The unemplyment rate reported on Friday was total fiction. No, that is not opinion. That is fact, from the Labor Department's own figures. The "sex" is tn the title is the reference to the ORGASMS media partisans had, or pretended to have, about a toally fictioinal unemplyment rate.
Is the Labor Department honest? No. But the media is far more dishoienst and incompetent. For literally hundreds of weeks, I have shwon yu that the Labor Department's numbers for any individual week or month are not concrete numbers. For example, the weekly number of new unemplyment claims comes out every Thusrsday It is almost ALWAYS a LIE. Even by the Labor Department's own figures, the number is ALWAYS, and CONSISTENTLY, revised UPWARD the next week: the revision being ALWAYS in one direction, understating the number of new nemplyment claims by usually 3,000 and more. And monthly eplylment numbrs are ALWAYS revised by substantial amounts. For example, the emplylment numbers released on Friday REVISED the previous two months "jobs added" figures to "create" more than 80,0000 jobs for the previoius two months, after the revisions for July and August (released first Friday in September) "uncreated" more than 40,0000 jobs previusly reported in those months. Thus, you have the Labor Department consistently understating the number of new unempyment claims by a number so conistent that it has to be dishoenst (whether "normal procedure" 9r not). Then you have so many numbers floating around, from sto many places--numbers that are consistently WRONG under the Labor Department's own figures in later months, it is obvius that each month's numbers are compiled with input from a number of sources. Is it surprising that the people GENERATING the monthy numbers could--n their own, wihtout even "conspiring" with one antoher--"fudge" the the numbers in such a way as to inflence the reported number? They do it every week, on the weekly jobless claims number. See Thursday's article posted on this blog, before the Friday employment numbers, and teh HUNDRES of preivous blog articles. I don't believe in huge coincidences, and an obivusly FALSE unemplyment rate, in the most crucial monthly report before the election (the October report the Friday before the electino being too late to have a s much effect), is just too much of a cincidence for me. No, I do't believe in big "conspiracies" to put togehter a false report. But neither do I believe in incredible coiincidences. Therefore, it is obvius to me that SOME people going through the process to generate these numbers did some things to "help" the unemplyment rate, which is a POLLWe KNOW that "polls" can be influenced, since it is the validity of the sample that matters (see the "explanatin" for the consistently dismal performance of exit polls, especialy i 2004). But it does not matter. The main "story" here--and the ignroing of it is what makes our media so DISHOENST--is the FALSE and INCONSISTENT numbers in themonthly emplyment rate. Waht the media shuld be 'reporting' is the questin of WHY the numbers are false and inconsistent: not "shooting down' conspiracy theories". Any "conspiracy theory" may be wrong about what is going on, but the FACT is that Friday's number on the unemplyment rate was a JOKE.
Let us go to the videotape. Second quarter GDP was jsut revised DOWN to 1.2$--insufficient (all economists agree) to lower the unemplyment rate). Weekly numbers of new unemplyment claims have been in the SAME "range' all year: 350,000-390,000, and they are now EXACTLY in themiddle of that range (see Thursday's article). Aain, all economists agree that this NO IMPROVEMENT is not good enough to lower the unemplyument rate. "Jobs added" have been consistently at 1000,000, or less, since March. Here is the most important item, and the most obvius inconsistency: "Jobs added" for September were CNSISTENT with prvious months, at only 114,000 (only 103,000 private jobs). ALL economists agree that 114,000 "new jobs' is NOT good enough to lower the unemplyment rate. But it is worse than that. The LABOR DEPARTMENT figures show that 114,000 "new jobs' is not nearly good enough to lower the unemplyment rate. No. I am not talking abut "discouraged workers", "underemployed workers", or the like--imiportant tas those subjects may be. I am talking about an OBVIUSLY FALSE UNEMPLOYMENT RATE, inconsistent with the other numbers int eh Labor Department report.
"Wait a second, Skip. You say that the Labor Department's own figures show that 114,000 new jobs is not enough to lower the unemployment rate. Then how can the Labor Department calculate an unemplyment rate of 7.8%, when they are using their own numbers to do that calculation.' Ah. Now you have lurched into the crucial pont: The unempllyment RATE is calculated on DIFFERENT numbers than the numbers used to calculate the "official" number of jobs added. Thus, the 114,000 number of jobs added last month ws based on a survey of EMP:PUERS (of actual payrolls). The unemplyment RATE was NOT calculated on this number, but on the different number of "jobs added" in the HOUSEHOLD SURVEY (poll of "representative" sample of households). What if a significant number of those "sample' households LIED in the PHONE POL (which I recommend people do in any poll)? Do you see how many places the result of this poll could be DISTORTED? In choosing the "sample". In what the people in the sample SAY. Etc. This is whre real "journalism", which no longer exists, culd be useful. The "Household Survey" purported to show a 'job gain" of 873,000. Bhat is an IMPOSSIBLE number, as the other Labor Department figures show. It is INCONSISTENT with--cannot be reconciled with--the 114,000 number of OFFICIAL "jobs added" from the separate survey of employoers. Can you see that 114,000 was NOT sufficient to decrease the unemployment rate? You should. Rather, the supposed, FALSE, decrease int he unemployment rate was the result of a supposed 873,000 increase in jobs i the separate "Household Survey", whihc is an obviusly false number.
Wehn does 873,0000 equal 114,000? No. Not Einstein's Theory of Relativity. Not the strange world of quantum mechanics. This only hpappens in the strange, impossible world of ur DISHOENST MEDIA (uninterested in looking into HOW these INCONSISTENT numbers can both be true), and int the strange and wonderful world of our Labor Department and economists. If ou ran up againstt this INCONSISTENCY in balancing your checkbook,, you wuld LOOK FOR THE ERROR. Our media--especially the mainstream media like CNN--instead look to "slap down", and ridicule", people asserting a "conspiracy" to create some exact false number. This is a red herring, to CONCEL and DECEIVE. It does not matter whether there is a "conspiracy" or not The 873,000 number used to assert a decrease int he unemployment rate is obviusly FALSE. That is a FACT. What we should be looking to determine is WHY it is false. What created this obvius glitch in the numbers--this obvius conlfict between 873,000 added jobs and 114,000 added jobs. The discrepancy s too large. Both of those numbers cannot be true.
"But, Skip, how do you know that it is the 873,000 that is false/" Well, you COULD simply disregrad the entire report, as interanlly inconsistent and false. However, the 114,000 is CONSISTENT with other numbers, while the 873,000 is not. The 873,000 is the largest increase in that "Household Survey" number since 1983, in what EVERYONE agrees is a sluggish economy (GDP growth of only 1.3% in the second quarter--the wrost since 2009). The 11,0000 is consistent with previus months. It is consistent with the weekly lack of improvement in new unemployment claims. But the "Household Survey" would suggest we are in a BOOM. Absurd. No. The 873,000 is FALSE, and should be reported as such (or at least as inconsistent with the other numbers). I agree, by the way that Mitt Romney cannot quite say it that way. But Mitt Romney CAN, and SHOULD, if asked aobut the numbers, say that this inconsistency exists between the 873,000 jobs suposedly addeed to reduce the unemploument rate, and thwe 114,000 jobs officially added in September. No. Romney hsouuld say he is NOT suggesting a conspiracy: only that the numbers do not add up, for whatever reason.
What is the "defense" to this Friday JOKE of an unemploymeht rate? The "defense' is a PROCESS "dfense": No defense at all. The "defesne" is that the Labor Department followed its decades old normal process, and that this difference between the "Employer Survey" and "Household Survey" is part of that "normal process". So what? That does not change a thing. The nubmres are INCONSISTENT, and not just by a littlle. The numbers are MASSIVELY INCONSISTENT, and the 873,000 number has to be regarded as FALSE. Now, if pressed, you will see some peole "admit" that the numbers are gard to reconcile, but they will--if lthey are the usual, dishonest tyes--simplly say that this kind of inconsistency is "normal'. NO. It is NOT. An 800% difference in these numbers is nOT "normal", and shows that at least one of these numbers (114,000 or 873,000) is WRONG. In this case, the 873,000 has to be wrong.
As I said at the beginning, I do not believe in totally convenient coincidence. That there woulduld be this kind of descrepancy in what is really the most important employment report before the electin strikes me as a DISTORTION that goes beyond coincidence. But I admit I don't know exaclty what the source of this DISTROTION is It is even barely possilbe that there was just a glitch in the normal process. I jsut don't believe in that magnitude of coincidence. As stated, it does not matter. What matters is that the unemploymnent RATE released on Friday is obviusly FALSE, and INCONSISTENT with other numbers releasesd by the same LaborDepartment on Friday. If you are a "journalists", and do not report that, then yoou are a LIAR.
P.S. No proofreading or spell checking (bad eyesight).
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