get trapped, many struggle to get and stay off if they can. Folks get booted out by time limits, and turn to the black econiomy. Many choose to work even if welfare is a better deal - but draw the line and go on the dole when it becomes a matter of health care for their kids. .
But when you look up close it's rational people, most with a history of hard work, of failed attempts to get into and stay in the middle class, trying to keep a roof over their heads, trying to keep their families together. Millions of people with millions of stories, Folks with beliefs, dreams, hopes, who will do things economists can't explain. Some cross borders and live like criminals to support their families, paying into welfare systems they can never draw from. Many cheat.
Then there are all kinds of barriers to getting onto welfare. Time limits for staying on it, and barriers to stepping off temporarily. The stories go on and on, millions of people, millions of stories, each trying to figure out how to survive.
Tyler's very interesting chart helps explain how crazy it all is, and is a contribution to explaining people's choices, but it's no theory of everything. The "real problem" is jobs. Good jobs, or lack thereof.
We've had some times when the economy was pretty close to full employment. Like during World War II. In spite of all the New Deal releif programs, just about everyone went back to work.
That could happen again!
We've had some times when the economy was pretty close to full employment. Like during World War II. In spite of all the New Deal releif programs, just about everyone went back to work. That could happen again!
Unlikely. The next World War goes Nuclear. There might be full Death from the resulting Nuclear Winter.
War is not an answer. War has been the problem all along.
Agreed! I brough up WWII only to point out what happens when there really is a full employment economy. Lots of problems go away. Something's very wrong if it takes a war to get there.
Sigh. The lack of jobs is not due to lack of aggregate demand ; rather, reduction of aggregate demand is due to lack of good paying jobs.
And, the lack of good jobs is due to outsourcing, failure to protect our markets, H1B visa programs, legal and illegal immigration, excessive regulation and taxes, and the general gutting of our manufacturing engine by politicians who are clueless as to what creates wealth in concert with wall-streeters concerned only with short term gains.
Don't forget Technology! A good example is Barcodes. Before Barcodes, retail clerks had to manually enter the price on an electromechanical cash register, for each and every item. Also, each item had to be priced by a store clerk, with a decal, so that the cashier would know the price, usually by examining each and every item. Checking out at a grocery store with twenty or thirty items used to take some time and time is money.
Contrast that with how it's done now. The cashier swipes the items quickly across the scanner and even the cashier is not needed, with self checkout. When that technology came about, you can bet that a whole lof of retail jobs permanently vanished.
My take on all this is we no longer need as many people, esp. the fast-breeding lower IQ portion of our population. And yes, bring back Manufacturing to our shores, because unlike Wall Street, they actually create and produce something tangible.
+1 Good to see that some folks get it.
It's a chicken-or-egg argument.
All the causes you mention are involved, but none represent core dynamics. The inevitable, inexorable self-destruction of our debt-based money system is another factor. And whatever dynamic has been causing gains in productivity to go entirely to the corporations needs to get fixed so that investment doesn't choke off purchasing power.
A currency spent into existence by the government or by a public bank, rather than borrowed into existence by a central bank, would work. Closing the offshore tax haven loopholes is another. A small tax on financial transactions could raise trillions, while slowing down the velocity of the markets - well worth the price for most smaller traders because it would have a leveling effect on the playing field. There's huge amounts of public work that needs doing if the government had the money, but borrowing the funds from CitiBank or HSBC has to stop.
I'm trying to hire for a full time positions with health, dental, prescription, vision, Short term disability, etc for the last four weeks. I thought the economy was bad and the stat's didn't represent reality. MAN WAS I WRONG.
I've gotten 12 applications in four weeks and they have zero experience. I will hire at least two new employees from the app's.
I think it is too easy to do nothing and collect money from uncle sugar.
It's funny because the union guys are bitching about the deadbeats riding in the wagon and I can say that for "some" the light has come on.
I don't want to read the article - can anyone tell me what happened?
Ronald happened.
The money you use to buy stuff is debt someone borrowed from a bank. And where did the bank get it? They created it out of thin air.
And where does the money come from that is used to buy imports? It's debt someone borrowed from a bank. And where did the bank get it? Out of thin air on a computer.
What else is new?
Crypto currency is new.
Trends happen - then they die.
I do not understand all the guessing. With computers a persons employment status, wage, benefits, should easily be recorded to the government by the first day the employee starts work or at least by the end of the first week.
.... from the people who bought you the ObamaCare Website?
Note it's a pdf
http://cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/attachments/45010-Outlook201...
Note the waterslide at 2008
for the labor participation
rate.
The continuation through 2020
should make at least the unscrupulous
oligarchs happy.
They like people being
desparate for work while the
unemployment rate gives a false
impression.
Also:
http://www.shadowstats.com/alternate_data/unemployment-charts
It looks sorta' like Shadowstats has the rate
around 23% +/-.
The exacting basis of difference:
http://pages.citebite.com/v2o7p4e3x6mfm
That reflects in employment to
population, which the column above
covers copiously.
I think non-privatized policy,
beyond simply they got bailed
out we got sold out, such as
having an economic and environmental
renaissance, rather than
privatized environmental policy,
would render most of the
super bearish language as to
employment prospects preposterous.
I worked for a Vietnam era gunny sargeant at Sears in the 80's. When I got to know him he confided that they kept the part-timers on low hours "to keep them hungry, it makes them more obedient." He gave and took away hours based on how obedient we were.
Knock knock
Now you say, "control freak who?"
I sure wish some {more} of you smart boys and girls would bring your insights over to Krugman's blog and columns. You might not change his mind {does he believe his own shit? Probably - he doesn't question the underlying paradigm} but it might irritate some of his fanboys and girls, who seem to get awfully flustered when anyone suggests that repeatedly blaming the "tea partiers" for the state of the economy doesn't make a lick of sense.
Admittedly, my stint there was only a bit longer than at Daily Kos. After merely being told to "familiarize yourself with Keynes {or macro}" without any rejoinder to the point I had made, however inelegant or modest, I sort of began feeling like I was dealing with a cult.
Indeed, if Krugman advised his readers that an alien craft hidden behind the moon was about to take them all to Keynestonia, where everyone would be "progressive" and imbued with a perfect love of The State, I'm pretty sure a healthy minority would quit their jobs and begin packing.
Krugman has declared that the United States is currently in an Economic Depression.
Did you know that? Even Broken Clocks are correct at times.
But if I were to waste my time and post there then I would not be serving people well.
People whom are lost in the "Cults of Personality" are not seeking out the truth.
Furthermore whom I am going to help? If they are lost in a Cult of Presonality then I am not going to persuade any to change their minds.
When they become disillusioned enough to venture outside of the Matrix then they will seek out a better understanding. That is what ZH provides. They will find ZH. I can help SOME people here. There is no need to troll Krugman's group. I will not be of any service to anyone there. I would only be an irritant.
I do not need them now. In the end I will not need them...at all. I cannot "save the World." So I do not intend to save the World.
A somewhat wise man once said, or sang, "once in the while you can get shown the light in the strangest of places if you look at it right"
Perhaps if you're shining a light there, someone or many will see it....
"...if you look ..."
It is a matter of numbers. Your statement implies that one has to look. They are not looking there.
But they are LOOKING for it here.
If that is what you want to do then knock yourself out.
I will not waste time on the unwilling. It is not worth it.
From Amazon:
Israel's next great crisis may come not with the Palestinians or Iran but with young American Jews
A dramatic shift is taking place in Israel and America. In Israel, the deepening occupation of the West Bank is putting Israeli democracy at risk. In the United States, the refusal of major Jewish organizations to defend democracy in the Jewish state is alienating many young liberal Jews from Zionism itself. In the next generation, the liberal Zionist dream—the dream of a state that safeguards the Jewish people and cherishes democratic ideals—may die.
In The Crisis of Zionism, Peter Beinart lays out in chilling detail the looming danger to Israeli democracy and the American Jewish establishment's refusal to confront it. And he offers a fascinating, groundbreaking portrait of the two leaders at the center of the crisis: Barack Obama, America's first "Jewish president," a man steeped in the liberalism he learned from his many Jewish friends and mentors in Chicago; and Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister who considers liberalism the Jewish people's special curse. These two men embody fundamentally different visions not just of American and Israeli national interests but of the mission of the Jewish people itself.
Beinart concludes with provocative proposals for how the relationship between American Jews and Israel must change, and with an eloquent and moving appeal for American Jews to defend the dream of a democratic Jewish state before it is too late.
http://www.amazon.com/Crisis-Zionism-Peter-Beinart/dp/0805094121
Funny, my wife and I are trying to get our expenditures under $50k per year so we can retire. Just about the amount of welfare someone is eligible for that don't earn squat... WTF?
We hire a monkey, then get upset when we get monkey results. Go figure!?
From Reagan to Obama, the methodology for calculating U3 has been changed several times (to make things seem better than they actually are). You are comparing apples with oranges.
What else would anyone expect from an arrogant, narcissistic, lying illegal alien muslim fudge packer only interested in maintaining its grand imperial lifestyle at theexpense of the sap tax paying serfs and peasant sheeple who keep voting these corrupt ruling political elite into yheir privileged positions.
Would like an explanation why American jews keep supporting the fudgepacker and its cronies who repeatedly throe Israel under the bus. Wtf up with that?
Why did the unemployment rate drop? Simple, the BLS went back to March 2013 and "revised" the new jobs created number upwards by 340,000. BINGO....there, that'll do it Mr. President.
So were not reaching Escape Velocity?
Here's Ronald Reagan before he was transformed into a stupid Republican:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uJDhS4oUm0M
Only dumbasses believe the stupid shit about blaming Reagan for the shitshow that is here to stay.
Another Holiday!
Walmart stores are open on Presidents' Day! Some are open 24 hours, others open at 7 a.m. Most federal employees, government officials, teachers, and many other state employees have Presidents' Day off, which means plenty of time to shop-till-you-drop for holiday sales. Walmart, Target, Best Buy, Kmart, and most retail stores have awesome Presidents' Day weekend and Washington's Birthday Celebrations going on.
http://www.examiner.com/article/presidents-day-2014-closures-are-banks-d...
Most private sector is open Presidents' Day.
OT: Can someone make a chart that correlates Hard Drive storage density or CPU processor speed to credit expansion. I'm of the opinion that the last 30+ years of credit expansion is a cause of banks and bean counters being able to count moar, moar easily.
So very true and well put together Tyler. Impressive and backed by facts. I believe this is why along with income inequality is why most people don't feel that this is a recovery. It simply has not been followed by any sort of prospreity on any level that defined the previous recovery periods in the past thity years or so where the baby boomers were spending most of their money and all these industries were popping up to service them. I remember 1982-3 when I was looking for a job as a fresh high school grad. It was awful. It did not recover until we had our first of the triumverate of housing bubbles that occured in the following thirty years as house flipping became a way to generate wealth if you were lucky enough not to be left standing when the chairs were pulled away.
Come on up here to Canada and you can see the nanny state well in action and where you are headed. Taxes as far as the eye can see and absolutely no incedntive what so ever to make anything over 100K as you will simply give it to the government to support all our wonderful programs that serve only to make an alread amby bamby society even more reliate on an already too large government.
I suspect that you would have incredible issues trying to remove it at this point as most people now "WANT" this. Even though it is stifling the entrepreneurial spirit.
Why would you work hard if it did not serve any purpose to better your own life? We toute that we have a capitalistic system here but it sure as hell resembles communism if you ask me.
Add about 20% to that # as they left out all the manipulation the BLS uses.
I wonder what those figures would look like with 30 million less illegal aliens.
When it snows on Mars, people in Miami Beach go to the beach. If you read this article and have concluded like ZH has that the size of labor force is determined by number of single women with children on welfare, BLS has a job for you too.
This is why zero hedge is the best!
This is why zero hedge is the best!