Unemployment Numbers Getting Worse
By AJStrata on Workforce Levels
The Democrats are all out of silly propaganda gimmicks to hide the utter failure of their socialist economic theories. The unemployment picture looks to be getting even worse as summer jobs shut down and jobless claims begin to climb again:
In the week ending Aug. 7, the advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims was 484,000, an increase of 2,000 from the previous week's revised figure of 482,000. The 4-week moving average was 473,500, an increase of 14,250 from the previous week's revised average of 459,250.
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The advance number of actual initial claims under state programs, unadjusted, totaled 420,997 in the week ending Aug. 7, an increase of 18,862 from the previous week. There were 482,590 initial claims in the comparable week in 2009.
Whether 'adjusted' or not, the number of initial claims is rising again, per week. And the frightening part of all this is the labor force continues to shed workers, meaning the official unemployment rates are underestimating the problem since these workers are not even counted.
In 2008 at this time of year there were around 154.4 million workers in the labor force. In 2009 there were 154.3 million workers. This year there are only 153.6 million. Which means the labor force has contracted by almost a million workers. We all know the population is not shrinking, but growing. For example, in 2005 the labor force at this time of year was 149.8 million, in 2000 it was 142.3 million.
Simple extrapolation indicates the labor force was adding about 1.5 million workers per year from 2000-2005. If that trend had continued through 2010 then the labor force should have been around 157.3 million workers right now! That means there must be around 3.7 million workers or jobs missing from the economy.
The fact is that the real unemployment rate, assuming a constantly rising work force level, could be as high as 11.5% right now if we assume the workforce should be at 157.3 million people in the summer of 2010. But even if we assume the work force should have held steady between 2008-2010 (at a level of 154.35 million) July's unemployment rate would be 10% (not the published 9.5%). The truth is somewhere in between 10-11.5%.
And indications are it will be getting a little worse heading into November.
Update: Ed Morrissey chimes in over at Hot Air:
The four-week rolling average will probably have more impact, as it is supposed to eliminate weeklong spikes and troughs. Hitting a six month high shows that whatever gains the US made in Q1 and part of Q2 have more or less dissipated. We have not even come close to the 325,000 level that usually indicates healthy job creation over that which merely keeps up with population growth, and we are once again headed in the wrong direction.
It seems the only ones surprised at this turn of events are the liberal sycophants in the news media. |
