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U.S. economy adds just 74,000 jobs in December

Helix said:
you guys know the drill. the economy is (awesome!) (horrible!), and it is the (accomplishment) (failure) of (___________.)
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Take your pick.

Isn't the US population growing by about 247,000 monthly?
 
Lord of Planar said:
Take your pick.

Isn't the US population growing by about 247,000 monthly?
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So, one vote for the economy is horrible, and it is the fault of immigration ?
 
NIMBY said:
The short article is a good, quick read.
It beats the hell out of a negative GDP and losing 750,000 jobs a month as we were doing 5 years ago.
Enough factors were listed to explain the numbers.
Let's hope and pray for a change in the way the two ruling parties work together, the real impediment to further growth IMHO .
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That was a temporary trend that should have been completely corrected by now.

Why do you imply that the numbers you state were a long term thing?
 
TheNextEra said:
That figure is close to the figure on bls.gov site which listed job openings as 3.9 million in October. It also doesn't say what type of jobs or where. But the number is pretty valid on its own.
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Probably not that great. Half of the 75 or so thousand filled jobs in December were not full time.

As long as the Ideologues in DC actively campaign against the creation of jobs, we are screwed.
 
TheNextEra said:
Relocating a family is not free. Yes, the cost involved to continually move to "Where the work is at" is going to be exceedingly difficult for people with very little to no income that are struggling just to pay the bills they have.

Somehow you think that a family with an underwater mortgage is just going to be able to uproot and move to a new location free of cost and start magically working. Doesn't work that way.

That doesn't even include what a cost to "retrain" would be. The fantasy is those thinking that people can just switch jobs and move their entire family at a drop of ahat free of charge. And you would have to think it is free of charge, otherwise where are they going to get the money to relocate and retrain in the first place?
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No, relocating a family isn't free, but then a better temporary model might be that one of the parents go to where the job is, live in an apartment and send checks home to support the family, at least on a temporary basis, until the mortgage situation can be resolved, perhaps through a short sale. Illegal immigrants do this all the time, and even across a national border.

TheNextEra said:
That's your problem then, but even the right as a whole doesn't dispute the BLS numbers. If you choose to ignore reality, that's on you not me.
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Problem being is that what everyone thinks is unemployment is reported by the BLS as the U6 number, which last I recall was running around 12-15%, and the official number is the what? U3?

Frankly, I think that the U6 number is far more accurate and representative of the unemployment situation, and I don't know the reasoning for the official use of the U3 number instead.

Table A-15. Alternative measures of labor underutilization

MeasureNot seasonally adjustedSeasonally adjusted
Dec.
2012		Nov.
2013		Dec.
2013		Dec.
2012		Aug.
2013		Sept.
2013		Oct.
2013		Nov.
2013		Dec.
2013
U-1 Persons unemployed 15 weeks or longer, as a percent of the civilian labor force4.23.73.54.33.83.83.83.73.6
U-2 Job losers and persons who completed temporary jobs, as a percent of the civilian labor force4.33.53.54.23.83.74.03.73.5
U-3 Total unemployed, as a percent of the civilian labor force (official unemployment rate)7.66.66.57.97.27.27.27.06.7
U-4 Total unemployed plus discouraged workers, as a percent of the civilian labor force plus discouraged workers8.37.17.08.57.87.77.77.47.2
U-5 Total unemployed, plus discouraged workers, plus all other persons marginally attached to the labor force, as a percent of the civilian labor force plus all persons marginally attached to the labor force9.27.97.99.48.68.68.68.28.1
U-6 Total unemployed, plus all persons marginally attached to the labor force, plus total employed part time for economic reasons, as a percent of the civilian labor force plus all persons marginally attached to the labor force14.412.713.014.413.613.613.713.113.1
NOTE: Persons marginally attached to the labor force are those who currently are neither working nor looking for work but indicate that they want and are available for a job and have looked for work sometime in the past 12 months. Discouraged workers, a subset of the marginally attached, have given a job-market related reason for not currently looking for work. Persons employed part time for economic reasons are those who want and are available for full-time work but have had to settle for a part-time schedule. Updated population controls are introduced annually with the release of January data.
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Table A-15. Alternative measures of labor underutilization

Lord of Planar said:
Take your pick.

Isn't the US population growing by about 247,000 monthly?
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That's the last number that I heard, which puts the 74,000 for December into a real perspective, as to how far and how fast the job growth is falling behind.
 
Helix said:
So, one vote for the economy is horrible, and it is the fault of immigration ?
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I only extrapolated the monthly growth based on the 2000 and 2010 census numbers.

Are you suggesting that the US would have a zero population growth rate if not for immigration?

Next question...

Are you speaking of legal immigration, or illegal immigration? Maybe both?
 
How many of you have looked for a job in the last 6-8 years or so?

Some of you seem out of touch.

Everything is online. And 98% of the postings you see online (monster, career builder, job fox, Craig's list, etc) are no longer active...they've been filled, or the job no longer exists. Of the remaining 2%, half are scams. 1 out of over 1,000 listings or so is an actual, boba fife job. And if the posting is over 2 days old...you're too late.
 
Erod said:
I'm tired of hearing about the drop in the unemployment rate as a "positive sign". Liberals will spin anything. The effective unemployment rate is closer to 20 percent, and far higher in certain regions.

92 million people in the U.S. are not working. Period. Whatever the various reasons, they aren't. And Democrats want to "up the punishment" for those that are working by raising their taxes more and more.

A workforce this out of work can't sustain a government hell-bent on spending wildly beyond its means.
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In september of 2008, the Democrat Establishment called the economy the worst one since the Great Depression.

In that month, that month was by no means a great economy, the participation rate was 66.0%, the ratio of employed to the population was 66% and 145,255,000 had jobs.

The clock turns and the government types have made various improvements. Now the participation rate is down to 62.8%, the rate of emp to Population is down to 58.6% and the number of employed is down to 144,586,000.

All of the meaningful measures are worse. How much lipstick do we have for this pig?

Economic News Releases
 
Helix said:
you guys know the drill. the economy is (awesome!) (horrible!), and it is the (accomplishment) (failure) of (___________.)
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Thank God, we can blame Obama for this and not Mitt Romney.
 
ludin said:
I wonder who obama is going to blame on this one?

i mean if you look the over all down trend in the unemployment rate is directly due to people not looking for work. it has nothing at all do to with them being hired.
the employor mandate kicks in this year as well so any highering that would be done is getting put off.

heck my company is cutting back this year in an attemp not to fire or lay people off. the reason being some economy other to do with existing contracts.
other parts is money they have had to pay out for regulations and such.

obama has no one to blame but himself. this is what happens when you wage a war on prosperity.
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From his policy of blame distribution in his first term, he should be blaming the guy from the previous 4 years.

I guess we can eliminate that as a likely course of action.
 
KevinKohler said:
How many of you have looked for a job in the last 6-8 years or so?

Some of you seem out of touch.

Everything is online. And 98% of the postings you see online (monster, career builder, job fox, Craig's list, etc) are no longer active...they've been filled, or the job no longer exists. Of the remaining 2%, half are scams. 1 out of over 1,000 listings or so is an actual, boba fife job. And if the posting is over 2 days old...you're too late.
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That seems to be the method taught in schools but that doesn't mean that is how it works in the real world. The majority of jobs are from small businesses and we don't operate that way. If you need to hire a bunch of people maybe, but we are looking for specific people, not place holders. If you are relying on finding a job using those methods the job you land is going to be one of those soulless corporate positions anyway. I wouldn't want one of those. The people I hire are persistent, and they keep showing up until I either hire them or tell them why not. It's the same way I did it when I was looking for work. I get plenty of people who walk in and hand me a resumee and never come back. We call it drive by application and it is reserved for those who don't really want a job or are just checking the box for unemployment.
 
Kobie said:
Pointing out that the job situation is better than it was 5 years ago is now "blaming Bush." :roll:
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Actually, it's just cherry picking the worst time in the last 30 years and using that as a base line.

Rigging the numbers is just rigging the numbers.
 
Lord of Planar said:
I only extrapolated the monthly growth based on the 2000 and 2010 census numbers.

Are you suggesting that the US would have a zero population growth rate if not for immigration?

Next question...

Are you speaking of legal immigration, or illegal immigration? Maybe both?
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mostly, i post these threads to see who defends the economy, who claims it is horrible, and for what reason. then, when the government changes hands, i can link back to these threads during similar economic circumstances. it's great fun to observe the polar shifts.

if you want my opinion on immigration, though, here it is. i support a blanket amnesty, and after the amnesty, every job from dishwasher to CEO goes through everify. the fine for hiring illegally, even if the employer claims not to know, will be crushing. soon enough, Tyson will cut it out, there will be no draw, and you'll pay a lot more for meat, veggies, and fruit. i would also support taking another look at legal immigration. i don't have any problem with good people coming here. i have a problem with an underground economy in plain site, though.

anyway, thanks for your answer, and i look forward to having another discussion when the presidency / congress is controlled by the other half of the duopoly.
 
eohrnberger said:
Frankly, I think that the U6 number is far more accurate and representative of the unemployment situation, and I don't know the reasoning for the official use of the U3 number instead
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DA60 said:
I couldn't agree more.

And I (believe) I know why they use the U-3 instead of the U-6...it sounds a lot better.
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The reasoning would lie in the fact that the U-6 figures include roughly 10 million individuals who are employed, hence its obvious limitations as an unemployment rate.
 
a351 said:
That's just plainly wrong. No data to support that assertion whatsoever.
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Here's some data:

Population in 2008, September was 303,850,456. The increase in population to now is a little over 4% to 317,357, 120.

The total employed in september 2008 was about 145,255,000. This produced an unemployment rate of 6.1%.

To have kept pace with population growth and to maintain a 6.1 unemployment rate, the number employed would have had to increase by more than 4% to a level of 151,065,200: This would be an increase in the number of jobs of 5,810,200 in round numbers.

Where are we really? We are actually down from the 2008 level to about 144,586,000. Instead of an increase of 5.81 million jobs, we have a decrease of .669 million jobs. This is a shortfall from the normal, non-spectacular job maintenance of 6.1% unemployment. Using the additional unemployed and adding to the baseline of 2008, this would create an unemployment factor of 11% give or take. If you convert the population and other numbers which gets too complex for me, the picture gets less optimistic.

On balance I'd goes that the 20% number was a tad overstated and the 11% I swaged is low. Probably closer to 12 or 13%.

However you slice it, though, the picture is bleak and the top priority should be providing the conditions that will allow job creation and slowing the regulation mill and other factors that have the movers and shakers paralyzed with fear.

Economic News Releases

http://www.bls.gov/news.release/archives/empsit_10032008.pdf

Population Clock
 
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code1211 said:
Here's some data:

Population in 2008, September was 303,850,456. The increase in population to now is a little over 4% to 317,357, 120.

The total employed in september 2008 was about 145,255,000. This produced an unemployment rate of 6.1%.

To have kept pace with population growth and to maintain a 6.1 unemployment rate, the number employed would have had to increase by more than 4% to a level of 151,065,200: This would be an increase in the number of jobs of 5,810,200 in round numbers.

Where are we really? We are actually down from the 2008 level to about 144,586,000. Instead of an increase of 5.81 million jobs, we have a decrease of .669 million jobs. This is a shortfall from the normal, non-spectacular job maintenance of 6.1% unemployment. Using the additional unemployed and adding to the baseline of 2008, this would create an unemployment factor of 11% give or take. If you convert the population and other numbers which gets too complex for me, the picture gets less optimistic.

However you slice it, though, the picture is bleak and the top priority should be providing the conditions that will allow job creation and slowing the regulation mill and other factors that have the movers and shakers paralyzed with fear.

Economic News Releases

http://www.bls.gov/news.release/archives/empsit_10032008.pdf

Population Clock
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However you slice it, the U3 figure is the official measure of unemployment, and the effective unemployment rate is nowhere near 20%.
 
a351 said:
The reasoning would lie in the fact that the U-6 figures include roughly 10 million individuals who are employed, hence its obvious limitations as an unemployment rate.
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Ladies & gentlemen ... an example of purposefully misleading ... which in a way is better than not knowing it's misleading.
 
a351 said:
Consistent job growth instead of substantial losses for starters. The labor market in general is in a much healthier state.
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Even if the job growth is outstripped by those giving up by 3 to 1?
 
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