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Jobless Claims In US Decline To Match Lowest Since 1973 (bloomberg.com)
Sho Chandra, reporting for Bloomberg: The number of Americans filing applications for unemployment benefits unexpectedly declined last week to match a more than 42-year low, indicating employers are upbeat about an economy that bogged down in the first quarter. Jobless claims dropped by 13,000 to 253,000 in the week ended April 9, equaling the level in March that was the lowest since November 1973, a report from the Labor Department showed Thursday. The median forecast in a Bloomberg survey called for 270,000. Continuing claims also declined, to the lowest since mid-October. "Jobless claims are running really low and all other labor market data are telling us that the economy is creating a lot of jobs," said Patrick Newport, an economist at IHS Global Insight in Lexington, Massachusetts. "This is further confirmation that the labor market is strong."
Or they just fell off the list due to time limitations. I know more than a few who have been unemployed for sooooooo long they are no longer eligible (or counted) as unemployed.
The number of Americans filing applications for unemployment benefits unexpectedly declined last week to match a more than 42-year low, indicating employers are upbeat about an economy that bogged down in the first quarter.
Non sequitur.
Chuuch. Preach. Tabernacle.
The number of people employed doesn't really tell the whole story, since most people don't have a choice NOT to work and obviously people who have dropped out of the market don't get counted. Sure as many people employed as in 1973 but quality of employment means everything.
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
The unemployment number is really a farce. While the unemployment number showing the ratio of employed people to people seeking employment is important, it does not show the whole picture. We need to see what the labor force participation rate is. People that have given up looking for work are not counted in the unemployment number. Real unemployment is far higher than the official unemployment rate.
See http://data.bls.gov/timeseries...
And also, with the less people claiming unemployment, there's no indication if they're in decent full time, not minimum wage jobs that are going to stick around. More than likely they're some variation of part-time and/or zero hour contracts.
Since people have to work, number of people working really means very little. What matters is job quality.
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
Unemployment claims went down, that doesn't mean that unemployment went down. I believe all the extensions that people used to be able to get have since expired, so a lot of people won't even bother to file at all now and will use their savings instead. It's fun with numbers, it's not a measure of the state of the economy.
Jobless claims is a deceiving statistic because it doesn't count people whose unemployment insurance expired without them finding new jobs or people who have dropped out of the labor market altogether (e.g. underemployed recent grads who move back into their parents because they can't find a job).
The actual labor market participation rate is 63.0, which, outside of last year, is the lowest it's been since the late 70's. See Labor Force Participation Rate from Dept. of Labor. I couldn't save a URL that pointed to the full series, but just adjust the start date back to 1976 to see the graph.
What's really happening is that capital is doing great, but the recovery from the financial crisis of 2007/8 has been largely jobless.
If you count discouraged workers, then the unemployment numbers are still REALLY bad -
http://www.shadowstats.com/alt...
[Insert pithy quote here]
Do it with words.
If you want to lie big, do it with statistics...
So rise up, all ye lost ones, as one, we'll claw the clouds.
Can you not post hyperlinks on the mobile site? That was supposed to link to https://research.stlouisfed.or....
U-6 is the real unemployment rate. Nobody but you, apparently, is fooled by the fraudulent U-3. Obama has yet to match Bush's worst U-6.
Unemployment statistics are a contentious topic because there are many "in betweens" to "unemployed". For example, a retired person may take up a job if it pays well and is convenient in terms of work/home balance, but otherwise are not spending much effort seeking. Does that make them "unemployed"? A prototypical "housewife" (house-spouse=PC?) may be in the same boat.
Because of these gray areas, it's been generally agreed as a de facto standard to ONLY count those "actively seeking" unemployment. This is usually measured by a combination of random surveys, and unemployment applications, which typically ask one to list companies contacted. (Since they don't need to fill out such forms when benefits run out, the random surveys are used to fill in the gaps.)
Sometimes political trolls will say, "unemployment is actually [really high percent] instead of the 5% official number; you are being lied to!". When probed, it will usually be found that they are using a statistic that includes one of gray area categories, like those mentioned above.
The same trolls will then often switch metrics again when their favorite politician or party is in power to make them look better.
Because what's usually used is merely a de facto standard, the trolls are not technically lying; just being manipulative. Most political "lies" are actually manipulation of words and misleading statistical games rather than being outright wrong.
Table-ized A.I.
The official unemployment numbers are based off a small random sample and don't capture a lot, so there's that issue.
The other issue is that the raw unemployment number doesn't address underemployment, such as
- Displaced workers who have to work crappy jobs but want better ones
- People who have to work part time but want more hours
- Long-term unemployed that stop getting counted when their benefits run out
If these factors were thrown in the mix, that raw percentage would go way up. I remember reading a statistic a little while back that showed that every net job gain since (I think) 2005 has been due to "gig economy" types of arrangements like Uber driver, etc. That's great for Uber and Taskrabbit and the like, but lousy for someone who needs stable full time work to support a family.
I'm one of those crazy people that thinks full employment for anyone who wants it in well paying jobs should be the macroeconomic goal. Unfortunately, it seems that most people don't agree anymore and are perfectly willing to throw the middle class away.
What kinds of jobs? I'm curious how this breaks down into service sector, manufacturing, or salaried. I suspect this is more of a regional thing because our area seems to suck. And we're located near a large metropolitan area. Most of the positions I've been seeing around here are in warehousing and they're building lots of warehouses lately.
What we're seeing in our area are "temp" jobs paying around $10 or $12 per hour and no benefits. A person is hired for some short period of time (typically 6 months) with the possibility of getting hired full time. This appears to be a way to string people along in these low-paying, no-benefit positions. Several people we've heard from have been extended 2 or 3 times and then finally their contract is not renewed. The reason is always that the budget just doesn't allow for a new hire. Several firms in our area seem to be doing this a lot. I have to admit some of this is anecdotal evidence, but this anecdotal evidence seems to be proliferating the area.
Having been a manager, I get why they're doing this. Cut costs. Operate "lean 'n mean." One of my previous employers became aware of the potential of temp positions and switched a large part of their manufacturing over to temp positions. That was back in the early eighties.
One of our family members has graduated from the state university with a bachelor's in two majors. Graduated magna cum laude in MIS and high honors in Business Admin and received several awards. Also won a regional competition in marketing strategy. Nobody is hiring. And this relative is looking in the surrounding communities. Consequently they've taken a temp to hire position only this time they've been hired. At $12 per hour. And they have a sizable student loan debt.
So I'm a bit skeptical re the whole jobs recovery scene.
An effective "democracy" creates the illusion the people have a say in their government.
Unemployment rates are not based on unemployment claims. They are based on a random survey of 60,000 households. Here's some information on how the various employment rates are calculated.
I just lost my job of ten years on the 15th of March. I also have two sons who are recent college graduates living with me who cannot get a job. None of us three are counted in the cited statistic because I was a new claim three weeks ago, and new college graduates aren't considered unemployed. If you read the linked article you'll see that continuing claims also went down. I'm a continuing claim, but my sons are not. So even though three of us are looking for jobs, none of us are considered unemployed, and only one-third of us is considered a continued unemployed. Needless to say, I'm not too impressed with the Obama recovery. At least my wife has a part-time job, enabling use to (barely) put a third son through college so he'll be able to take his turn being unable to find a job.
Unfortunately, my wife is working as a receptionist at a tax preparation office, and that's likely to end...tomorrow. As a part time worker, she's going to be ineligible for unemployment. That means that next week, with none of us five having a job, the new claims statistic won't reflect that. At least the statistics will look good.
~Loyal
I aim to misbehave.
They are based on a random survey of 60,000 households that can still afford a phone
Fixed that or you so that the selection bias was obvious.
"His name was James Damore."
Someone else already commented on the number of the "unemployed" being artificially lower due to the number of unemployed no longer being eligible for unemployment compensation. Another reason just could be a large number of Boomers who just decided to retire rather than face the uncertainty of ever finding another job due to ageism, ludicrous skill set "requirements", etc. I have several good friends who loved their work and wanted to keep working but, after being laid off and looking for work for a year or more, just threw up their hands and declared "Screw this... I'll just retire".
CUR ALLOC 20195.....5804M
"...they've been killed off because, while nicely profitable, they weren't enough of a 'growth opportunity' to be of interest to the private equity guys"
And this is what an MBA will get you: stupid, short-term thinking. I've seen too much of this. "What are your growth projections?". If you answer: "We're a stable, profitable business, we don't expect to grow" the MBA look at you like you just died. Weird. What it is about "stable" and "profitable" that they don't understand? It's not a quick buck. Instead of flipping houses, they want to flip companies. This adds nothing of value to the economy - in fact, it's counterproductive - but it's like gambling: an adrenaline rush and a chance at riches.
Or the marketing equivalent: "What is your USP? How are you build your brand?". If you answer: "We have a high quality product and loyal customers", they look at you like something unpleasant a dog might roll in. They don't want to hear about good products and satisfied customers. No, they want to hear about social media campaigns and rebranding initiatives.
The sad thing is that these people manage to move on to the next company, and escape the blame before the corpse of the previous victim hits the ground.
Enjoy life! This is not a dress rehearsal.
While yes, the number doesn't mean what it used to, there's a reason to be optimistic that opportunities could open up in the US. The stability of the US is a major factor that draws people right now, because a lot of them bet big on emerging markets and are losing their asses. There really isn't anywhere else you can put your money right now to get big returns with reasonable risk - Brazil is in a crisis, the Euro is in danger of breaking apart, Russia is Russia, the Middle East turmoil is turning that part of the world upside down, all the oil producing countries' economies are struggling, and China/Asia is looking riskier by the day. What's left? Stable returns on stable investments in the US.
Stable markets are very valuable right now because we live in a very unstable world.
Or, the government has found some clever way to cherry pick the statistics in order for it to appear that way.