Suspicious could be the first thing on your mind when you hear the media repeat verbatim what the government states as if it is truth. I have always doubted government statistics due to the spin that can be applied to “snow” the average American who understands very little about economics.
So when I saw the Burning Platform article and the quote below, I knew I had to dig deeper:
As you can see, the “civilian labor force”declined by 469,000 people in August from July. The number of “employed” dropped 423,000. The “not in labor force” increased by nearly 700,000. With these facts in mind (“facts” at least as far as the BLS numbers contain any shards of credibility), how can the Government claim that 201,000 “jobs were created” in August? How can CNBC say the “economy created more jobs than expected?” Based on the numbers in the details of the BLS report, it looks like, between the decline in the number of people employed and the decline in those not counted as part of the labor force, the economy shed over 1 million jobs.
PFM* is what the government uses to come up with these numbers. To really understand, one has to read AROUND the headline and dig for the truth.
[ * PFM is a nautical term we used in the US Navy ]
You can look at the monthly government stats, but know that “unemployment” is only when one has ACTIVELY searched for a job in the last 4 WEEKS! Do know that the US Bureau of Labor Statistics has a second measure of unemployment that includes workers who have been discouraged and out of the labor force for less than one year (below):
While the US government no longer tracks unemployment among discouraged workers who have been out of the work force for more than one year, John Williams of http://shadowstats.com continues to estimate this rate and places it at about 20%:
I highly recommend this site as an excellent antidote to government statistics to get a more accurate view into the US economic environment whether it be unemployment, money supply or other critical statistics that show the true health of the US economy!
The bottom line is, how many people over 16 in this country have the opportunity to create value which generates wealth that sustains families and communities domestically (for this measure) for the health of all who call the US home? The US Government has a statistic that shows this, but these days they don’t publish it on the front page of major media outlets:
THIS is not good, too many people have given up on creating wealth for them, their kids and grandkids ..
… OR they have gone “underground” in their “business” of choice
… OR if they have chosen to leave the workforce behind, then that is fine. Maybe people have downsized, simplified and live a more self-sustaining lifestyle outside of the “rat-race”, well that is fine too.
Just please do your own research and be suspicious when the government / major media reports something .. anything!
-SF1