Unemployment rate falls to 8.3% - GOP heads explode.

[wyldwolf]

The U.S. economy added 243,000 jobs in January -- the fastest growth since April, according to the Wall Street Journal.

The unemployment rate fell by two-tenths of a percentage point to 8.3%, the lowest it has been since February 2009. Economists had forecast a gain of 125,000 in payrolls and for the jobless rate to remain at 8.5%.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203711104577200730710149216.html?mod=djemalertNEWS

[bowens43]

1. I was hoping for pics of exploding GOP heads. nt

[wyldwolf]

2. LOL. Well how about some response predictions?

From the WSJ comments:


I can really save people a lot of time posting here today. Let's all agree that:

If the economy is tanking,
- It's President Obama and Nancy Pelosi's fault.

If the economy is improving,
- The numbers are a lie
or
- It would have happened anyway
or
- It's due to John Boehner

There. Does that just about cover it?

[Firebrand Gary]

3. Thanks for doing the "dirty work"

This President would not receive credit if it fell to 5%.

[SaintPete]

4. I was thinking something like this:

[feat12515si]

22. good one

[bowens43]

10. sounds right nt

[JoePhilly]

5. Watch for Obama approval to go up.

[yellowcanine]

6. About a month behind the cycle leading up to the 1984 election. Real good for Obama if the trend

continues......it will be "Morning in America" all over again. I thought at the time that was a dishonest campaign slogan and still do but what was good for the Repubs in 1984 is good for the Democrats in 2012. So suck it up, Pubbies.

1983-06-01 10.1
1983-07-01 9.4
1983-08-01 9.5
1983-09-01 9.2
1983-10-01 8.8
1983-11-01 8.5
1983-12-01 8.3
1984-01-01 8.0
1984-02-01 7.8
1984-03-01 7.8
1984-04-01 7.7
1984-05-01 7.4
1984-06-01 7.2
1984-07-01 7.5
1984-08-01 7.5
1984-09-01 7.3
1984-10-01 7.4
1984-11-01 7.2

[yellowcanine]

7. According to Freeper "dufekin" (I did not make that up) it is all because of the mild winter!

To: blam

Recovery? That’s a seasonally adjusted annual rate (SAAR). Bureau of Economic Analysis typically determines seasonal adjustments in advance. Because this January lacked the normal intensity of snow and cold in most populated, winter-vulnerable regions of the country, this adjustment will bias high. People went to work, earned money, and bought cars now rather than pay heating bills, sit home, and shovel snow.


10 posted on Thu Feb 02 2012 00:01:36 GMT-0500 (Eastern Standard Time) by dufekin (Stop Obama and the Democrats from making war against the Catholic Church)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

So a lower heating bill in Jan means a person will go out and buy a car. Yes that is quite logical, at least if your name is dufekin.

[WI_DEM]

8. Hopefully this will keep up this year

if it does I don't see how the GOP could make a jobs argument against Obama. It is Bush who didn't grow any private sector jobs--under Obama the tide was turned by the stimulus and now we have had how many quarters of job growth?

[Robbins]

9. Jobs

If this continues It IS disaster for Romney and Republicans.Their only chance Is economy to be bad that some who voted for
Obama to say we need someone else to try at fixing the economy.Improving economy gives no reason to vte Romney.

The hardcore racists are among the 46 percent who voted for Mccain.Romney needs some of the 53 percent who voted for Obama to
win.Of course to get nomination he let himself be pulled further and further to right.The Romney who ran against Ted Kennedy for
senate and who was elected governor would be mre formable than the far right Romney of today.Of course It just shows he has
no princibles except getting power.

Romney's favorabilty ratings have been going down.NBC/Marist poll has Obama winning Florda against Romney with Independents
moving toward Obama.PPP also has Obama beating Romney In Ohio.

Also Remember Obama's favorables are higher than approvol.If economy can push his approvol close to favorable ratings It's more
bad news for Republicans.

Obama also has Congress to runn against.And the Republicans there have even lower numbers.

[Johnny2X2X]

11. JOBS JOBS JOBS

The story is the jobs added, not the unemployment rate. The Unemployment rate will fluctuate the rest of the year, but keep this focused on the jobs being added, that's the important number here. 243,000.

[wyldwolf]

12. I agree it's the most important. But the percentage probably seems more important to people

[DavidDvorkin]

13. Some DU heads, too.

[Drunken Irishman]

14. The thought of getting below 8% before election day seemed unlikely a couple months ago...

Now it's entirely possible the unemployment rate will can get below 8% by mid-spring. That's exciting.

[DCBob]

15. They are frantic today desperately tryng to convince everyone this is bad news.

What a bunch of pathetic losers.

[Major Hogwash]

16. Yeah, and the Republicans just refilled their Klown Kar with gas and hot air!!

They got nothing!!!

[airforcerg45]

17. o rly?

[airforcerg45]

18. here are some sobering realities of this "good news":

In order to keep up with population growth and new worker entries into the labor force, the economy needs to create about 250,000 jobs per month (about 7,000 more than were created in January)

The number of people that are "not in the labor force" is approximately 88.7 million. That is a year-over-year increase of 2.7 million people. There were also year-over-year increases in every category listed (i.e. discouraged workers) except "persons who want a job". The number or people working 2 jobs (both 1 full and 1 part time or 2 part time) also had big year-over-year increases. http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t16.htm

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the labor force participation rate fell to 63.7%, which is lower than the previous month's 64%, which was the lowest since the early 80's. http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS11300000

Much of this decline in unemployment is due to a "seasonal adjustment" that took a month-over-month increase in literally every category of the number of unemployed (based on the amount of time they have been unemployed) and turned them to a decrease. http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t12.htm

I think you will continue to see a decline in unemployment throughout the year due in large part to a large number of people not being counted any longer. This will not, however, reflect the real unemployment picture.

[joshcryer]

23. Baby boomers. Labor force participation rate is affected by boomers.

It will continue to decline well into the 2020s.

[Grateful for Hope]

25. Member is no longer with us.

[joshcryer]

26. Darn, I was hoping to see their spin.

For what it's worth I wasn't even alerted to the member until I served on a jury where he posted this nonsense.

[Grateful for Hope]

27. I guess one can say that his "head exploded"

and it was time for him to go.

[airforcerg45]

20. The news just gets better and better

This is the largest absolute jump in 'Persons Not In Labor Force' on record...and biggest percentage jump in 30 years.

[airforcerg45]

21. Should I keep going

Or is this thread not completely debunked yet?

[joshcryer]

24. This is a common theme, misrepresenting the labor force participation rate.

The news isn't as rosy as the thread makes out, but it's not as bad as you're making it out to be:

http://www.bls.gov/opub/ted/2009/ted_20091231.htm

http://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2000/07/art2exc.htm

http://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2000/07/art2abs.htm

And finally, from the CBO: http://cboblog.cbo.gov/?p=1976

The second factor is the impending retirement of the baby-boom generation (people who were born between 1946 and 1964), which will cause the potential labor force participation rate to decline throughout the next decade. In CBO’s estimates, the effect of the second factor outweighs the first, pushing down the labor force participation rate, on balance, over the next decade.

It is wrong to focus on the labor force because millions and millions of baby boomers will be retiring in a very short period of time, the next twenty years. If we focus on labor force that way, we're going to wind up with perpetuating a false meme that Obama or the administration policies are responsible for the drop in labor force.

Nah, a very big boost in births some 50 years ago is responsible for that. And there's nothing wrong with it.