U.S. July nonfarm payrolls up 32,000 (expecting 200,000+)

[cthrumatrix]

U.S. July nonfarm payrolls up 32,000 By Rex Nutting

WASHINGTON (CBS.MW) -The U.S. economy added 32,000 nonfarm payroll jobs in July as hiring slowed for the fourth straight month, the Labor Department reported Friday. It was the slowest job growth of the year. Economists were expecting much stronger payroll growth of about 235,000 in July. Payroll growth in May and June was revised lower by a cumulative 61,000. Meanwhile, a separate survey of households showed the unemployment rate fell to 5.5 percent from 5.6 percent as 629,000 more adults were working. In July, hiring slowed across most sectors. Goods-producing industries added 18,000 including 10,000 in manufacturing. Services-producing industries added 14,000 jobs, the lowest since August 2003.

http://cbs.marketwatch.com/news/newsfinder/pulseone.asp?guid={A044D1FE-58DC-4A9A-933B-3ABEC99B0CDF}&siteid=

[MikeG]

1. Say Goodbye, Whistle-Ass!!!!

[74dodgedart]

54. I sense that Kerry's "bounce" is coming

[k in IA]

2. On CNBC they called these numbers a disaster and the stock market

will be going down.

[Wright Patman]

17. 'The market' knew these numbers yesterday

somehow already and it tanked big-time. Maybe it will go down more today, but I think many got out while the getting was good yesterday when "inside sources" leaked the figure.

[alcuno]

21. RNC spin was being prepared last night.

On FAUX last night, that nitwit Hannity said he had heard the unemployment rate was going down. Forget the number and focus on the %.

[JSG]

32. I think yesterday's drop was due to the record-high oil prices

Look for it to drop again. Dow futures are down 92 points already.

[wicket]

20. The market TANKED yesterday

Looks like today will be no different. Bush is toast.

[Snellius]

46. CNBC: "Out of a job". "Tough Shit. Just as long as Bush keeps his."

All CNBC cares about is the politics of the election.

Who thought American capitalism would die not because of the commies but because it shoots itself in the brain?

[Johnyawl]

67. The communists spend 50 years predicting that...

...capitalism would die from it's own greed. The only thing that has allowed capitalism survive and prosper in the modern world has been the policies instituted by FDR. The more the right wing dismantles the New Deal, the more volatile, and vulnerable capitalism becomes.

[Yavin4]

68. WELL SAID, Johnyawl! WELL SAID!!!

Without strong Liberal policies, capitalism would have died out a long, long time ago. Think about where capitalism would be without UE insurance, without SS, without medicare, etc. These safety net provisions keep the masses from storming the gates.

[lastliberalintexas]

69. Actually, the Communists did

If you remember, Kruschev famously pointed out the fatal flaw in the capitalist system- that the capitalists would sell their enemy the very weapon to be used to destroy them in the long run so long as money was made in the short term.

Though Kruschev wasn't really a Communist, more of a totalitarian oligopolist, but that's a different thread altogether. :-)

[RhodaGrits]

83. I tried to google up that quote and can't find anything -

do you have the exact quote or can you point me to the source? Thx.

[lastliberalintexas]

85. That's because I'm an idiot

Kruschev merely threatened to bury us, Lenin pointed out the flaw.

Lenin said something like "They (meaning the US capitalists) will sell us the rope with which we will hang them"- or something to that effect. Maybe you can find the exact quote and source now!

[RhodaGrits]

90. Thanks! Here's the quote:

"Lenin, who spent most of his life in the West and not in Russia, who knew the West much better than Russia, always wrote and said that the Western capitalists would do anything to strengthen the economy of the USSR. He said: They will bring us everything themselves, without thinking about their future. And, in a difficult moment, at a party meeting in Moscow, he said: 'Comrades, don't panic, when things get very though for us, we will give the bourgeoisie a rope, and the bourgeoisie will hang itself.' Then Karl Radek, who was a very resourceful wit,said: 'Vladimir Ilyich, but where are we going to get enough rope to hang the whole bourgeoisie?' Lenin effortlessly replied, ‘They will sell it to us themselves.' " -Alexander Solzhenitsyn, speech to the AFL-CIO, Washington, D.C., June 30, 1975

[richp0469]

76. Come on now.....

Are you really going to say Capitalism is dead because of one jobs report? Isn't that a bit over the top?

[Yavin4]

82. No, What's Over The Top Is Your

simple-minded analysis of what we're saying. Let me explain it to you as if you were a "My Pet Goat" reader. What we're saying is that without stong Liberal economic policies providing a social safety net to all Americans, then capitalism would have failed a long time ago.

[Snellius]

104. When American capitalism is contradicting its own self-interest

it's killing itself. Let's put this in terms they can understand: George W. Bush is bad for business. He is sacrificing immediate windfall gains for a few corporate interests for the long-term economic well-being of the system as a whole. Any moron can see that. Unless you're a moron named "George W. Bush". Kudlow and that bunch at CNBC have let their reactionary politics and (in Kudlow's case, at least) their religious beliefs get in the way of sound financial judgment. They don't want Bush because he's good for business. They want business to be good for Bush.

[dave29]

92. Let them eat Prozac

the philosophy for the masses

[Pale Blue Dot]

3. Reuters link

Employment Growth Surprisingly Weak

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. employers added a paltry 32,000 workers to payrolls last month, the government said on Friday in a report far weaker than expected that will come as unwelcome news for President Bush ahead of the presidential election.

The Labor Department also cut its tally of job growth for May and June by a combined 61,000.

The unemployment rate, however, fell to 5.5 percent from 5.6 percent in June as a separate government survey of households showed robust employment growth. The department cautioned that the household survey was a less reliable barometer of month-to-month changes in employment than its larger survey of businesses.

http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=businessNews&storyID=5897012

[papau]

28. DOL Report - and CNN Comments

http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.nr0.htm

Friday, August 6, 2004. THE EMPLOYMENT SITUATION: JULY 2004

Nonfarm employment was little changed (+32,000) in July, and the unemployment rate was essentially unchanged at 5.5 percent, the Bureau of Labor Statistics of the U.S. Department of Labor reported today. Employment levels in most of the major industry sectors were little changed over the month.

Unemployment (Household Survey Data)

Both the number of unemployed persons, 8.2 million, and the unemploymen rate, 5.5 percent, were essentially unchanged in July. The unemployment rate has shown little movement since December 2003. The jobless rates for the major worker groups--adult men (4.9 percent), adult women (4.9 percent), teenagers (17.6 percent), whites (4.8 percent), blacks (10.9 percent), and Hispanics or
Latinos (6.8 percent)--also were little changed over the month. The unemployment rate for Asians was 4.3 percent in July, not seasonally adjusted. (See tables A-1, A-2, and A-3.)

Total Employment and the Labor Force (Household Survey Data)

Total employment rose by 629,000 to 139.7 million in July, and the employment population ratio--the proportion of the population age 16 and over with jobs--increased to 62.5 percent. The civilian labor force also increased over the month, rising by 577,000 to 147.9 million, and the labor force participation rate rose to 66.2 percent. (See table A-1.)

Persons Not in the Labor Force (Household Survey Data)

The number of persons who were marginally attached to the labor force was 1.6 million in July, the same as a year earlier. (Data are not seasonally adjusted.) These individuals wanted and were available to work and had looked for a job sometime in the prior 12 months. They were not counted as unemployed, however, because they did not actively search for work in the 4 weeks preceding
the survey. There were 504,000 discouraged workers in July, little changed from a year earlier. Discouraged workers, a subset of the marginally attached, were not currently looking for work specifically because they believed no jobs were available for them. The other 1.1 million marginally attached had not searched for work for reasons such as school or family responsibilities. (See table
A-13.)<snip>


http://money.cnn.com/2004/08/06/news/economy/jobless_ju...

Job growth shock

Only 32,000 new jobs in July, far fewer than Wall Street forecast; unemployment rate slips to 5.5%.
August 6, 2004: 8:38 AM EDT



NEW YORK (CNN/Money) - Hiring by U.S. employers slowed significantly in July, according to a government report Friday, as the number of new jobs added to payrolls came in far below Wall Street expectations.

The Labor Department report showed only 32,000 new net jobs added to payrolls during the month, down from a revised 78,000 jobs that were added in June. The unemployment rate fell to 5.5 percent, an improvement from the 5.6 percent reading in June.

Economists surveyed by Briefing.com forecast a 243,000 gain in jobs, and the unemployment rate staying unchanged at 5.6 percent, while economists surveyed by Reuters had a median jobs growth forecast of 228,000, with a range of estimates between 200,000 and 300,000.

This is the second straight month of jobs growth far below economists forecasts, following three months that showed strong jobs growth starting in March. <snip>

[papau]

41. Prentend Job adjustment was -91000 in July - down to +700,000 YTD

http://www.bls.gov/web/cesbd.htm

Another major source of nonsampling error in the establishment survey is
the inability to capture, on a timely basis, employment generated by new
firms. To correct for this systematic underestimation of employment growth,
an estimation procedure with two components is used to account for business
births. The first component uses business deaths to impute employment for
business births. This is incorporated into the sample-based link relative
estimate procedure by simply not reflecting sample units going out of busi-
ness, but imputing to them the same trend as the other firms in the sample.
The second component is an ARIMA time series model designed to estimate the
residual net birth/death employment not accounted for by the imputation.
The historical time series used to create and test the ARIMA model was de-
rived from the unemployment insurance universe micro-level database, and
reflects the actual residual net of births and deaths over the past five
years.

The sample-based estimates from the establishment survey are adjusted
once a year (on a lagged basis) to universe counts of payroll employment
obtained from administrative records of the unemployment insurance program.
The difference between the March sample-based employment estimates and the
March universe counts is known as a benchmark revision, and serves as a
rough proxy for total survey error. The new benchmarks also incorporate
changes in the classification of industries. Over the past decade, the
benchmark revision for total nonfarm employment has averaged 0.3 percent,
ranging from zero to 0.7 percent.

The table below shows the net birth/death model adjustment used in the published CES estimates since the establishment of the most recent benchmark level for March 2003.

2003 Net Birth/Death Adjustment (in thousands) Supersector Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec
Natural Resources & Mining
-1 1 1 0 1 1 1 -1 0
Construction
13 35 28 -8 16 9 8 -7 -8
Manufacturing
-15 5 5 -29 6 3 -7 3 1
Trade, Transportation, & Utilities
-4 21 18 -19 17 17 13 17 18
Information
-3 4 0 -4 2 0 -1 3 3
Financial Activities
9 8 6 -11 8 4 14 7 13
Professional & Business Services
61 32 21 -22 31 15 18 10 9
Education & Health Services
32 6 -4 -20 14 12 26 10 7
Leisure & Hospitality
29 72 83 40 24 -29 -27 -14 15
Other Services
7 8 6 -10 5 1 0 2 4
Total
128 192 164 -83 124 33 45 30 62



2004 Net Birth/Death Adjustment (in thousands) Supersector Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec
Natural Resources & Mining
-4 0 1 0 1 1 0
Construction
-66 7 27 38 39 31 -7
Manufacturing
-38 4 7 3 8 7 -22
Trade, Transportation, & Utilities
-61 9 22 19 23 22 -15
Information
-5 5 2 2 3 1 -6
Financial Activities
-12 10 9 16 7 10 -18
Professional & Business Services
-95 27 31 66 26 24 -32
Education & Health Services
-6 15 10 37 11 -2 -10
Leisure & Hospitality
-24 33 37 80 71 81 30
Other Services
-10 5 7 9 6 7 -11
Total
-321 115 153 270 195 182 -91
Note: There is no net birth/death model adjustment for the government supersector.

[papau]

75. Sorry -my error - Since last benchmark 1198000 of jobs are "pretend"

:-(

Golly - that seems to about equal the number of new Jobs in the Bush economy since Jan 04!

:-(

[papau]

44. Unemployment drop was 0.1 to 5.6 on U-3 basis (9.5 U-6 basis)

http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t12.htm

Table A-12. Alternative measures of labor underutilization

(Percent)



Not seasonally adjusted Seasonally adjusted

Measure

July June July July Mar. Apr. May June July
2003 2004 2004 2003 2004 2004 2004 2004 2004


U-1 Persons unemployed 15 weeks or longer, as a percent of
the civilian labor force................................. 2.3 2.0 1.8 2.4 2.3 2.0 2.1 2.1 1.9

U-2 Job losers and persons who completed temporary jobs, as
a percent of the civilian labor force.................... 3.4 2.6 2.8 3.4 3.1 3.0 2.9 2.8 2.8

U-3 Total unemployed, as a percent of the civilian labor
force (official unemployment rate)....................... 6.3 5.8 5.7 6.2 5.7 5.6 5.6 5.6 5.5

U-4 Total unemployed plus discouraged workers, as a percent
of the civilian labor force plus discouraged workers..... 6.6 6.1 6.0 6.5 6.0 5.9 5.9 5.9 5.9

U-5 Total unemployed, plus discouraged workers, plus all
other marginally attached workers, as a percent of the
civilian labor force plus all marginally attached
workers.................................................. 7.3 6.7 6.7 7.2 6.7 6.5 6.6 6.5 6.5

U-6 Total unemployed, plus all marginally attached workers,
plus total employed part time for economic reasons, as a
percent of the civilian labor force plus all marginally
attached workers......................................... 10.5 9.8 9.8 10.3 9.9 9.6 9.7 9.6 9.5

NOTE: Marginally attached workers are persons who currently are neither working nor looking for work but indicate that they want
and are available for a job and have looked for work sometime in the recent past. Discouraged workers, a subset of the marginally
attached, have given a job-market related reason for not currently looking for a job. Persons employed part time for economic
reasons are those who want and are available for full-time work but have had to settle for a part-time schedule. For further
information, see "BLS introduces new range of alternative unemployment measures," in the October 1995 issue of the Monthly Labor
Review. Beginning in January 2004, data reflect revised population controls used in the household survey.

[papau]

45. Bloomberg comments on "softpatch"

"We are stuck in a soft patch and it may not be as transitory as some of us thought" as manufacturers gained 10,000 jobs last month (after the non-reported "revised" decline of 1,000 in June -So now over 7 months the U.S. has added 1.2 million jobs this year.

http://quote.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000103&sid=aQSPqONXdtVM&refer=news_index


U.S. July Payrolls Rise 32,000, Trailing Forecast (Update1)
Aug. 6 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. employers added 32,000 workers to payrolls in July, just an eighth of the number forecast and adding to evidence that a slowdown in economic growth may extend into the third quarter. Treasury notes surged.

Job gains also were revised lower for the preceding two months, to 78,000 for June and 208,000 in May, or 61,000 less than originally stated, the Labor Department said in Washington. The unemployment rate fell to 5.5 percent, the lowest since October 2001, from 5.6 percent as a separate survey of households showed a gain in employment. <snip>

<snip>The manufacturing workweek rose to 40.9 hours from 40.8 in June and overtime rose held at 4.6 hours for a third month. Average weekly hours worked for all employees rose to 33.7 from 33.6 the month before. Economists predicted hours would rise to 33.8 from an originally reported 33.6 in June, according to a Bloomberg News survey.

Incomes rose last month. Workers' average hourly pay rose 0.3 percent, or 5 cents, after a 0.1 percent increase in June. Economists had expected a 0.3 percent increase in hourly wages, according to the Bloomberg survey. Average weekly earnings rose to $529.09 in July from $525.84 the month before. <snip>

[tritsofme]

4. What a horrible report.

Yuck, there's just nothing good to say, except a handful of manufacturing jobs were added.

June was revised downward to 72,000.

Unemployment 5.5%

Net/Birth Model subtracted 91k, lol.

[qanda]

22. Well Hannity was right--

The number went down from 5.6% to 5.5%. Too bad he didn't know how pitiful the jobs numbers would be-- idiot!

[TahitiNut]

87. The downward revision of June was DOUBLE the "gain" of July.

In other words, today's reported July employment was tens of thousands lower than last month's June figures. If the June figures hadn't been revised downward, there'd be a loss of employed in July. Next month we'll probably (undoubtedly?) learn that today's July employment figures were overstated as well.

The Busholini Regime is far more successful in its War Against Workers than any specious "War on Terror." Fewer jobs at lower compensation ... slave labor.


... actually "through July 2004" (will correct).

[dbt]

5. Mr bu$h, your toaster is ready.

It's set for Extra Crispy.

:evilgrin:
dbt

[DeaconBlues]

6. Why did the unemployment rate go down if so few jobs were added?

Doesn't the economy need to add at least 400 thousand jobs just to keep the rate at its current level?

[Torgo Johnson]

8. Unemployment benefits ran out for many people.

And when that happens, you are no longer considered unemployed.

[tritsofme]

13. Wrong

Unemployment benefits and the unemployment rate are unrelated.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

24. Really? Please explain for those of us who seem convinced by...

...the mere common sense notion that when the unemployed exhaust the last of their unemployment insurance that they drop off the list of those considered to be unemployed.

By my estimate, and the estimate of others more in the know, we have about 2.5 milion to 3 million unemployed who no longer receive unemployment benefits. Unless I'm way off base, those people are not being tracked by any formula used to calculate unemployment.

[Maeve]

31. The unemployment rate is set by household survey

And the drop may be due to "discouraged" workers--folks who have just given up looking for a job.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

38. And the household survey is nothing more than a statistical sampling...

...from what I understand. The question I would like to have answered is where exactly are they doing the sampling?

[tritsofme]

36. It would be common sense, but that's not how its done

It is calculated through the Household Survey of 60,000 households throughout the nation.

The unemployment roles are used in other figures, but not in the actual UE rate.

[mhr]

65. Actually You Are Wrong - If You Exhaust Your Unemployment Benefits

You are no longer counted in the unemployment rate.

Hence if the economy is not creating significant jobs fast enough to handle new entrants or growth, the unemployment rate can decline even though many people are still out of work.

Unemployed 50 months - 4 years and two months - here!

I know the stats well!

[Name removed]

77. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Occulus]

93. And it costs HOW much just to move?

Sorry- I just went through that fiasco. Even by doing ALL the moving myself using my own vehicles, it still cost me over $1000 just to move across town. This is because I had to pay a larger security depost (while being scammed out of my other one by my previous, we're-a-college-complex-and-scam-all-our-tenants-when-they-move landlord, mind), a to my mind unnecessarily large pet deposit, and the various "final" utility bills from my old location. And guess what? Two days ago, my transmission died. On a car a paid off last month.

And hey- I have a job, a good one. Including bennies, I make over $50K a year. Whoopee-frillin'-doo! I work to pay the bills and feed myself. It's still not enough.

"Try moving" doesn't take into account the costs of doing so. If one is unemployed, what do you expect one to do? Starve?

[TahitiNut]

100. "Try moving man."???

Wow! Such a cogent, insightful analysis! (not) :eyes:

Clue #1: The "job market" is national. Many (most?) newspapers have abdicated printing of employment want-ads in favor of on-line sites available to everyone.
Clue #2: Networking ("not what you know but who you know") continues to be the #1 strategy for hiring. (Over 90% of jobs are obtained by personal referral.)
Clue #3: Getting a job is a good reason to move. Looking for a job is a lousy reason to move.
Clue #4: It makes no sense to look for something where the "light is better" - it only makes sense to search where it's located.

[TahitiNut]

91. Not true. This is a widespread misapprehension.

The unemployment rate is determined by the Current Population Survey. If the respondant says they're not employed (no wages during month) and did look for work, then they're counted as unemployed.

The reported unemployment rate has nothing to do with unemployment benefits. Nothing.

[tritsofme]

107. Actually I'm not.

Unemployment benefits are in no way related to the unemployment rate which is calculated through the Household Survey.

[tritsofme]

11. Its 2 different surveys, for UE rate and payrolls

And you need 150k to keep up with population growth.

[Cooley Hurd]

12. I'd assume that many stopped applying for unemployment insurance

...that, in itself is a horrible sign. :(

[DrDan]

14. they quit looking for work

so no longer counted in unemployment numbers

[DeaconBlues]

29. Thanks to everyone who clarified this for me.

An economist I am not.


Looks like even the freepers know this spells trouble for their boy....

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1186192/posts

[Francine Frensky]

97. household survey problems, plus more part-timers or underemployed

[Scorpious_Maximus]

7. Numbers

AP-Unemployment URGENT, take 2

The added jobs sent the unemployment rate down to five and
a-half percent -- the lowest since October 2001. It stood at
five-point-six percent in June.

[Zynx]

16. That's not true. The unemployment rate fell due to a statistical aberratio

n, not these "new jobs".

[Keirsey]

19. what will they do?

Well, the swift boat anti-Kerry campaign has apparently blown up in their freeper faces, so what will they do to counterract this "It's the economy, stupid!" news?

Cheney is probably on the phone now to Ridge calling for another terrorist alert.

[papau]

79. LOL :-)

:-)

[cal04]

9. U.S. July Payrolls Rise 32,000; Jobless Rate Falls to 5.5%

U.S. Labor Department says economy added 32,000 jobs in July, smallest gain since December; jobless rate dips to 5.5 percent.


We are stuck in a soft patch and it may not be as transitory as some of us thought,'' Sung Won-Sohn, chief economist at Wells Fargo & Co. in Minneapolis, said before the report.

The weaker-than-expected job gains may not keep the Federal Reserve from raising its target interest rate Tuesday yet may make them more likely to delay future increases, economists said. The weakest jobs report this year also may fuel criticism President George W. Bush faces from Democratic challenger John F. Kerry, who says Bush has not done enough to help the economy. No economist a Bloomberg News survey expected fewer than 170,000 jobs in July.

``I don't think it would change the Fed's call on Tuesday, but it's not hard to put together a scenario where they would not do anything,'' said Cary Leahey, a senior economist at Deutsche Bank Securities in New York, before the report.

The economy slowed last quarter as higher gasoline costs caused consumers to spend less on other goods and services. Central bankers on Tuesday are expected to raise their benchmark interest rate by a quarter percentage point for a second time this year, to 1.5 percent, to prevent inflation from flaring.

http://quote.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000006&sid=a73girUfUKP4&refer=home

[NewYorkerfromMass]

30. jobless rate down to 5.5 percent due to shrinking workforce

The labor pool is shrinking because unemployed have exhausted benfits, still can't find work, and are now off the radar and out of the equation.
Is this correct?

[MikeG]

10. Those tax cuts for the rich are really effing working, aren't they?

[cthrumatrix]

15. bush has his "base"....the elite. He has no plans for the others.

[liberalcanuck]

18. I really was getting some 'bites' on my resume in early June

and thought that maybe, just maybe there are a few jobs out there for grabs. I am currently employed at one of those corporations that are really taking advantage of the fact that the job market is weak by working its staff to death. So, I thought I'd test the job market. I did find a second job but boy did the hits on my resume slow down in July. All this blabbing by repukes about how this is the strongest growth we've seen in 20 years, blah, blah, blah --talk to me buddy, I can tell ya exactly how 'great' the economy is.

[Southsideirish]

86. Ya, we were, too. Then it dried up and then has been nothing

going on since.

[Torgo Johnson]

23. Didn't Insanity promise great numbers

on his radio show yesterday? I would love to see him try to spin these numbers.

[cthrumatrix]

26. he will NOT explain why the unemployment rate drops with less jobs

nor does CNBC

[KayLaw]

25. Birth/Death rate

Is there a way to figure the actual numbers without the birth/death rate being applied? Are we actually losing jobs?

[tritsofme]

39. Birth/Death= -91,000

And it is not compatible to the seasonally adjusted nonfarm payroll number being reported at 32,000.

[KayLaw]

40. Wow!

Thanks for answering me, Tritsofme.

[NeoConsSuck]

27. Corporate media will bury this by afternoon..

On orders from Rove, they'll saturate with terrorist news.

[DrBB]

33. Billmon called it!

If you haven't read his post in advance of this, check it out. Very interesting speculation toward the end--thinks he's seeing the market reacting in advance of the news, and he calls it. Pretty impressive, to me anyway, being a complete imbecile on this stuff.

[NewYorkerfromMass]

37. imbecile? You're a doc ,doc!

And this link works better: http://billmon.org

[ps1074]

34. Freepers take on the report

Below are actual quotes from FR:


"5.5% is nearly full employment.....I remember reading that comment somewhere back when unemployment used to be consistently in the 6's and 7's"

"And thats the political problem as it gives the rats a "spin" that the economy is still not good."

"Jobs are being created. Period."

"10,000 of the jobs created were in manufacturing - that's HUGE news! Plus Unemployment went DOWN! A larger jobs number would have been nice, but I'll take this news any day"

"Congratulations to the Democrats - their talking down of the economy is having the desired effect."

"The unemployment rate is lower now than when Clinton was re-elected"


Pathetic...

[DemoTex]

35. President Kerry has his work cut out for him.

The Bu$h regime has totally sabotaged the economy.

[DeepModem Mom]

42. Anybody seeing the reporting on TV news? What are they saying?

[KayLaw]

53. On CNNfn

I just heard a man talk about excitement over the lower employment rate, because " that's what mainstreet pays attention to." Also, we're moving in the right direction.

[DeepModem Mom]

55. That's what I was afraid of -- thanks, KayLaw -- nt

[Cocoa]

56. they're talking about Scott Peterson n/t

[prolesunited]

43. Every day I find myself falling farther and farther behind

I have to work a job and a half just to survive without living paycheck to paycheck. If I manage to hang on to my job, it will be at a 10 to 15 percent pay cut (although they are giving us days off to compensate). I just had a $400 per MONTH property tax increase due to a complicated reassessment. And I'm lucky to be treading water in my retirement account after finally breaking even on what I lost when Bush took office.

And I realize that I'm one of the FORTUNATE ones. How could anybody (but the wealthy elite) look at their bottom line and even consider voting for Bush? It boggles the mind.

[2Design]

47. And with all the post this last month of companies that plan

to cut more jobs, it will get worse. I saw on this board easily over 50,000 jobs being cut by different firms.....so that will be this month and beyond....

[Bob3]

48. Economists surprised by the coming of spring

Does it bother anybody else that the Economists are constantly being surprised by what's happening? They remind me of Medieval barbers who kept wondering why their patients were dying all time even though they bled them just like the books said.

Is economics as a study really that off base or are the papers just talking to the hired geeks who spout the GOP line?

[redqueen]

58. I'd like an explanation of that as well

Krugman doesn't seem too surprised, so the latter explanation would be my bet.

[ProfessorGAC]

70. I'm Not Surprised

Look for my posts in the archives here. I have been predicting the opposite of the hacks in Labor and Commerce on nearly every issue for the last 3 years, and posted them right here on DU. I have every bit of their knowledge and credentials, and i disagree with them on nearly everything, and have been contrary in my predictions. I have been surprised by NOTHING!

And, look who's laughing now! Dumbasses!
The Professor

[ProfessorGAC]

72. Bought & Paid For, Is What They Are

And, if you get an MS or Ph.D. from U of Chi, you can write your own ticket. But, you don't get that unless your thesis includes the elements that are accepted by the two dimensional thinkers that work there. (Yeah, i know Nobel Prize, blah, blah, blah. Do some post analysis, and you'll find most of the NP winners can now be proven wrong.)

The academic elements of economics are doing a woeful job of teaching people how to acquire the right data, how to properly dimension a dataset, how to analyze it, and how to develop causation. So, the whole system is rooted in marginal data analysis that is used to support pre-existing theories and hypotheses, and not in developing theories of causation from the data.

There are some of us out here, but we're considered the radicals and troublemakers.

The field is in intellectual disarray.
The Professor

[redqueen]

103. U of Chi?

Where Strauss was?

[lastliberalintexas]

73. It's the latter

Only those "economists" who've graduated from the School of Friedman are surprised.

[sendero]

101. Exactly...

... I heard one on the radio just the other day blathering about "capital formation", as if a shortage of capital is the problem this economy has.

Some people just cannot revise their theories in the face of overwhelming evidence that the theory no longer holds water at all.

[Snellius]

49. Will this month's numbers also be revised DOWN next month?

There seems to be a pattern here of over-estimating job growth and then revising the figures downward a couple of months later (when they hope no one will be paying attention?) Both May and June numbers were significantly overly optimistic. I wonder if Rove is still keeping the books.

[TahitiNut]

94. Yes. The overestimation is due to the model they use.

When the figures actually come in, they're "surprised" primarily due to the tendency of government employees being strongly "encouraged" to make "optimistic" assumptions in their statistical models.

The downward revison of June's employment figures was more than DOUBLE the "preliminary" gains reported for July-over-June.

[jmcbroom]

50. is it just a coincidence that...

the July number is 32,000 and the June number was revised down by 32,000? (From 110K to 78K) Maybe i'm reading too much into this.

[papau]

78. Nope you are correct -without the prior Months writedown- July is negative

:-)

[Screaming Lord Byron]

51. Remember that guy who had a Wall St buddy who swore blind

the next set of job figures were going to be fantastic. Whatever happened there, eh?

[snippy]

52. Republican presidents are always bad for job creation.

Since the 1920's, the annual rate of job creation under republican presidents has always been lower than under democratic presidents.

Since the depression, not a single republican president has had a better rate of job creation than any democratic president. The highest rate of job growth under a republican was 2.2% per year during Nixon's time in office. The lowest rate of job growth under a democrat was 2.3% per year during Kennedy's time in office. Bush has had a -0.7% annual rate which is the first negative number since the depression.

Since WWII ended, a total of 57.51 million jobs were created during the terms of democratic presidents which is an average of 2.054 million jobs per year. During the terms of republican presidents a total of 31.11 million jobs were created which is an average of 1.003 million jobs per year.

The numbers for bush in this graphic are a year old, but the historical numbers are still good.

[redqueen]

59. This would make a great GD thread! n/t

[underpants]

57. TURNING THE CORNER TURNING THE CORNER TURNING THE CORNER

neenerneeenernneeener

[cthrumatrix]

66. "just becuase he says so...doesn't mean it's true".....great Kerry line

[Francine Frensky]

95. Uhh, maybe we should have taken a left back there, not a right.....

someone teach w how to drive, please.

[Jack Rabbit]

60. Let's look at the reasons to vote for Bush

1. Jobs aren't being lost like they were two years ago
2. There is no evidence that he didn't report for duty in Alabama (nevermind that there's none that he did, either)
3. He's not as bad as Saddam

Such an overwhelming case.

[Cocoa]

62. kept America is safe from terror attacks

(except for Sept. 11)

[CarolynEC]

63. But, golly, he's just such a down-home guy...

... ya know, with that Texas drawl he picked up at Andover, the elite New England prep school.

Or was it at Yale, the Ivy League school in Connecticut?

No, wait. I think it was the yacht club in Kennebunkport. The one in Maine.

Ahm gone git musself one ah them drawls too, now that ahm livvin in Massah-choo-sutts.

[Jeff in Cincinnati]

61. 3,086 counties in the United States

Or Parishes, if you live in Louisiana.

At 32,000 jobs, that ten new jobs for each county. Woo-Hoo! We've turned the corner!!

[NewYorkerfromMass]

74. 640 or so per state. eom

[WarhammerTwo]

64. Here's some more wonderful business news...

Halliburton accused of accounting fraud.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5620776/

There's a shocker. Yet, we the taxpayers are funding these yahoos. You would think, in a logical society, that when a company is shown to be crooked, you would stop doing business with said company. Not this administration. Kerry's plan of tax breaks for creating American jobs doesn't go far enough. The government has really got to start regulating big business. I mean, somebody's gotta make sure these know nuthin' nitwits play by the rules. Yeesh!

[Manix]

71. Hey....we're turning the corner!....right to the ditch.......LOL!

[4MoreYearsOfHell]

80. Wait a minute! To be fair,

we should count job gains in India as well...

Or do you all just hate America?

[chelsea0011]

81. "Best economy ever".....Donald Evans

No Rose Garden gathering to get the "good news" out to the public?

[Zynx]

84. I couldn't believe it when he said that.

In my lifetime, this is one of the worst four year periods.

[West Coast Democrat]

88. Where's our little hobbit friend this morning?

I'll bet he has a few word to share about this!

[NewYorkerfromMass]

96. I found him!

[West Coast Democrat]

102. He looks quite shocked, stunned and speechless...

after hearing about the last employment numbers!

[NewYorkerfromMass]

105. Yep. Can't post at DU. Too shocked. eom

[TahitiNut]

98. Well, given his reliance on specious "unemployment" numbers ...

... while nearly ignoring declining employment levels and population growth, I continue to border on uninterested.

[bluestateguy]

89. Whoops!

I think it's safe to say that this will be the first president since Hoover to have no net job growth in his Administration. Even Jimmy Carter and the real President Bush managed to pull that off.

If this keeps up I may have to start looking for a date to the Kerry inaugural ball.

[Got WMD]

99. He shot his "wad" way to early!!!

Dumbass should have saved his TERROR ALERT for today instead of last Sunday.

**44% approval in the latest Fox poll!!!

[Protected]

106. Wow, those tax cuts for the rich really just move the economy along

:(

[cthrumatrix]

108. the RW is grinding it today...they know they are cooked