Received: by 10.66.81.74 with SMTP id y10mr1475865pax.17.1350081778412; Fri, 12 Oct 2012 15:42:58 -0700 (PDT) Path: s9ni4311pbb.0!nntp.google.com!news.glorb.com!border6.newsrouter.astraweb.com!news.astraweb.com!border5.newsrouter.astraweb.com!not-for-mail Date: Fri, 12 Oct 2012 15:43:04 -0700 From: Bruce S User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1; WOW64; rv:15.0) Gecko/20120907 Thunderbird/15.0.1 MIME-Version: 1.0 Newsgroups: rec.outdoors.rv-travel Subject: Re: OT...unemployment rate References: <50747a2d$0$31274$c3e8da3$3a1a2348@news.astraweb.com> <08b0c78b-dc23-492d-ae6f-8106af003476@googlegroups.com> <5075f63b$0$63613$c3e8da3$e408f015@news.astraweb.com> <5075fbc2$0$48095$c3e8da3$dd9697d2@news.astraweb.com> <43c9a48b-cf47-43b9-9164-afef36879fac@googlegroups.com> <5076f7b0$0$51880$c3e8da3$88b277c5@news.astraweb.com> <50784782$0$25357$c3e8da3$12bcf670@news.astraweb.com> In-Reply-To: Lines: 164 Message-ID: <50789cf2$0$22915$c3e8da3$76a7c58f@news.astraweb.com> Organization: Unlimited download news at news.astraweb.com NNTP-Posting-Host: e621a9ca.news.astraweb.com X-Trace: DXC=f:3AW5BBTA_?W?WaA58nC`28QgSnj;lNcA>Xhh`^A2gL1]PBHNQL9R2YoUle;ONN?Dd On Fri, 12 Oct 2012 09:38:32 -0700, Bruce S > wrote: > >> On 10/12/2012 1:55 AM, nothermark wrote: >>> On Thu, 11 Oct 2012 13:00:02 -0500, Mike Hendrix >> (dot) us> wrote: >>> >>>> On Thu, 11 Oct 2012 09:45:40 -0700, Bruce S >>>> wrote: >>>> >>>>> On 10/11/2012 3:15 AM, Hank wrote: >>>>>> On Wednesday, October 10, 2012 6:50:43 PM UTC-4, bruce wrote: >>>>>> >>>>>>>> >>>>>>> >>>>>>>> Yes - a lot more. >>>>>>> >>>>>>>> >>>>>>> >>>>>>>> Here are some official numbers from the Bureau of Labor Statistics: >>>>>>> >>>>>>>> >>>>>>> >>>>>>>> Total employment Sept. 2012 - 133,500,000 >>>>>>> >>>>>>>> Total employment Jan. 2009 - 133,561,000 >>>>>>> >>>>>>>> >>>>>>> >>>>>>>> Total working age population growth during those years - 7,865,000 >>>>>>> >>>>>>>> >>>>>>> >>>>>>>> So, the population has gone up by almost 8 million people, but the >>>>>>> >>>>>>>> number of people holding jobs has gone up by 61 thousand. The only way >>>>>>> >>>>>>>> to claim that unemployment is less now than then is to believe that NONE >>>>>>> >>>>>>>> of those 8 Million people want jobs. >>>>>>> >>>>>>>> >>>>>>> >>>>>>>> Do you really believe that? >>>>>>> >>>>>>>> >>>>>>> >>>>>>>> Traditionally about two thirds of the working age people want jobs, so >>>>>>> >>>>>>>> if we make the assumption that about 2/3rds of that 8 million people >>>>>>> >>>>>>>> want jobs, that would mean that almost 6 million people are not being >>>>>>> >>>>>>>> counted as unemployed but should be. Doing the math in my head, that >>>>>>> >>>>>>>> comes to about 3% more unemployment - or a total of about 11% instead of >>>>>>> >>>>>>>> the 7.8% they are claiming. >>>>>>> >>>>>>>> >>>>>>> >>>>>>>> Of course the percentage unemployed goes down if you quit counting >>>>>>> >>>>>>>> people, but a person would have to be an idiot to believe that none of >>>>>>> >>>>>>>> those people want jobs. >>>>>>> >>>>>>> >>>>>>> >>>>>>> I just noticed a typo in what I wrote - I said employment went up by 61 >>>>>>> >>>>>>> thousand, I meant it went down by 61 thousand. The actual employment >>>>>>> >>>>>>> numbers just above that line are correct, I just typed the math backwards. >>>>>>> >>>>>>> >>>>>>> >>>>>>> >>>>>>> >>>>>>> -- >>>>>>> >>>>>>> Bruce >>>>>> >>>>>> You can't just use the working age stats and employment stats for figuring unemployment. There are other factors that have to be taken into consideration. It's not as simple as you think. >>>>>> >>>>>> If you wasn't so lazy, you'd figure out how to delete a post after you send it. Sound familiar? :-) >>>>>> >>>>>> Hank >>>>> >>>>> You still haven't answered my question (and I DID answer yours): Do you >>>>> really believe that NONE of those 8 million people who came into the >>>>> workforce age group wanted jobs? >>>>> >>>>> It's a simple yes or no question. >>>>> >>>>> Fewer people have jobs today than had jobs 4 years ago. >>>>> 8 million people entered the employment age group. >>>>> >>>>> How is that possible? >>>> ------------------------------- >>>> >>>> Something tells me that Hank is going to pull a nothermark and not >>>> provide that answer. >>>> >>>> If it was nothermark he would reply with a canard........ if you do >>>> get a reply expect just that...... a canard. >>>> >>>> mike >>> >>> >>> I'd go here and look for a cross correlation to folks on early >>> retirement. That is probably the answer. The more one is past 55 the >>> harder it becomes to get a decent job if one is laid off. If one has >>> the resources then why push to take a low paying job? >> >> In my opinion, being forced to retire is the same as being unemployed. >> I retired at age 57 because I wanted to retire - I would have retired at >> 23, but couldn't afford it. I had planned on retiring at age 55 but >> because of my father's health, I continued to work till after he died >> and my mother moved back to AZ and stabilized. >> >> So I was done working at age 57 - but that had NOTHING to do with the >> economy, or availability of work - I just wanted out. On the other >> hand, if I had been laid off and ended up spending my retirement money >> to survive because I couldn't find a job, I would have considered myself >> unemployed, not retired. > > OMFG You did not work until you were 65???? How could you look > yourself in the face in a mirror? > > > ;-) > > My point is that the aberration is trying to put everybody between 18 > and 65 or whatever into the work force. We never achieved that > number. We did get a peak with the boomers because a lot more women > chose to work instead of stay home and live off of some man. For a > variety of reasons that number is probably dipping back down as folks > decide that somebody home with the kids is important, or a host of > other reasons already mentioned. > > I was looking for a historical trend in workforce size and found this: > > http://www.prb.org/pdf08/63.2uslabor.pdf > > If you look at the numbers the historical workforce is closer to 50% > than the 2/3 you tossed out. If you have better numbers it would be > interesting. If not the 2/3 is your first problem as it is too high. Even if you are correct that it is 50% rather than 66%, that still means 4 million people are not being counted as unemployed, even though they want to work. Today there are fewer people holding jobs than there were when 0bama took office. Your claim is that NONE of the 8 million people who entered the workforce in the last 4 years want jobs. That is an asinine assertion. -- Bruce "The truth is hate speech for those who hate truth."