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Politics : View from the Center and Left -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Mary Cluney who wrote (129446)	1/27/2010 4:50:04 PM
From: Jeff Hayden	Respond to of 542131

Adam Smith will whack you with the back of his invisible hand. :-)

To: Mary Cluney who wrote (129446)	1/27/2010 5:02:55 PM
From: Katelew	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 542131

First, even though the official unemployment rate is only a little over 10% but most economists acknowledge that the real rate may be higher than 17%. That is approaching Depression levels. You can't pick and choose your numbers when making policy. I know that 17% number is being bandied about by the Depression fear mongers, but policy has to made using traditional government figures otherwise there would be total inconsistency from one recession to the next. And legitimate economists are going to put government released data into their models so everyone is on the same page. I'm not totally disagreeing with you. A case can be made that the official unemployment numbers are always understated....that actual unemployment is really higher. But nevertheless policymakers can't pick and choose. If the real unemployment rate is 17%, then everything the Obama administration has done is a dismal failure and all those Macro Economists need to be put out to pasture. Also, Dems aren't doing Obama much of a favor to be tossing that notion around while O is claiming the stimulus is saving jobs.