Opinion: 7.8% Unemployment Rate Is Questionable
While Americans want the unemployment rate to drop and the economy to improve, there is a severe contradiction regarding the positive unemployment report released Friday which says that the unemployment rate in the nation has suddenly dropped three-tenths of one percent to put the rate below 8.0% for the first time in nearly four years – except for one month, the duration of President Barack Obama’s presidency. The contradiction which isn’t being explained is quite clear when it clearly reports that, on the one hand, 873,000 people found work and, on the other hand, only 114,000 new jobs were created.
Obviously, one does not need a math degree of any sort to realize that something is amiss with these figures and thereby needs further explanation. It appears as though their number of those who found work, the number of new jobs created, or both are inaccurate.
Naturally, it’s also curious that the alleged jobs report shows such improvement for the first time in 43 months just five weeks before the presidential election. Anyone who has read Hilda Solis’ job reports on a monthly occurrence knows that – even when the unemployment rate increased – Ms. Solis irritatingly put the hint of a positive spin on it. Her motive for possibly doing such a thing could be that her boss, naturally, is President Barack Obama.
Her continual positive spin compounded with a report where the numbers simply don’t completely add up is of severe concern to persons who want to know the true unemployment rate – the true jobs situation – in the nation. By all practical reasoning, the report released for on October 5, 2012 for September 2012 does not logically register in totality.
Again, allegedly 873,000 people found work but there were only 114,000 new jobs. If the jobs aren’t created, where are these jobs being had? Answers are needed. While the federal government always seems to find a way to confusingly answer such questions, let’s be honest. Common sense dictates that 873,000 jobs found out of 114,000 new jobs is skewed data – apparently skewed with a political agenda. While jobs may be found from other sources, the variation between 873,000 and 114,000 is extremely huge.
The members of the stock market community on Wall Street were quick to figure out that something was wrong with the figures. After the announcement that the unemployment rate declined below 8.0%, the stock market showed gains in the early hours on Friday. Before long, as the details were released, the stock market quickly reacted and Wall Street turned, reacting negatively to the Department of Labor’s otherwise positive unemployment rate figure.
Aside from questionable figures being released from the federal government in the midst of a pre-election period, Americans have to somehow find the truth through the clouded liberal media-reporting as well.
A day after the latest unemployment rate was released, Ed Morrissey made an extremely appropriate observation by comparing what the media said about Friday’s 7.8% unemployment rate just before Obama’s reelection in 2012 to the 5.4% unemployment rate just before President George W. Bush’s reelection in 2004.
In 2004, when the unemployment rate was stalled at 5.4% under President Bush, the New York Times negatively wrote: “Employment growth in the United States slowed last month, falling far short of expectations, the U.S. government reported. The new jobs report cast doubts on the strength of the U.S. economic expansion and appeared to bolster Senator John Kerry’s case against President George W. Bush’s handling of the economy…”
Yet, in 2012, when a much worse unemployment rate of 7.8% is announced just before Obama’s reelection, the New York Times writes with a positive spin for Obama: “The jobless rate abruptly dropped in September to its lowest level since the month President Obama took office, indicating a steadier recovery than previously thought and delivering another jolt to the presidential campaign…”
What? In 2004, the media suggested a 5.4% unemployment rate was reason to defeat Bush – but in 2012, a 7.8% unemployment rate is reason to elect Obama. There is absolutely no defense for the media to continually report against the Republican candidates and to continually report in favor of the Democratic candidates in such situations– in which their reports are apparently designed to sway voters’ opinions rather than to simply report the facts.
There is little that can be done about the stilted reporting one can do rather than to voice their concern – as I am here – and to not patronize the newspaper.
But as far as the government report is concerned, it is beyond the time a politician in Washington, D.C. calls on the Department of Labor to release more details regarding the figure put out monthly and the summary released by U.S. Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis – which continually indicate that the employment rate in the United States is anywhere from stabilized to improving. In the latest report, again, there are contradictory and doubtful numbers. Ms. Solis’s report does not address the obvious confusion one has after receiving the “7.8%” figure.
Obviously, I am not the first who has said in recent times that the unemployment rate released by the government obviously appears to be much lower than the true unemployment among Americans. Does anyone really believe that only 78 people who want to work in this nation out of every thousand are without jobs?
Also, there needs to be more emphasis on the basic truth that so many Americans are underemployed – working part-time when they want and need full-time employment, or in terms of the menial jobs they are performing when they’ve educated or prepared themselves to do so much more in our society.
The time for the congressional intervention is now – weeks before the presidential election – before the next doubtful report tells us that the unemployment rate has improved by three-tenths of a percent again.
It may also be added that Obama’s promise before spending trillions of dollars of our tax money on stimulus jobs – which turned out to be not so “shovel-ready” after all – was that the unemployment rate would be 5.6% by now. That’s right, for our money we were told the nation’s unemployment rate would be 5.6% by the next election. Obviously, at the alleged 7.8% rate, it’s not even close.
About Scott Paulson
Scott Paulson writes political commentary for Examiner.com and teaches English at a community college in the Chicago area. The views and opinions expressed in this post are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of CBS Local.
