New Unemployment Claims: Labor Dept./Media Dishonesty and Incompetence Continue

Read the previus article, and realize again that I am simply never wrong.  The IMPOSSIBLE series of weekly numbers on new unemplyment claims continues. Here is the incredible, absurd record of the last 10 weeks:  362,000, 362,000, 367,000, 372,000, 335,000 (lol), 330,000 (lol), 371,000, 368,000, 342,000 (lol), and 362,000 (to be REVISED tomorrow). Thus, we have SEVEN weeks (not even together) with an AVERAGE of 365,000, and the weekly numbers not varying much from the "average".  But we have THREE weeks (total FICTION--again not even together) with an average of about 335,000, with the 3 weekly numbers very close to the "average". To call this "impossible" is to be KIND.  It is absurd, and I am wiling to flatly cal lit DISHOENST.  Media reporting of these absurd "bounces" (based on a subjective, very fallible "seasonal adjustment") is beyond dishoenst.  Labor Dept. gets great headlines on those weeks that we have a FICTIONAL large drop, and then dismissive headlines when the number jumps back up.  Nope.  There is no way the labor market is actually "fluctuating" like this.  If you beleive that, apply at the nenearest "news" media location.  You will fit right in:  stupid and dishoenst. 


Doubt me? You shuld know better. Here is Marketwatch.com/mainstream media "lead" about 20,000 plus (remember revision tomorrow)  jump in new unemplyment claims reorted last Thursday (342,000 to 362,0000, after supposed "drop" of 26,000 (lol) the previus Thursday.--gain, this yo-yo bounce up and down is absurd, and indicates either ALL of the numbers are totally unreliable/dishonest or that SOME (those three aberrational weeks) are hopelessly absurd.):  "New unemplyment claims reversed drop of previus week, but still suggest slow, BUT STEADY, improvment in the labor market".  I kid you not.  That was the LEAD as to last weeks's number:  "The number of new unemplyment claims reversed the drop of the previuos week, but still suggested a slow, STEADY improvement in the labor market."  Review those ten weeks of numbers I quote above.  STEADY?  Today's "journalists" have to be among the biggest LIARS who have ever lived.


Any statistician wuld tell you that you have to THROW OUT those namalous 3 weeks.  That leaves you with new unemplylment claims averaging 365,000.  How does that comopare with LAST February?  Ah.  Last February, new unemplyment claims were CONSISTENLTY between 351,0000 and 355,000 (or so), and the range of new unemplyment claims from about mid-January of 2012 to mid-March of 2012 was 351,0000-365,0000. This blog has told you how these numbers must be interpreted:  NO IMPROVEMENT in more than a year.  Not only is there no STEADY "improvement", but there has been NO "improvement' in more than a YEAR. 


Tomorrow, Thursday, we will get the weekly number of new unemplyment claims again (for last week), as well as a REVISIN of the 363,0000 reported last Thursday (for the previus week, as always).  Note a curius thing: The REVISION of the LOWER numbers has been almost nothing, whikle the REVISON of the higher numbers has been generally the conistent UPWARD revison of usually 3,0000 or more.  Thus, the 330,0000 and 335,0000 were not "revised" at all, while lat week's 342,0000 REVISED number was only an upward revison of 1,0000.  There has only ONCE been a DOWNWARD revisoin of the weekly number in living memory.  This CONSISTENT "revision" of the number in only one directin has always indicated DISHONESTY.  And having a consistent larger "revision" upward for HIGHER (more unfavorable headline) numbers indicates BLATANT DISHONESTY.  We will see tomorrow whether that trend continues, and whether last week's 362,0000 wil be revised upward more substantially than the 330,00, 335,0000 and 341,0000 were revised. 


The "suspense" is killing me  What LIES will the Labor Dept, and our "jurnalists", tell tomorrow?  Will the number of new unemplyment claims again "drop" 20,0000 or more, in another "reversal"?  Will we again get a nuber EITHER above 360,0000 or below 345,0000, with no "middle' ground (indicating GROSS error in the "seasonal adjustment" calculatin)?  We will see.


P.S. No proofreading or spell checking (bad eyesight)  Yes, I know That one sentence above was awfully convoluted, which is why I repeated the dishonest "lead" from last week's media dishonsty about "slow, steady improvement' (lol).  But my eyesight is just not good enoubh to correct the sentence with all of those asides and parentheses.  So I left it.  Let it be a challegning puzzle for you, for which I am not even charging you.