How date he take a vacation when the unemployment rate is plummeting like this!

Hopefully those specific figures also start to move in the right direction as well!!

Start? They have been. For a very long time.

If you will recall, that number was as high as 14 million not too long ago.  In all reality, do you really expect to see a noticeable dent in 12 million in one month?

Perhaps we should get Mitt Romney in the white house now - Afterall - he did say he would create 12 million new jobs... 

From your linked article:

"Statistics suggest that much of the decline in the unemployment rate since 2008 has been due to people dropping out of the workforce, either due to retirement or because they have given up seeking work.

The unemployment figure only includes those actively seeking a job, and once people stop doing so they drop out of the statistics."

Only a brainwashed liberal would see any of this as something "good".

So you were one of the guys that thought that the recent uptick in unemployment due to people *re-entering* the workforce was something "good"... right?

I was wondering when someone was going to spin this to crap all over it.

Last month, it was "manipulated" so that Obama would get re-elected.  They told us it would be back up over 8% this month.  But now it's just "everyone quit looking".

Whatever.  You hate Obama.  I get it.

People re-entering the workforce is good, people dropping out and giving up is bad.

I hope that clears things up for you.

Watch this y'all:

Hey lightcraft, how many people retired in the last 4 years?


Wait for it....

The number of people "not in the workforce" has been going up pretty steadily for the last 30 years.  In fact.. I don't think that there is more than a handful of years in which that number went down since 1980.  So.. to you every year has been bad since 1980?

Would you care to back that up with some data from somewhere?

How many people entered the workforce in the last 4 years... people graduating college or becoming of age to work, or immigrating here from across the border?

Love to:

http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS15000000

you can change the start date to 1980 (or whatever date you like).

Those are seasonally adjusted numbers too.

1980  US population 226.5M   not in workforce 60M    26.5%
2009  (January) US pop 308.7M  not in workforce 80.5M   26.0%
2012 (November) US pop 312.8M  not in workforce 88.8M  28.4%


So yes, the people not in the workforce (as a % of total) has gone up... since Obama took office. It was actually down slightly (since 1980 at least) by the end of GWB's second term.. but is now skyrocketing.

The numbers of people on welfare, unemployment and "disability" is hitting new records every month now... which I suppose liberals think is a great thing (guaranteed voters).

Still waiting for it... 

Watch this y'all:

Hey lightcraft, how many people retired in the last 4 years?


Wait for it....

You tell us... because I don't know. While you're at it, tell us how many became of age to work and enter the workforce. Which number is higher?

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2012-11-2 … fare-state

As quantified, and explained by Alexander, "the single mom is better off earnings gross income of $29,000 with $57,327 in net income & benefits than to earn gross income of $69,000 with net income and benefits of $57,045."

I can think of three in SB.
Some retirements are planned others caused by layoffs, closures etc and it is difficult for those over 50 to find employment, especially if they do not have a job at the time so not all those retirements are voluntary. That is one reason why a lot of folks over 50 start their own business.

Is it really as good as it sounds? The BLS revised downward the numbers for the last two months by a total of 49,000 jobs. But here is the real key:

"Statistics suggest that much of the decline in the unemployment rate since 2008 has been due to people dropping out of the workforce, either due to retirement or because they have given up seeking work.

The unemployment figure only includes those actively seeking a job, and once people stop doing so they drop out of the statistics."

In other words, it's not nearly as good as it sounds.

Compared to a year ago, the  number of people that want a job but aren't in the labor force is up by 300,000.

http://bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t16.htm

The market seems to think so. Net of revisions, the payrolls number was a little better than expected.

No one number conveys the health of the labor market perfectly. But the unemployment rate does convey the approximate chance at the margin of finding a job should one enter the labor force looking for one. In that sense, it's as good as it sounds.

The labor force participation rate is about half as bad as it sounds. Research shows that demographics will keep it from improving with the economy.

It's tricky to directly compare household survey stats before January, when they incorporated the latest Census data. Note that in January, the population supposedly shot up 1.685 million in a month. Even so, compared to a year ago, the number of employed rose 2.648 million, and the number of unemployed fell 1.294 mln. That more than makes up for 300k NILFWAJNs.

Some of the above, some go to school, some may have been only saying they're working because they want to keep unemployment (and think they'd better say they are to the BLS surveyor just to be safe, even though he has nothing to do with it).

It's a telephone and door-knocking survey.

Holy crap. $15k for childcare in addition to CHIP? This I gotta see.

Tonic Dog Studios wrote:

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2012-11-2 … fare-state

As quantified, and explained by Alexander, "the single mom is better off earnings gross income of $29,000 with $57,327 in net income & benefits than to earn gross income of $69,000 with net income and benefits of $57,045."

A difference of $300 over the course of a year for a family of four.

I'm not going to be outraged about that. $57000 for a family of four is rough.

Hah, a deep dive indeed. I think their math is wrong on the number who left the workforce, but that was payback for an unusually large reportedly joining the work force in the prior two months. The government figures apparently come from the household survey, which nobody looks at for a sectoral breakdown because of its smaller sample size. Needless to say, the five-month period is cherry-picked as starting at a time when the number of government workers had sharply declined (almost 700k in four months). Even by the household survey, the number of government workers is lower than where it started the year, while total employment is up 1.625 million.

By the more reliable establishment survey, the number of government workers rose 34k in the last five months, while the total number of nonfarm workers rose 789k.

What does your statement have to do with [dis]incentives to work?

"A difference of $300" leads me to believe you don't understand the data/graph. 

Umm....the quote is from YOUR article that YOU provided as evidence.  Seems (since we know there's an article out there that shares your view) you failed in choosing an article that was too unbiased not to cheer that people have given up hope.

*slow clap*