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Economy adds 192,000 jobs; unemployment rate holds steady at 6.7%

zimmer,

i understand that you're a passionate Republican. i'm a left leaning independent who doesn't much GAF. when you get into political discussions, you mostly post cartoonish hyperpartisan bumpersticker slogans. given this, i'm just not interested in having a political discussion with you unless you're willing to stop doing that and just talk.
I'm a recovered Demokrat, and I'm not surprised you have no interest in a political discussion that is direct.... bare knuckles. Welcome to the real world.

Obama and his idiots like to stick their knuckles deep, and frankly... people who are ignorant are the reason why we have this mess and the mess created by decades of socialist legislation on our hands. This is not time to be polite. He's certainly not. He's hell bent on "fundamentally changing America".

You see, I spend my valuable time here trying to jolt open a few minds. You don't like being jolted... OK... but... I'll stick by my previous posts.

Hopefully in some lonely hours of contemplation or research, you'll realize despite my directness... I'm right. I know I didn't like finding out what I believed was wrong... but that is what learning is about. Sometimes it's uncomfortable.

i will talk with you about anything else, though. i don't dislike you at all; i just really dislike the inflammatory hyperpartisan stuff. i spent much of the 2000s on a couple right wing partisan purity boards, and i just got burned out on it.
Once again, the TRUTH is not hyper-partisan.

I don't have a problem with you... and I NEVER take shots personally (unless it comes wrapped in a racist blanket) but I prefer to write short... direct... and readily readable posts. People's eyes glaze over congested or long posts.

Prost.
 
Zimmer: I was once a Lib too.
What happened?

I grew up. That's what happened.

I grew up, traveled the world, met a lot of interesting people, and did a lot of reading.

After about a decade... I was cured. I left the Left.

Moral of the story: There is hope for you.
 
Ouch! Looks like I overwrote one my posts. Luckily it was a snippet and not one of my great American novels. Here is is again, for prosperity's sake:

I encourage you guys to read every word of this very brief note, so I won't quote from it: It Wasn't Fannie, Freddie, or the CRA.

No... it wasn't the Demokrat party and their idiotic schemes once again. ROTFLOL...

Start with the folly of the financiers.

The years before the crisis saw a flood of irresponsible mortgage lending in America.

Loans were doled out to “subprime” borrowers with poor credit histories who struggled to repay them.

These risky mortgages were passed on to financial engineers at the big banks, who turned them into supposedly low-risk securities by putting large numbers of them together in pools. Pooling works when the risks of each loan are uncorrelated.

The big banks argued that the property markets in different American cities would rise and fall independently of one another.

But this proved wrong. Starting in 2006, America suffered a nationwide house-price slump.

The origins of the financial crisis: Crash course | The Economist
Boom goes the dynamite!
 
I grew up. That's what happened.

Is that what you call it?

earning your world view is so very wrong isn't fun. Being held up as an example of ignorance even less so.

Ignorance has massive costs, and folks like Helix, are a large part of the problem. I would say folks like Helix ARE the problem, especially if they vote. Either Helix is ignorant of the truth, or choses to ignore it.

Either way... big, big problem.

One simply has to stop lying to oneself, or escape the shackles of ignorance and become a well-rounded, informed citizen. … Of course, ignorants and bitter clingers... hyper-partisans fail to recognize the obvious... and that only adds to our problems.

If you don't think yer comments are partisan, you oughta look the word up in the dictionary. The word I'd use is arrogant. That is, if I were being polite.

Yer favourite descriptor for yer political opponents seems to be "ignorant." You've had a lot to say here about the CRA. My guess is you wouldn't recognize it if you tripped over it. Does that mean yer ignorant?
 
Is that what you call it?
It's the fact Jack. Travel, growing up, meeting people who ran businesses... and reading. Maturing as a person.

If you don't think yer comments are partisan, you oughta look the word up in the dictionary.
I've never denied I am a partisan, but an educated one. An open minded one. One who used to be on the other side of the isle. I

know the Left and their lies. Why would I (or anyone) want to be associated with failure and the lies and deceits used to sell these failures and pervert society?

The word I'd use is arrogant. That is, if I were being polite.
You're not being polite? ROTFLOL...

Yer favourite descriptor for yer political opponents seems to be "ignorant."
Ignorance abounds and we are paying the price for it. "Spreading the wealth around" is not a winning economic system.

You've had a lot to say here about the CRA. My guess is you wouldn't recognize it if you tripped over it. Does that mean yer ignorant?
I've posted what the politicians stated about it. Obama... Clinton... Cuomo. Barney Frank oughta be in there somewhere too. Cuomo/Clinton admitted the coming failures, but like most LIb schemes could never imagine how badly their forecasts would be or the massive collapse that would ensue.
 
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Ouch! Looks like I overwrote one my posts. Luckily it was a snippet and not one of my great American novels. Here is is again, for prosperity's sake:

I encourage you guys to read every word of this very brief note, so I won't quote from it: It Wasn't Fannie, Freddie, or the CRA.

Nonsense, It WAS FnF and the CRA.

You must be one of the low information Obama supporters.
 
It's the fact Jack. Travel, growing up, meeting people who ran businesses... and reading. Maturing as a person.

Just a lot of talk.

>>I've never denied I am a partisan, but an educated one. An open minded one.

With all due respect, I haven't noticed anything in yer comments that strikes me as "educated," and certainly nothing open-minded.

>>I know the Left and their lies. Why would I (or anyone) want to be associated with failure and the lies and deceits used to sell these failures and pervert society?

Pervert? Is that an expression of bigotry? Why would I want to be associated with the lies and deceits of the Right?

"92 million Americans can't find a job."

"Climate Change is a hoax."

"Illegal immigrants are too lazy to work, and they're stealing our jobs."

"Minimum-wage earners are almost all teenagers."

"Obama is a Muslim, Kenyan, commie, terrorist sympathizer who hates America and wants to destroy it. He wasn't really a law professor, he didn't write those books, he did poorly in school, he's paid millions of dollars to have his records sealed, his law license has been revoked, his wife goes on million-dollar shopping sprees with government credit cards, and he murdered both his grandmother and his gay lover."

>>You're not being polite? ROTFLOL...

I don't understand. I'd say I am being polite, as least compared to you.

>>"Spreading the wealth around" is not a winning economic system.

And it's not Obama's policy. That's just right-wing rhetoric. Are you happy with the way income has been distributed in this country for the past thirty years?

>>I've posted what the politicians stated about it.

But what do you know about it?

Nonsense, It WAS FnF and the CRA.

You must be one of the low information Obama supporters.

Ah, the classic two-word argument: "it was." Here are three words: "I'm not convinced."

You must be one of the misinformation voters.
 
Just a lot of talk.

>>I've never denied I am a partisan, but an educated one. An open minded one.

With all due respect, I haven't noticed anything in yer comments that strikes me as "educated," and certainly nothing open-minded.

>>I know the Left and their lies. Why would I (or anyone) want to be associated with failure and the lies and deceits used to sell these failures and pervert society?

Pervert? Is that an expression of bigotry? Why would I want to be associated with the lies and deceits of the Right?

"92 million Americans can't find a job."

"Climate Change is a hoax."

"Illegal immigrants are too lazy to work, and they're stealing our jobs."

"Minimum-wage earners are almost all teenagers."

"Obama is a Muslim, Kenyan, commie, terrorist sympathizer who hates America and wants to destroy it. He wasn't really a law professor, he didn't write those books, he did poorly in school, he's paid millions of dollars to have his records sealed, his law license has been revoked, his wife goes on million-dollar shopping sprees with government credit cards, and he murdered both his grandmother and his gay lover."

>>You're not being polite? ROTFLOL...

I don't understand. I'd say I am being polite, as least compared to you.

>>"Spreading the wealth around" is not a winning economic system.

And it's not Obama's policy. That's just right-wing rhetoric. Are you happy with the way income has been distributed in this country for the past thirty years?

>>I've posted what the politicians stated about it.

But what do you know about it?



Ah, the classic two-word argument: "it was." Here are three words: "I'm not convinced."

You must be one of the misinformation voters.

Well it IS nonsense NOT to blame the CRA and Democrats AND the GSEs on the Sub-Prime Bubble.

And yes, if someone believes Paul Krugmans accoubt or any other Liberals account of the Sub-Prime crisis they would be less informed than your average American.

Most liberals are ignorant when it comes to how our economy works and how to properly build a economy but when it comes to the Sub-Prime bubble their ignorance is willfull.

They cant accept that their ideology caused it all.
 
The recession ended in June 2009

Yes, and its effects continued to play through the labor market until at least the end of the year.

>>we are into June 2014

This may explain why I can't keep up with yer argument. It's still May where I live, and we're still looking at April data.

>>Compare the economic results today with those of Reagan's and get back to me.

I've already posted them in this thread: http://www.debatepolitics.com/break...te-holds-steady-6-7-a-110.html#post1063275988

>>Due to the high inflation and unemployment then that recession was worse than this one.

Some do argue that, e.g., Sarah Palin. Others point to the fact that Obama was faced with a near-collapse of the financial sector similar to the events that precipitated the Great Depression. See, e.g., PolitiFact.

As that article points out, the economy was not in recession when Mr. Reagan took office. There were two recessions in the early 1980s, one in the the first two quarters of 1980, and another in the last two of 1981. So the economy was expanding for six months before Reagan's term began, and continued to expand for another six months.

I'm willing to go along with those who call those a "double-dip" recession, although I'd say there's good reason not to. i have to wonder if Obama's critics would be as generous.

>>Reagan leadership and Obama's lack of leadership generated significantly different results.

Rhetoric.

>>When the recession began in 81 there were 99 million working Americans

In July 1981, employment stood at 100.7 million.

>>when Reagan ran for a second term that number was over 7 million more

When his second term began in Jan 1985, the figure was 106.3, so an increase of 5.7 million. More than three million of those jobs had been added in just the previous twelve months. The stimulative effect of the very large deficits the government was running (a total of $335 billion under his first two budgets in '82-'83, after Carter ran up $253 billion in four years — I call it "the Reagan stimulus"), combined with the "snap-back" effect associated with business cycle recessions led to a very rapid expansion in employment.

>>By the end of the second Reagan Term we had 17 million more Americans working than when he took office.

16.7 million. And the per capita national debt had increased by 92% in inflation-adjusted dollars.

>>Too many people bought the rhetoric from the media as to how bad this recession was. Tell me, how did this recession affect you and your family?

Three-year pay freeze. Got the agency-wide 1% this year. Makes those glowing performance evaluations seem a bit irrelevant in terms of compensation. My property value went from $238K down to $160K; it's now rebounded to $180K.

My brothers each lost another small fortune in the stock market, just like they did when the dot com bubble burst in 2000. They're both engineers and seem to think that markets are characterized by the same hyperbolic functions they're so familiar with. "What goes up … keeps on going up, even faster." They don't listen to me when I offer them my advice, based on thirty-five years of looking at economic data, looking for underlying trends. To their credit, they don't whine; they just sock away another small fortune.

>>I am telling you that population growth occurred and the labor force didn't grow in relationship mostly due to discouraged workers. That is a sign of poor leadership and economic policies.

Population growth isn't the number to look at. As you yerself mentioned it's labor force. Population growth outstripped the expansion in the labor force mostly due to demographic and societal shifts — retiring baby boomers, fewer women working, some of them withdrawing temporarily from the market to raise young children. more young people deciding that, given the poor market conditions, their time would be better spent focusing on education than working, in part due to the large number of low-wage jobs that result from a very low inflation-adjusted minimum wage.

The number of "discouraged workers" tends to bounce around. There was a large increase in April to 783K. But I'd say there's good reason to think the annual average for 2014 will fall below the figure for 2009.

discouraged_workers_2004_2014.png


>>Compare the labor force growth during the Reagan.

This was a period during which a lot of baby boomers and women were continuing to enter the labor force. It was driven by demographics, not economic policy.
 
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>>The economic results don't agree with you and this list is being given credit for something that no one can quantify.

Which results are those? The 9.2 million private-sector jobs that have been added in four-and-a-half years? The decline in deficits from 10% of GDP to 2.8%. A profit on TARP?

>>QE has done more for Wall Street than any economic policies to help the American people.

For one thing, I don't see a sharp distinction between them. And moreover, I think QE has benefited the economy broadly. It certainly has helped the government control the deficit. As I see things, we the People are the government. Government accounts belong to us.

>>The rich have gotten richer and the poor poorer.

The rich have gotten much richer. This is due largely to tax policies in place for the past thirty years, made worse by the Bush-era tax cuts, that I expect you support.

In 2010, as the nation continued to recover from the recession, a dizzying 93 percent of the additional income created in the country that year, compared to 2009 — $288 billion — went to the top 1 percent of taxpayers, those with at least $352,000 in income. That delivered an average single-year pay increase of 11.6 percent to each of these households.

Still more astonishing was the extent to which the super rich got rich faster than the merely rich. In 2010, 37 percent of these additional earnings went to just the top 0.01 percent, a teaspoon-size collection of about 15,000 households with average incomes of $23.8 million. These fortunate few saw their incomes rise by 21.5 percent.

The bottom 99 percent received a microscopic $80 increase in pay per person in 2010, after adjusting for inflation. The top 1 percent, whose average income is $1,019,089, had an 11.6 percent increase in income. — The Rich Get Even Richer, NYT, March 25, 2012​

Obama has indeed been unable to reverse this trend, and for a very simple reason — opposition to his policies by the Republican majority in the House. To anyone concerned about this, and I agree we should be very concerned, my suggestion would be to vote for Democrats in the mid-term.

>>What people want to ignore is that Bush took over an economy in recession, had 9/11, had a Democrat Congress from 2007-2009 and yet grew GDP 4.5 trillion dollars.

He also had a federal budget that was in much better shape.

Yer choice of a passive verb — "had" 9/11 — is an interesting one. He also "had" a clear wraning presented to him in a PDB that Al Qaeda was "determined to strike inside the US." Fwiw, I blame Chaingang, Mr. National Security, more than I blame Bush.

$4.4 trillion, to be more precise, and only $1.7 trillion if you adjust for inflation. He did a lot better than Mr. Reagan on deficits — the per capita national debt under Mr. Bush increased by only 45%, half of Reagan's number.

>>The stimulus plan was a payoff to Obama economic supporters, ie unions. Tell me how much of a tax cut did you get?

The tax cuts in that legislation went mostly to businesses and investors. I guess I missed out on those. I did get a check for, what was it, $300? I don't where yer getting the union stuff? Construction projects? I suppose we could have had the Girl Scouts do the work.

>>Again, you buy what you are told

Pretty funny coming from the Right.

>>how many House passed bills are sitting in Harry Reid's desk and not being debated? Reid is much more of a problem than the House.

How is the Senate more of a problem? Those House bills are largely tax give-aways. The American people don't support that nonsense anymore.

>>That is a pipe dream. We have a 17.3 trillion dollar debt and this adds to it thus the debt service is going up. How does a bill that costs this much and yet leaves 31 million people uninsured benefit the economy and American People?

It's true that the ACA is projected to add to the deficits in the future. This should be balanced out, at least in part, by reduced healthcare costs. And in my view, there is a societal benefit involved in providing millions of Americans affordable health insurance. In general, it will be very difficult to determine the costs and benefits.

>>Ask the people of W. Va. about regulations on Coal production. How could a Democrat state of W. Va. be so anti Obama now? How about the Keystone Pipeline? I could go on.

Poeple are always telling me they could go on about the terrible regulations. My guess is they don't have any to talk about.

West Virginia. Isn't that the state where all those people had their water supply contaminated by a chemical spill from a coal mining company? About 100K people got sick. I hear that the Right blames the EPA because the chemical that was leaked is used in washing clay and rock from coal so that it will burn cleaner.

WV voted for Bush in 2004. Should Democrats "pay off their economic supporters" by favouring the coal industry at the expense of the health of human beings and the environment in general?

>>So what? Is the cost of living the same in each state? States can raise the minimum wage so why is this something the Federal Govt. should get involved in?

Because it's in the national interest. The feds should set a minimum and states with a higher cost-of-living can set a higher level.

>>You think it is the Federal Responsibility to tell a private sector business what to pay its worker? What investment does the Federal Govt. have in that business in terms of actual dollars?

Is it a federal responsibility to tell a private-sector business that it can't legally operate with unsafe working conditions? Minimum wage standards protect workers from exploitation, like other labor laws.

>>Global Warming is a hoax

Not according to 97% of climatologists. I suppose you know better.

>>What you show are examples of brainwashing.

Not the most convincing argument.

>>You don't think Obama has lied? Wow, you haven't been paying attention and are going to believe exactly what you want to believe. This is the most corrupt Administration and one of the least transparent in history. IRS, Benghazi, ACA, Economic predictions, again I could go on but you are only going to believe what you want to believe.

You could go on and on, and yet you don't list a single alleged "lie." It's all rhetoric.
 
Well it IS nonsense NOT to blame the CRA and Democrats AND the GSEs on the Sub-Prime Bubble.

Nonsense in what way?

>>Most liberals are ignorant when it comes to how our economy works and how to properly build a economy but when it comes to the Sub-Prime bubble their ignorance is willfull.

I'm a liberal. Maybe you could explain it to me.
 
Nonsense in what way?

>>Most liberals are ignorant when it comes to how our economy works and how to properly build a economy but when it comes to the Sub-Prime bubble their ignorance is willfull.

I'm a liberal. Maybe you could explain it to me.

Sorry, but it does seem that liberals are incapable of learning, they just feel and think with their hearts. I assure you that you will grow out of your ideology or be destroyed by it.
 
>>The economic results don't agree with you and this list is being given credit for something that no one can quantify.

Which results are those? The 9.2 million private-sector jobs that have been added in four-and-a-half years? The decline in deficits from 10% of GDP to 2.8%. A profit on TARP?

>>QE has done more for Wall Street than any economic policies to help the American people.

For one thing, I don't see a sharp distinction between them. And moreover, I think QE has benefited the economy broadly. It certainly has helped the government control the deficit. As I see things, we the People are the government. Government accounts belong to us.

>>The rich have gotten richer and the poor poorer.

The rich have gotten much richer. This is due largely to tax policies in place for the past thirty years, made worse by the Bush-era tax cuts, that I expect you support.

In 2010, as the nation continued to recover from the recession, a dizzying 93 percent of the additional income created in the country that year, compared to 2009 — $288 billion — went to the top 1 percent of taxpayers, those with at least $352,000 in income. That delivered an average single-year pay increase of 11.6 percent to each of these households.

Still more astonishing was the extent to which the super rich got rich faster than the merely rich. In 2010, 37 percent of these additional earnings went to just the top 0.01 percent, a teaspoon-size collection of about 15,000 households with average incomes of $23.8 million. These fortunate few saw their incomes rise by 21.5 percent.

The bottom 99 percent received a microscopic $80 increase in pay per person in 2010, after adjusting for inflation. The top 1 percent, whose average income is $1,019,089, had an 11.6 percent increase in income. — The Rich Get Even Richer, NYT, March 25, 2012​

Obama has indeed been unable to reverse this trend, and for a very simple reason — opposition to his policies by the Republican majority in the House. To anyone concerned about this, and I agree we should be very concerned, my suggestion would be to vote for Democrats in the mid-term.

>>What people want to ignore is that Bush took over an economy in recession, had 9/11, had a Democrat Congress from 2007-2009 and yet grew GDP 4.5 trillion dollars.

He also had a federal budget that was in much better shape.

Yer choice of a passive verb — "had" 9/11 — is an interesting one. He also "had" a clear wraning presented to him in a PDB that Al Qaeda was "determined to strike inside the US." Fwiw, I blame Chaingang, Mr. National Security, more than I blame Bush.

$4.4 trillion, to be more precise, and only $1.7 trillion if you adjust for inflation. He did a lot better than Mr. Reagan on deficits — the per capita national debt under Mr. Bush increased by only 45%, half of Reagan's number.

>>The stimulus plan was a payoff to Obama economic supporters, ie unions. Tell me how much of a tax cut did you get?

The tax cuts in that legislation went mostly to businesses and investors. I guess I missed out on those. I did get a check for, what was it, $300? I don't where yer getting the union stuff? Construction projects? I suppose we could have had the Girl Scouts do the work.

>>Again, you buy what you are told

Pretty funny coming from the Right.

>>how many House passed bills are sitting in Harry Reid's desk and not being debated? Reid is much more of a problem than the House.

How is the Senate more of a problem? Those House bills are largely tax give-aways. The American people don't support that nonsense anymore.

>>That is a pipe dream. We have a 17.3 trillion dollar debt and this adds to it thus the debt service is going up. How does a bill that costs this much and yet leaves 31 million people uninsured benefit the economy and American People?

It's true that the ACA is projected to add to the deficits in the future. This should be balanced out, at least in part, by reduced healthcare costs. And in my view, there is a societal benefit involved in providing millions of Americans affordable health insurance. In general, it will be very difficult to determine the costs and benefits.

>>Ask the people of W. Va. about regulations on Coal production. How could a Democrat state of W. Va. be so anti Obama now? How about the Keystone Pipeline? I could go on.

Poeple are always telling me they could go on about the terrible regulations. My guess is they don't have any to talk about.

West Virginia. Isn't that the state where all those people had their water supply contaminated by a chemical spill from a coal mining company? About 100K people got sick. I hear that the Right blames the EPA because the chemical that was leaked is used in washing clay and rock from coal so that it will burn cleaner.

WV voted for Bush in 2004. Should Democrats "pay off their economic supporters" by favouring the coal industry at the expense of the health of human beings and the environment in general?

>>So what? Is the cost of living the same in each state? States can raise the minimum wage so why is this something the Federal Govt. should get involved in?

Because it's in the national interest. The feds should set a minimum and states with a higher cost-of-living can set a higher level.

>>You think it is the Federal Responsibility to tell a private sector business what to pay its worker? What investment does the Federal Govt. have in that business in terms of actual dollars?

Is it a federal responsibility to tell a private-sector business that it can't legally operate with unsafe working conditions? Minimum wage standards protect workers from exploitation, like other labor laws.

>>Global Warming is a hoax

Not according to 97% of climatologists. I suppose you know better.

>>What you show are examples of brainwashing.

Not the most convincing argument.

>>You don't think Obama has lied? Wow, you haven't been paying attention and are going to believe exactly what you want to believe. This is the most corrupt Administration and one of the least transparent in history. IRS, Benghazi, ACA, Economic predictions, again I could go on but you are only going to believe what you want to believe.

You could go on and on, and yet you don't list a single alleged "lie." It's all rhetoric.

Please learn how to respond to posts. I will not correct this one for you. If you want a response, post the quotes accurately and properly.
 
Nonsense in what way?

>>Most liberals are ignorant when it comes to how our economy works and how to properly build a economy but when it comes to the Sub-Prime bubble their ignorance is willfull.

I'm a liberal. Maybe you could explain it to me.


Well, it depends.

Before I educate you on the Sub-Prime bubble, from its genesis to its conclusion, to who started it and who perpetuated it and who lied to keep the truth hidden, are you going to even keep an open mind ?

Because this subject has been discussed ad nauseam on this forum, and the typical Liberal rebut to pages and pages of sourced data is to stick their heads in the sand and repeat talking points.

I understand the implications of accepting the truth when it comes to this issue.

You have to accept that Liberal policies implemented by Bill Clinton and carried out by a unprecedented level of Government corruption are in fact, responsible for nearly collapsing the US economy and also responsible for collapsing Capital Markets all over the world.

I've got all the proof I need ready to go with links.

Im not going to waste my time if all your'e going to do is ignore it and repeat the typical blame the banks and Bush nonsense that typifies the Liberal account of what happened in 2008.
 
Why do you think a sample size of 60,000 households could possibly be more accurate than a sample of 144,000 businesses (554,000 worksites)?
How does that math work?

the CPS is broader and more inclusive, and the two measure different things, but as far as accuracy? CES is more accurate.

I apologize as I was too harsh with you.

If you have links to unbiased facts that disproves what I said, please provide them and I will look at them.

Otherwise, let's just agree to disagree?
 
I apologize as I was too harsh with you.
No problem, I'm thick-skinned.

If you have links to unbiased facts that disproves what I said, please provide them and I will look at them.
Easy. There are 2 kinds of error: sampling and non-sampling error. Sampling error is the math on how much the sample could be off. For the employment level from the CPS, the standard error is approximately +/- 323,000. And the month to month change error is +/- 265,000. The 90th percentile confidence level is 1.645 standard errors, so the level error would be +/- 531,000 and the change is +/- 436,000. http://www.bls.gov/cps/eetech_methods.pdf

The CES standard error is about +/- 0.1% and the change is +/- 57,494. At 90th percentile 1.645 standard errors) so that's +/- 0.1645% (227,000) and +/- 95,000 for the level All Employees Standard Error Tables

Furthermore, for the CES only, we can find out the non-s molding error (mistakes, misunderstandings, lies, etc) because the CES is benchmarked to the Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages… the Unemployment Insurance tax records. So the actual numbers (adjusted for slight differences in scope) averages about 0.3% off from the CES estimate CES Tables and Charts

Otherwise, let's just agree to disagree?
I don't get that…accuracy is not a matter of opinion. It is a fact that the FED is more accurate. But keep in mind that they do not measure the same thing. An article on the differences http://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2006/02/art2full.pdf

If something is not clear, I'll do my best to a newer.
 
No problem, I'm thick-skinned.

Easy. There are 2 kinds of error: sampling and non-sampling error. Sampling error is the math on how much the sample could be off. For the employment level from the CPS, the standard error is approximately +/- 323,000. And the month to month change error is +/- 265,000. The 90th percentile confidence level is 1.645 standard errors, so the level error would be +/- 531,000 and the change is +/- 436,000. http://www.bls.gov/cps/eetech_methods.pdf

The CES standard error is about +/- 0.1% and the change is +/- 57,494. At 90th percentile 1.645 standard errors) so that's +/- 0.1645% (227,000) and +/- 95,000 for the level All Employees Standard Error Tables

Furthermore, for the CES only, we can find out the non-s molding error (mistakes, misunderstandings, lies, etc) because the CES is benchmarked to the Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages… the Unemployment Insurance tax records. So the actual numbers (adjusted for slight differences in scope) averages about 0.3% off from the CES estimate CES Tables and Charts

I don't get that…accuracy is not a matter of opinion. It is a fact that the FED is more accurate. But keep in mind that they do not measure the same thing. An article on the differences http://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2006/02/art2full.pdf

If something is not clear, I'll do my best to a newer.

First, I do not even begin to care what the BLS sites as the accuracy of their claims. That is like a corporation doing an internal audit...totally bias and completely useless.


Second, the BLS has apparently, on occasion, been pressured (and agreed) to cook the numbers for political higher ups.

Census ‘faked’ 2012 election jobs report | New York Post

Census office survey scandal grows as inflation stats faked | New York Post


Third, as I believe I have stated before - the CES is NOT a stright tabulation. There is a TON of creative math and modelling going on. The Net Birth/Death Model is just one of them.

CES Net Birth/Death Model

'Birth/Death does not refer to people but to businesses. The BLS guesses how many new companies opened versus how many closed their doors. The BLS then uses that guess to guess again how many jobs those business created or lost.'

http://www.zerohedge.com/article/morning-musings-art-cashin-15

I am not saying the CPS is great either...but I believe their tabulation process is less adjusted by 'modelling'...although my above link appears to show that even the CPS is open to flat out fraud.



It's simple, you have faith (apparently) that the BLS is an honorable organization that would never fudge numbers. But - considering you say you worked there - you are clearly biased.
I say the BLS regularly fudges the numbers through usually legal tabulation/modelling processes to get the result their superiors desire.

I believe the CPS is the more accurate number (when it is not being deliberately manipulated) - you do not.


And, with respect, nothing you have provided has factually proven me wrong as I asked for links to unbiased, factual proof that what I said was wrong.

Citing sources from the BLS itself is in NO WAY unbiased...it is the exact opposite.
 
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Please learn how to respond to posts. I will not correct this one for you. If you want a response, post the quotes accurately and properly.

In a way, I want to give you credit for being original. But I very quickly must decide that that is the weakest, most pathetic example of excuse-making I've even seen in a discussion group. There isn't even a tone of defiance, just an avoidant-dismissive withdrawal.
 
In a way, I want to give you credit for being original. But I very quickly must decide that that is the weakest, most pathetic example of excuse-making I've even seen in a discussion group. There isn't even a tone of defiance, just an avoidant-dismissive withdrawal.

Pathetic? He is completely right.

Your 'quotes' are ridiculous. There is no realistic way to know who said what.

And your quote replies are just a jumbled mess.

Hey, we all seem to know how to do it properly. So you can do it as well...it ain't gonna kill you.

If you are not sure how, just ask anyone or a mod.
 
There is no realistic way to know who said what.

"Conservative" said them all, and all in one post. I used a linked quote box for the first excerpt in the two posts I put up one right after the other (I hit the 8K character limit). You can argue that I should have done so for the first excerpt in the second post. It didn't occur to me.

Does he not recognize his own words from a couple of days earlier? And even if he doesn't, does he now disavow them? Seems disingenuous t' me.

>>your quote replies are just a jumbled mess

Any examples?

I'm not going to use linked quote boxes for every excerpt I cite. If the author of the material changes, I again use a linked quote box. This is of course done to allow others to follow what's going on. The poster knows what he/she said.

If you guys don't want to respond to my posts, I'll survive. In fact, it'll save me the time I spend repeating myself when you fail to address the issues I raise.
 
First, I do not even begin to care what the BLS sites as the accuracy of their claims. That is like a corporation doing an internal audit...totally bias and completely useless.

The information provided by pinqy in that post is just an outline of the potential error involved in the results of these surveys. As he noted, "accuracy is not a matter of opinion."

>>Second, the BLS has apparently, on occasion, been pressured (and agreed) to cook the numbers for political higher ups.

Apparently? This very quickly becomes a dead end. People who don't like the numbers from BLS can claim that "the books are cooked," point to one employee among thousands who falsified a very tiny amount of data, and claim that the survey results should be ignored, or even better held up as an example of vile corruption.

The Census Bureau spends some of those hard-earned taxpayer dollars we're all justifiably concerned about verifying the accuracy of the CPS survey, and I can say that I have a 100% confidence level that no supervisor ever told a field rep to "just go ahead and fabricate it." What would be the point? If someone can't get the work done, the office will easily find someone who can. Why anyone would believe this story from the "very ambitious" Mr. Buckmon is beyond me.

>>Third, as I believe I have stated before - the CES is NOT a stright tabulation. There is a TON of creative math and modelling going on. The Net Birth/Death Model is just one of them.

So you want the Bureau to contact every single employer in the country every month to collect more accurate data? The statisticians at BLS are world-class; they could make a lot more money working in the private sector. They're public servants and their work is both highly respected and very carefully scrutinized.

There's a real irony involved here. To gain the desired level of statistical validity, the CPS requires a ninety percent response rate. In recent years, the agency has struggled to get that, and in a number of months has fallen short.

Government-haters are a large percentage of those who initially refuse to participate. And they are in fact the most difficult to persuade. Time constraints can be dealt with fairly easily, as can concerns about privacy and confidentiality. But what can you do with a Tea Partier who slams the door in yer face when they find yer a federal employee, or with some nut that grabs a shotgun or a baseball bat to "defend liberty"?

>>even the CPS is open to flat out fraud

And what in this world isn't?

>>I say the BLS regularly fudges the numbers through usually legal tabulation/modelling processes to get the result their superiors desire.

Well, I guess you win that argument. I mean if you "say it," how could anyone question it? And I assume that under a Republican administration they "fudge the numbers" in the opposite direction, to make their superiors look bad. The fact that only Democrats are employed by the agency must go a long way in furthering this massive conspiracy.

>>nothing you have provided has factually proven me wrong as I asked for links to unbiased, factual proof that what I said was wrong.

Not everyone can rely on sources like the New York Post and Zero Hedge to back them up.
 
are you going to even keep an open mind ?

Please proceed, Governor.

>>I've got all the proof I need ready to go with links.

Loaded for bear, are ya? I anticipate nothing but rhetoric and links to right-wing sites. Since it's all so clear to you, and you've been over this material so many times, why not just tell me what you know?

>>the typical blame the banks and Bush nonsense that typifies the Liberal account of what happened in 2008

If you read my earlier post and see that as "the typical blame" account, perhaps you should spare yerself the effort. I said "[y]ou can join me in blaming Clinton, Bush, Greenspan, and those in Congress who voted to gut the mortgage lending regulations." Apparently, you want Mr. Bush's name removed for that list. As I recall, he was in office for a few years before the crisis hit.

Mr. Bush did foresee the danger posed by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the government-sponsored mortgage finance giants. The president spent years pushing a recalcitrant Congress to toughen regulation of the companies, but was unwilling to compromise when his former Treasury secretary wanted to cut a deal. And the regulator Mr. Bush chose to oversee them — an old prep school buddy — pronounced the companies sound even as they headed toward insolvency.

As early as 2006, top advisers to Mr. Bush dismissed warnings from people inside and outside the White House that housing prices were inflated and that a foreclosure crisis was looming. And when the economy deteriorated, Mr. Bush and his team misdiagnosed the reasons and scope of the downturn; as recently as February, for example, Mr. Bush was still calling it a “rough patch.”

The result was a series of piecemeal policy prescriptions that lagged behind the escalating crisis.

“There is no question we did not recognize the severity of the problems,” said Al Hubbard, Mr. Bush’s former chief economics adviser, who left the White House in December 2007. “Had we, we would have attacked them.”

Looking back, Keith B. Hennessey, Mr. Bush’s current chief economics adviser, says he and his colleagues did the best they could “with the information we had at the time.” But Mr. Hennessey did say he regretted that the administration did not pay more heed to the dangers of easy lending practices. And both Mr. Paulson and his predecessor, John W. Snow, say the housing push went too far.

“The Bush administration took a lot of pride that homeownership had reached historic highs,” Mr. Snow said in an interview. “But what we forgot in the process was that it has to be done in the context of people being able to afford their house. We now realize there was a high cost.” — White House Philosophy Stoked Mortgage Bonfire, NYT, Dec 20, 2008​

Believe it or not, I tried to limit the amount of material I quoted from that article. As far as Mr. Bush's responsibility goes, I'd say those reporters did a pretty thorough job.

If banks had no responsibility, why are they settling for tens of billions of dollars in fines?

In any event , I await yer "proof" regarding the central role played by the CRA in precipitating the crisis. Please recall that this has been my focus (#1170). I put up one link to a very brief argument that included F & F along with the CRA as institutions being held to a level of undeserved culpability. If you think you can present an informed indictment of F & F, I'll look it over, but my point has been to defend the CRA for a very simple reason: some on the Right love to hammer on it because it's associated with … BLACKS! Ya know, those horrible, lazy, shiftless people that the Democrat party bribes into voting for them with freebies and giveaways funded by taxes collected from the upstanding, God-fearing whites who built this country.
 
In a way, I want to give you credit for being original. But I very quickly must decide that that is the weakest, most pathetic example of excuse-making I've even seen in a discussion group. There isn't even a tone of defiance, just an avoidant-dismissive withdrawal.

And yours is the typical liberal response when you don't get your way. Fact, your post was difficult to read and impossible to respond to point by point but then typical liberalism takes over.Learn how to use this forum and I will be happy to engage you and make you look foolish by offering actual verifiable facts.

If you cannot do that then I suggest you move to another country more in line with your ideology as liberalism is killing this country and its economy. Maybe that is what you want because this economy has survived centuries and generated a lot of personal wealth that you are jealous about.
 
Please proceed, Governor.

>>I've got all the proof I need ready to go with links.

Loaded for bear, are ya? I anticipate nothing but rhetoric and links to right-wing sites. Since it's all so clear to you, and you've been over this material so many times, why not just tell me what you know?

>>the typical blame the banks and Bush nonsense that typifies the Liberal account of what happened in 2008

If you read my earlier post and see that as "the typical blame" account, perhaps you should spare yerself the effort. I said "[y]ou can join me in blaming Clinton, Bush, Greenspan, and those in Congress who voted to gut the mortgage lending regulations." Apparently, you want Mr. Bush's name removed for that list. As I recall, he was in office for a few years before the crisis hit.

Mr. Bush did foresee the danger posed by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the government-sponsored mortgage finance giants. The president spent years pushing a recalcitrant Congress to toughen regulation of the companies, but was unwilling to compromise when his former Treasury secretary wanted to cut a deal. And the regulator Mr. Bush chose to oversee them — an old prep school buddy — pronounced the companies sound even as they headed toward insolvency.

As early as 2006, top advisers to Mr. Bush dismissed warnings from people inside and outside the White House that housing prices were inflated and that a foreclosure crisis was looming. And when the economy deteriorated, Mr. Bush and his team misdiagnosed the reasons and scope of the downturn; as recently as February, for example, Mr. Bush was still calling it a “rough patch.”

The result was a series of piecemeal policy prescriptions that lagged behind the escalating crisis.

“There is no question we did not recognize the severity of the problems,” said Al Hubbard, Mr. Bush’s former chief economics adviser, who left the White House in December 2007. “Had we, we would have attacked them.”

Looking back, Keith B. Hennessey, Mr. Bush’s current chief economics adviser, says he and his colleagues did the best they could “with the information we had at the time.” But Mr. Hennessey did say he regretted that the administration did not pay more heed to the dangers of easy lending practices. And both Mr. Paulson and his predecessor, John W. Snow, say the housing push went too far.

“The Bush administration took a lot of pride that homeownership had reached historic highs,” Mr. Snow said in an interview. “But what we forgot in the process was that it has to be done in the context of people being able to afford their house. We now realize there was a high cost.” — White House Philosophy Stoked Mortgage Bonfire, NYT, Dec 20, 2008​

Believe it or not, I tried to limit the amount of material I quoted from that article. As far as Mr. Bush's responsibility goes, I'd say those reporters did a pretty thorough job.

If banks had no responsibility, why are they settling for tens of billions of dollars in fines?

In any event , I await yer "proof" regarding the central role played by the CRA in precipitating the crisis. Please recall that this has been my focus (#1170). I put up one link to a very brief argument that included F & F along with the CRA as institutions being held to a level of undeserved culpability. If you think you can present an informed indictment of F & F, I'll look it over, but my point has been to defend the CRA for a very simple reason: some on the Right love to hammer on it because it's associated with … BLACKS! Ya know, those horrible, lazy, shiftless people that the Democrat party bribes into voting for them with freebies and giveaways funded by taxes collected from the upstanding, God-fearing whites who built this country.

Ok, I'm going to try to help you out because your rebuts are a mess and hard to read.

Use the " Reply with Quote " button, and then copy and paste the beginning and ending of the "Quote" function when you want to make additional replies.

I know you can do it
 
The information provided by pinqy in that post is just an outline of the potential error involved in the results of these surveys. As he noted, "accuracy is not a matter of opinion."

>>Second, the BLS has apparently, on occasion, been pressured (and agreed) to cook the numbers for political higher ups.

Apparently? This very quickly becomes a dead end. People who don't like the numbers from BLS can claim that "the books are cooked," point to one employee among thousands who falsified a very tiny amount of data, and claim that the survey results should be ignored, or even better held up as an example of vile corruption.

The Census Bureau spends some of those hard-earned taxpayer dollars we're all justifiably concerned about verifying the accuracy of the CPS survey, and I can say that I have a 100% confidence level that no supervisor ever told a field rep to "just go ahead and fabricate it." What would be the point? If someone can't get the work done, the office will easily find someone who can. Why anyone would believe this story from the "very ambitious" Mr. Buckmon is beyond me.

>>Third, as I believe I have stated before - the CES is NOT a stright tabulation. There is a TON of creative math and modelling going on. The Net Birth/Death Model is just one of them.

So you want the Bureau to contact every single employer in the country every month to collect more accurate data? The statisticians at BLS are world-class; they could make a lot more money working in the private sector. They're public servants and their work is both highly respected and very carefully scrutinized.

There's a real irony involved here. To gain the desired level of statistical validity, the CPS requires a ninety percent response rate. In recent years, the agency has struggled to get that, and in a number of months has fallen short.

Government-haters are a large percentage of those who initially refuse to participate. And they are in fact the most difficult to persuade. Time constraints can be dealt with fairly easily, as can concerns about privacy and confidentiality. But what can you do with a Tea Partier who slams the door in yer face when they find yer a federal employee, or with some nut that grabs a shotgun or a baseball bat to "defend liberty"?

>>even the CPS is open to flat out fraud

And what in this world isn't?

>>I say the BLS regularly fudges the numbers through usually legal tabulation/modelling processes to get the result their superiors desire.

Well, I guess you win that argument. I mean if you "say it," how could anyone question it? And I assume that under a Republican administration they "fudge the numbers" in the opposite direction, to make their superiors look bad. The fact that only Democrats are employed by the agency must go a long way in furthering this massive conspiracy.

>>nothing you have provided has factually proven me wrong as I asked for links to unbiased, factual proof that what I said was wrong.

Not everyone can rely on sources like the New York Post and Zero Hedge to back them up.

Let me be clear so as to save you wasting your time...I am interested in only one thing in the economic threads...facts/data from unbiased sources.

I am not in the SLIGHTEST bit interested in opinions from most people - especially from those who I believe have closed minds...as you seem to have (no offense).

Since I did not see a link in your reply, I did not read it.

Once again, I am interested in facts...not opinions - life is too short.

If you cannot provide links to facts from unbiased sources then you are of no use to me in this thread.


Good day.
 
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