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US economy creates 243,000 jobs in January

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Biggest surprise of the week? Obama not winning an Oscar for best acting job as President of the United States and his ability to fool so many Americans into believing he is qualifed to be President of the United States
Yeah, I was waiting for that category.
 
Where do you think the discouraged workers come from except through the unemployment lines?
You would have been smart to leave that one alone after I clued you in [with 'seriously?'] to the ignorance of drawing a connection between new jobless claims and discouraged workers.

New jobless claims are people who recently became unemployed and have just begun looking for work, which is a prerequisite to collecting unemployment benefits. Discouraged workers are people who are unemployed less than 12 month who have not looked for work for at least 4 weeks.

The two categories have absolutely nothing to do with each other. You were a fool for thinking otherwise and Conservative is a desperate fool for 'liking' your mistake. But then again, he constantly demonstrates his need to try to better me, even by proxy of others more competent than himself.
 
Yep it is all a a matter of record that Perry raises taxes......

What matters is people control their own expenses in TX, no state income taxes thus if you don't want to pay higher taxes then don't buy the product or services that were taxed
 
You would have been smart to leave that one alone after I clued you in [with 'seriously?'] to the ignorance of drawing a connection between new jobless claims and discouraged workers.

New jobless claims are people who recently became unemployed and have just begun looking for work, which is a prerequisite to collecting unemployment benefits. Discouraged workers are people who are unemployed less than 12 month who have not looked for work for at least 4 weeks.

The two categories have absolutely nothing to do with each other. You were a fool for thinking otherwise and Conservative is a desperate fool for 'liking' your mistake. But then again, he constantly demonstrates his need to try to better me, even by proxy of others more competent than himself.

I haven't been following for a few days, but I think he meant underemployed (BLS: underutilized)...that leads to "discouraged" workers, which do not show up in the discouraged workers category.

From BLS:
Discouraged workers
Discouraged workers are a subset of persons marginally attached to the labor force. The marginally attached are those persons not in the labor force who want and are available for work, and who have looked for a job sometime in the prior 12 months, but were not counted as unemployed because they had not searched for work in the 4 weeks preceding the survey. Among the marginally attached, discouraged workers were not currently looking for work specifically because they believed no jobs were available for them or there were none for which they would qualify.

From BLS (the definition seems rough):
Alternative Measures of Labor Underutilization for States, 2011 Annual Averages
Six alternative measures of labor underutilization have long been available on a monthly basis from the Current Population Survey (CPS) for the United States as a whole. They are published in the Bureau of Labor Statistics' monthly Employment Situation news release. (See table 15.) The official concept of unemployment (as measured in the CPS by U-3 in the U-1 to U-6 range of alternatives) includes all jobless persons who are available to take a job and have actively sought work in the past four weeks. This concept has been thoroughly reviewed and validated since the inception of the CPS in 1940. The other measures are provided to data users and analysts who want more narrowly (U-1 and U-2) or broadly (U-4 through U-6) defined measures.
 
I haven't been following for a few days, but I think he meant underemployed (BLS: underutilized)...that leads to "discouraged" workers, which do not show up in the discouraged workers category.

From BLS:


From BLS (the definition seems rough):

Now try explaining what a person who hasn't looked for a job for 4 weeks has to do with someone who is looking for a job who just filed their first jobless claim?
 
Now try explaining what a person who hasn't looked for a job for 4 weeks has to do with someone who is looking for a job who just filed their first jobless claim?

I think I can make the leap that they are going for. Again, I am being lazy and haven't caught to the last few days, I just started on this page.

A person who just filed their first jobless claim has just entered the unemployment stats. The person who has not looked for a job for 4 weeks after being on unemployment will not be included in the labor force. Since discouraged workers are no longer looking for employment, they are not counted as active in the labor force. This means that unemployment rates, which are based on labor force calculations, do not consider discouraged workers.

Eh....?
 
I think I can make the leap that they are going for. Again, I am being lazy and haven't caught to the last few days, I just started on this page.

A person who just filed their first jobless claim has just entered the unemployment stats. The person who has not looked for a job for 4 weeks after being on unemployment will not be included in the labor force. Since discouraged workers are no longer looking for employment, they are not counted as active in the labor force. This means that unemployment rates, which are based on labor force calculations, do not consider discouraged workers.

Eh....?

Ummm, all you did there was to explain what a jobless claim is and what a discouraged worker is. I did that myself just a few posts ago.

What I'm looking for is how one impacts the other ... ?
 
Ummm, all you did there was to explain what a jobless claim is and what a discouraged worker is. I did that myself just a few posts ago.

What I'm looking for is how one impacts the other ... ?

In short, they don't. The only reason to bring the both of them up in the same breath is to point out that the unemployment numbers are not real right now because they don't account for the discouraged workers.

If the economy is still down, the people who have just joined the unemployment numbers can unwillingly become discouraged workers and fall off the unemployment count.

But as I said, the only real reason to bring both of them up in the same breath is to say that our unemployment numbers right now are not reflecting reality.
 
In short, they don't. The only reason to bring the both of them up in the same breath is to point out that the unemployment numbers are not real right now because they don't account for the discouraged workers.

If the economy is still down, the people who have just joined the unemployment numbers can unwillingly become discouraged workers and fall off the unemployment count.

But as I said, the only real reason to bring both of them up in the same breath is to say that our unemployment numbers right now are not reflecting reality.

If you want to look at discouraged workers all you have to do is look at the U-6 unemployment number ... which includes discouraged workers. As it happens, U-6 has improved even more than U-3.
 
If you want to look at discouraged workers all you have to do is look at the U-6 unemployment number ... which includes discouraged workers. As it happens, U-6 has improved even more than U-3.

You are right, 15.1% is a great number in the liberal world, isn't it? What is 15.1% of 154 million?
 
If you want to look at discouraged workers all you have to do is look at the U-6 unemployment number ... which includes discouraged workers. As it happens, U-6 has improved even more than U-3.

True, that is under the table of "Alternative measures of labor underutilization"

That is not the "reported" unemployment rate. The Jan 2012 (adjusted) was 15.1%, where the reported unemployment rate was 8.3% (adjusted). It is important distinction between the two. At least to me.
 
You are right, 15.1% is a great number in the liberal world, isn't it? What is 15.1% of 154 million?

Leave the strawman at home -- no one said it was "a great number". But it is the SAME number that it was in February of 2009 -- Obama's first full month in office, and it has improved for five straight months.
 
Leave the strawman at home -- no one said it was "a great number". But it is the SAME number that it was in February of 2009 -- Obama's first full month in office, and it has improved for five straight months.

Here are the U-6 percentages

2009 14.1 15.0 15.6 15.8 16.4 16.6 16.5 16.8 17.0 17.4 17.1 17.2
2010 16.5 16.8 16.8 17.0 16.5 16.5 16.5 16.7 17.1 17.0 17.0 16.7
2011 16.1 15.9 15.7 15.9 15.8 16.2 16.1 16.2 16.5 16.2 15.6 15.2
15.1

The real problem is the drop in the labor force in a country with a growing population
 
Here are the U-6 percentages

2009 14.1 15.0 15.6 15.8 16.4 16.6 16.5 16.8 17.0 17.4 17.1 17.2
2010 16.5 16.8 16.8 17.0 16.5 16.5 16.5 16.7 17.1 17.0 17.0 16.7
2011 16.1 15.9 15.7 15.9 15.8 16.2 16.1 16.2 16.5 16.2 15.6 15.2
15.1

The real problem is the drop in the labor force in a country with a growing population

Right, like I said, five straight months of improvement and the lowest level since February of 2009.
 
Right, like I said, five straight months of improvement and the lowest level since February of 2009.

Do you ever do a cost benefit analysis in your business? The 15.1% number in January 2012 came at the expense of 4.6 trillion added to the debt and the debt service on that 4.6 trillion
 
Actually, that is the scariest thing.

Not so scary, really. It was predicted many years ago that once the baby boomer generation hit retirement age, which they did starting in 2008, that it would impact the labor force. It's not surprising to see that wen you mix retiring baby boomers in with the worst recession since the Great Depression that the results are a declining labor force.
 
Do you ever do a cost benefit analysis in your business? The 15.1% number in January 2012 came at the expense of 4.6 trillion added to the debt and the debt service on that 4.6 trillion

Err, you can't really do a cost benefit analysis that way, particularly in view of the fact that much of the deficit is the result of lower revenue due to the recession.
 
Err, you can't really do a cost benefit analysis that way, particularly in view of the fact that much of the deficit is the result of lower revenue due to the recession.
First, the recession ended 3 years ago. Second, as Sheik Yerbuti pointed out, much of the decline in the labor force is baby boomers retiring. That has the duel impact of lowering income tax revenues while increasing the drain on the treasury. What we have is a structural problem where a declining work force will have to support a growing population that has retired and living off of SS and Medicare. The trillion dollar annual budget deficit is something that may never go away. Unless, someone steps forward and leads on the issue. And I see no presidential candidate in either party ready to step forward and lead on that issue.
 
Err, you can't really do a cost benefit analysis that way, particularly in view of the fact that much of the deficit is the result of lower revenue due to the recession.

We are talking about the GM/Chrysler buyout and the cost benefit of doing that. Taxpayers are losing billions on this deal all because of Obama's desire to save union contracts and keep money coming into the DNC coffers. You certainly can do a cost benefit analysis of the GM/Chrysler takeover but you choose to buy the rhetoric from Obama
 
In short, they don't.

Exactly. They don't. Which is why I was slamming Veritis and Conservative for trying to establish a connection between the two where none exists.

That was the nuance which eluded you for skipping to the end of the thread.
 
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