Rocky Mountain Perspective: Insight & not-so-PC News
  • Intro
  • November's NiLF & PT #s spike
  • October's #s belie recovery
  • Graphed & Charted DOL #s
  • July breadwinner jobs missing
  • O Channels Abrams on Jobs
  • Emperor's purge 130 mil'n
  • O's Shrinking Aug. Jobs #s
  • May grads flood job market
  • Spring 2014 ETA Job Numbers
  • March BLS Report Unmasked
  • Real Unemployment
  • Smoke & MIrrors on Labor Day
  • 98.5 Million Jobs Slashed
  • Obama's BLS Numbers
  • 90 Million Jobs Lost
  • Romney At Red Rocks

Are BLS Reports Confusing?

Dozens of different categories and data sets exist with the BLS, useful for spinning employment figures to political advantage!  

BLS Series Reports
While we enter the final month leading up to an historic Presidential election, candidates have moved from unopposed opinions and carefully crafted statements for fans and media alike, to a controlled, civil form of discourse presented to the American public as a kind of debate. The interaction and message to the electorate from a shared stage makes it easier to select whose words and vision for America resonates sufficiently with voters to choose who should occupy the White House in 2013 and beyond. The topic in Denver was domestic policy and issues surrounding a flagging economy, including tens of millions of Americans unable to find work during Obama’s 44 months in the White House thus far. 

Among the patterns our media have chosen to ignore this election season is Bureau of Labor Statistics data showing more than thrice the number of previously employed, willing and able jobless Americans pared from the BLS’ marginally attached unemployed ranks than those who achieved newly hired status. In that category, debate centers around what number between 150,000 and 200,000 would sufficiently allow newcomers entree to the labor market on a monthly basis from growing numbers of college educated, secondary and trade school graduates, Legal Permanent Residents (LPR’s) awarded green cards, H1B recipients and asylees not granted permanent status, and millions of migrant aliens newly protected by the President’s Executive Order bestowing de facto amnesty on undocumented foreign nationals. Graduates from education and higher education programs nationwide are counted as accurately as any BLS figures in the Digest of Education Statistics, and they’ve numbered between 18 and 20 million under Obama so far. The U.S. government keeps careful records of visas awarded to LPR’s, which approach 4.5 million since January 2009, and 600,000 H1B visas have been awarded (including renewals) to legal newcomers who are promised employment to be able to secure that visa through the State Department. With refugees and asylees topping a quarter-million, and estimates of 4 to 6 million migrant, mostly Mexican National illegal aliens (90 percent of IA’s were from Mexico, according to DHS records over the past five years), the total number of potential newcomers seeking employment during Obama’s time in Office is estimated at between 26 and 30 million. Yes, a segment of the workforce has reached retirement age on the other end of the spectrum, but since the initial wave of births after the nation’s World War II survivors returned reached a typical retirement age of 65 just this past year, the numbers haven’t spiked upward all that much over the past four.

I’ve explained why those most familiar with Department of Labor counts believe ETA figures to be more accurate than the survey-based figures recorded by the BLS, but I’ll offer a comparison here so there’s little question or room for misunderstanding about what employment data kept by the U.S. government says about the current economy. Given claims from the Obama election team suggesting almost a 4.5 million recovery from the 5 to 8 million jobs lost on three separate BLS counts, and the ETA employer payroll record numbers from each States’ Unemployment Insurance Funds showing who’s paying in, as well as who’s being compensated, the various statistics show an odd range of results but no growth in jobs across the board, overall. At times, those differences are skillfully used to paint a picture the Administration and willing accomplices in the media have sought to create. I’m going to compare results from BLS Series Reports LNU02000000, LNS12000000, CES0000000001, and the ETA employers’ payroll counts to make this Administration’s jobs numbers as understandable and real as possible for anyone not wanting to invest hours researching the DOL data, as I’ve done over the past couple of years on a regular basis.

Let’s start with a simple fact. On none of the four major employment level counts has there been even one job added to the workforce above the numbers in place on January 21, 2009. President Obama has simply failed to add any new American jobs to the economy during his Presidency for the first time in almost 7 decades. The performance has been dismal, to say the least, but not all counts have been as ugly as the ETA employer payroll figures showing Obama’s economy down 6.39 million jobs since the day he took Office. Seasonally Adjusted Employment Level figures kept by the BLS (SR LNS12000000) show the President down 1,227,000 from the 143,328,000 count in place when he took Office to 142,101,000 at the start of September. The most frequently used cumulative workforce count by the media is the Total Non Farm Employment Level count (SR CES0000000001), which showed 134,379,000 when Obama was inaugurated, while the latest count shows a preliminary figure at 133,300,000(P). That’s a loss of 1,079,000 jobs since January 2009. The Unadjusted Employment Level count shows just a 792,000 loss overall on SR LNU02000000, and this is the only count that can be argued in any way to appear to reach a positive figure, if the BLS data released on February 6, 2009 sixteen days into Obama’s Presidency is used rather than the figures in place when the President was sworn in. Part of the issue there includes the one-time adjustment for population controls made each January by the BLS on unadjusted counts, which is supposed to help balance and bring the UA figures in line with Seasonally Adjusted counts, according to statisticians’ estimates and impressions based upon census projections. Without explaining that process in depth, that mechanism for applying a one-time adjustment on the otherwise more accurate Unadjusted counts makes January and, to a lesser extent, February figures the least accurate UA figures each calendar year, in that order.

If we go back to the 150,000 to 200,000 figures debated by economists for how many new jobs must be created monthly to add newcomers to the workforce without displacing current jobholders, perhaps a monthly summary of jobs added to the workforce since this Administration claims recovery began might be worth looking at, as well. Since the start of the second half of 2010, Unadjusted Employment Level counts have shown 1,564,000 jobs added to the economy, which translates to a pace of 60,150 new jobs per month. Seasonally Adjusted Employment Level counts showed 2,964,000 new jobs added since the first of July 2010, which suggests a rate of 114,000 jobs added monthly according to the latest SA figures. Total Non Farm Employment Level records showed the largest gain from a more than 5 million worker loss overall, coming back 3,279,000 from July 2010 onward, averaging 126,000 new jobs added back into the economy monthly. Of course, nowhere in any data found with the Department of Labor does any figure approach what would be necessary to add the number of newcomers looking to enter the workforce, much less restore 87 million workers who filed first time claims for unemployment under Obama’s crippled economy. Those figures have everything to do with how the Employment Population Ratio has fallen to 30 year lows under Obama and at 58.5% remains almost 4 percent behind President Bush’s monthly figures through 2008. Another worthy indicator available through the BLS is Average Weeks Unemployed on SR LNU02300000, which remains roughly double President Bush’s highest count at the end of 2008, currently shown at 39.2 weeks of futility for the unemployed. The average weekly duration for unemployment under Obama has reached the longest length since that data’s been kept, ranging from two to four times the rates recorded under the eleven Presidents who’ve served post WW II. 

If the current ugly economy represents Democrats’ version of recovery, there’s little question what Americans must do to address far worse economic data than the left expressed anger over during the late stages of George Bush’s Presidency. My impression of the best single comparative figure is the ETA employers’ payroll data showing more than 7 million jobs added to the economy under Obama’s predecessor, while this Administration’s jobs numbers languish 6.39 million workers behind real supportable counts of Americans paying into Unemployment Insurance funds nationwide. A baseline of 133,886,830 in place during January 2009 served as the final count for “W”, and Obama’s original employment figure that he’s not approached again. The difference between Bush’s job growth and Obama’s shrunken workforce comes in at 13.5 million. Similarly, on ETA unemployment counts, records available on another page here show 25 million more newly unemployed workers filing first time claims for unemployment assistance under Obama than did so during the corresponding period in President Bush’s second term. Furthermore, there’s no way around acknowledging at least 25 to 26 million hopeful, ready and willing new candidates for employment during Obama’s time in Office, at this point. The combination of the above factors with Bush’s real 7 million-plus jobs added to the economy assures Obama’s failed economy trails the solid, if uninspiring, performance of his predecessor’s job growth by somewhere in the mid 30 million range.

 
Friday, October 5, 2012 jobs report comment:
 
The release of new jobs data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics this morning seemed incredible for its departure from Obama’s prior 44 months of data, but it was hardly unpredictable. I’ve said in print that it’s far easier to pressure bean counters and statisticians for favorable analysis of survey results than to create actual jobs that haven’t appeared on any sustained, acceptable level thus far, 3 ¾ years into the Chicagoan’s Presidency. Given that several major employers have leaked threats and bullying tactics from this Administration demanding they withhold layoff notices and normal activity toward profitability that would impact jobs data, why would one think the extraordinary data wasn’t similarly manufactured by this Administration?

Several observations about today’s counts include the Total Non Farm Employment Level (CES0000000001) inching upward to 133,500,000 as a preliminary count, which remains 879,000 behind the 134,379,000 in place when Obama took Office, and it’s closing in on the 133,561,000 count posted February 6, 2009, sixteen days after Obama took the helm. The 114,000 anticipated new jobs on the preliminary count dropped the overall rate through the President’s supposed recovery period of 27 months back to 125,500.
 
The Unadjusted Employment Level was gifted a generous 775,000 increase, essentially matching the second best figure of this President’s 45 months of employment records, while the 143,333,000 overall figure remains 17,000 behind the SR LNU02000000 count in place on January 21, 2009. The Seasonally Adjusted Employment Level was hiked fully 873,000, which stands as the largest increase in the nation’s employment level under Obama. Still, the overall count of 142,974,000 trails the SR LNS12000000 count in place when Obama took the Presidency by 354,000, but now exceeds the count released on February 6th
for the first time under this Administration.
 
The Unemployment Level remarkably shed 954,000 long-term out of work Americans, which nearly equaled the impressive 994,000 drop in April of this year, and only April 2010 bettered those two figures with 1,069,000 disappearing from the counts. With almost 1.7 million slashed from the ranks of the BLS’ counts of unemployed over the past two months, one can only wonder now whether actual payroll figures will spike upward showing employment gains approaching 2 million. Neither of the prior April purges of the unemployed translated into comparable growth on employer payrolls. In fact, the 2010 period from March through May that showed 1.62 million dropped from BLS’ Unemployment Level counts came at the same time twice as many jobs disappeared from the ETA’s employer payroll record counts at 3,365,000. Similarly, the April 2012 purge of almost a million unemployed, which reached 1.63 million slashed from BLS Unemployment Level counts from February through April, showed a slight uptick in employers’ payroll counts of 468,000. Of course, that would also indicate more than 1.16 million were simply dropped for expediency and to make employment numbers look better entering the summer months as the Presidential election ramped up. All of the Unemployment Level counts referenced above came from BLS Series Report LNU03000000 1-Month Net Change.

Since prior purges of a million or more unemployed have come without corresponding jobs added in any recognizable way to the economy, what’s your best guess (ESP not necessary) telling you about whether two million new jobs will appear on employers’ payroll records when the final Quarter’s summary data is released on ETA Report r539cy? Has Obama sought to deceive the American public before? Is the Pope Catholic?
 
Today there’s celebration by liberals who needed something to celebrate after Romney’s schooling of Obama in the first debate. This level of disinformation is tough to stomach for many of us, because of the harm this Administration has already caused and intends at an accelerated pace during a second term, if American voters are gullible enough. Those who’ve paid attention heard precisely what Obama said to Medvedev on an open mike about constraints and his willingness to deal once the election is past. Do you really think he cares about you and your loved ones, unless you can pass for the son Trayvon Martin did in the President’s own words?

November 6th is shaping up to be the most important election of our lives. This cannot be an opportunity that is squandered or lost without taking a stand!

 
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2012/oct/1/lockheed-says-it-wont-issue-layoff-notices/
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