the 16-19 AND the 25-54 age ranges (the latter the backbone of the economy) both had less people employed in April.
Why not tell people how many … fewer … 25 to 54? (Because human beings are discrete units, you should use
fewer, rather than
less, to describe them.) Do you know how many fewer? Nineteen thousand, from 96,501,000 to 95,482,000 — a drop of less than two one-hundredths of one percent.
What has the trend for this group been over the past year? Not too bad:
>>there were 252,000 less Americans employed full time in April.
Hey, ya got one right. But again, the trend over the past year or so is fairly acceptable:
>>since January, there are only 61,000 more Americans employed full time
True. But over the past two years, 4.8
million more Americans have become employed full-time. You may have noticed that there was a slowdown in the economy over the winter. And the dollar has been climbing, which hurts hiring in export-sensitive industries. And of course there is yer touching concern for those being laid off in the energy sector.
>>192,000 more who are part time.
Correct. And many of those 192K are happy to have a job. And
some of them would like to work full-time. Did you bother to look into that?
The number employed PT for
economic reasons, i.e., wanted to work FT but didn't get the hours, FELL by 230K.
>>since January, there are less people employed in the important 35-54 age group
I'm guessing this cohort follows the pattern found in the others discussed already — a slowdown in the past three months, and a generally acceptable trend over the past, say, five years.
>>(as usual since the 'recovery' began' - the over 55's get FAR AND AWAY most of the new employed).
Over the past five years, employment among those age fifty-five and older has grown from 27.8 million to 33.4 million, an increase of 5.6 million. During that same period, total employment has gone from 139.3 million to 148.5 million, an increase of 9.2 million. So 61% of the expansion has been in the 55+ group. Is that "FAR AND AWAY most"? I'd probably go with just "most."
Let's consider why this has occurred. I admit it doesn't sound too good. I'm 58 and I'd like to retire before too long. (Sadly, I'll probably need to work for another fifteen years.
) There's a term ya hear thrown around a lot — the aging baby boomer population. Could it be that that group is one growing in numbers at a rate that would explain why so many of them are employed?
Over the past five years, the civilian labor force has grown from 154.6 million to 157.1 million, an increase of 2.5 million, or 1.6%. During that same period, the 55+ segment of that number has grown from 29.9 million to 34.8 million, an increase of 4.9 million, or 16.4 percent. In other words, the pool of
potential workers aged 55 and older has grown TEN TIMES FASTER than the civilian labor force as a whole.
I'm gonna guess that the mistake you've made is in using the language we often use in these discussions — jobs
created. It's better to just call it "employment." A whole lot of people have moved into the 55+ group over the past five years, and a lot of them were working five years ago and are still working now.
I would politely suggest that the way to avoid mistakes like this is to STAY AWAY from sites like ZeroHedge. All they do is lie, lie, lie, 24/7/365.
>>Always look past the headlines.
Always remember that US labor market data is highly complex. I've been studying it for forty years and getting paid to put together data on it for the BLS for the past ten. I'd say I know
a little bit about it. I'm sure pinqy knows more. It pays to be humble — ya learn more that way.