The difference between 80% and 75%

[cthulu2016]

Last edited Mon Apr 9, 2012, 12:42 AM - Edit history (2)

Civilizations always run at close tolerances... the difference in 80% employment among prime-age workers and 75% employment is the difference between mere stagnation and crisis.

Look at my current favorite measure of the labor market, the employment-population ratio of prime-age Americans — employment rather than unemployment so as to avoid distortion by people dropping out, prime-age to avoid demographic issues as the population ages. Here it is:



What has been happening lately is that conventional wisdom, including among people with influence over policy, has taken that little uptick at the right as evidence that it’s time to sound the all-clear, time to call off efforts to boost the economy and worry about inflation instead. This was a terrible misjudgment: we’ve barely made a dent in the employment decline that followed the financial crisis, and are still a very long way from full recovery..

And you can’t even count on the trend continuing to be favorable — which was the message of last month’s numbers.

I was for more stimulus before those numbers came out; I’m still for more stimulus now. The only difference is that it might be a bit easier today than two days ago to argue against unjustified complacency.

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/04/07/reactions-and-overreactions/

[cthulu2016]

1. ...

[Egalitarian Thug]

2. Trying to get people to pay attention to this is a worthy challenge.

Good luck!

K&R

[zappaman]

3. The answer is 5%

Did I win?

[cthulu2016]

4. Hmmm... It might be 6.25%

Depends on your perspective. The prime age total employment at 80% dropped by about 6.25% to get to 75. (But only by 5% of 100)