That 7.8% and job increase is REAL, bitches

Here's my quick take on the huge employment report that came out yesterday, which probably has cemented Obama's victory (if there was any doubt before). The data largely matches up with historical trends of the last 2 1/2 years, all treasonous GOP whining to the contrary.

First of all, the drop in unemployment below 8% is understandably the biggest development, and let's look at the report to see where it came from. First thing to remember is that the unemployment rate is a separate survey from non-farm payrolls, and so it is therefore not unusual for it to be a bit different than the non-farm payroll survey. And the household survey showed 775,000 more people reported to be "employed" in September than in August. Quite a bit more than 200,000 in the non-farm payroll report, but if you look over the last 2 years, the difference isn't all that much at all.

Change in NSA "employed," Sept 2009- 2012
Sept 2009- Sept 2010 +636,000
Sept 2010- Sept 2011 +787,000
Sept 2011- Sept 2012 +2,831,000
TOTAL +4.254 million

Change in NSA non-farm payrolls
Sept 2009- Sept 2010 +114,000
Sept 2010- Sept 2011 +1,784,000
Sept 2011- Sept 2012 +1,822,000
TOTAL +3.722 million

So the household survey is slightly nicer to Obama over 3 years, at another 500,000 jobs, but over the last 2 years, the numbers are within 12,000 of each other. So it's quite logical to think that there is a regression to reality for both these numbers over the course of time. Certainly no funny business as far as I can tell.

Let's not get too peachy though, because the "employed" increase isn't all rainbows and ice cream, as is was partly due to a huge increase in part-time workers in September. And to it credit, the BLS report minces no words on it (unlike a Walker DWD report, where this information would be buried or not even mentioned).

The number of persons employed part time for economic reasons (sometimes referred to as involuntary part-time workers) rose from 8.0 million in August to 8.6 million in September. These individuals were working part time because their hours had been cut back or because they were unable to find a full-time job.

Sounds like back to school time certainly played a factor here. But a 0.3% increase in average hourly earnings is a good sign, as the biggest missing piece in this recovery has been wage growth (despite record profits, proving once again that trickle down is a load of crap).

And no, the 7.8% number is NOT due to people dropping out of the workforce (unlike the August decrease), as the workforce numbers actually grew on a seasonally-adjusted basis for September

Change in U.S. labor force, Aug, Sept 2012

August DOWN 368,000
Sept. UP 418,000

There's an interesting reason for this discrepancy, and it relates to my theory of seasonal adjustments being obsolete. If you look at the non-seasonally adjusted numbers, the 2-month change in the workforce isn't all that different than the last 5 years (except for the Depression year of 2009 and the re-entry year of 2011).

2-month change in labor force, N.S.A
2006 -1.394 million
2007 -1.471 million
2008 -1.791 million
2009 -2.638 million
2010 -1.416 million
2011 -0.790 million
2012 -1.451 million

Know what's interesting? 2007 also has a huge amount of its dropouts be in August with few in September, just like 2012. Know else 2007 and 2012 had in common? Same calendar. 5 Fridays in August in both years and Sept. 1 and 15 falling on a Saturday (for example), and it makes me wonder if the survey schedule was messed up as a result. It washes out after 2 months, but it makes the month-to-month numbers look different than a typical year, and it makes the "seasonal" adjustment different as well.

But no matter the reason, the 7.8% is good news, and the continued drop in unemployment makes Obama's first term continue to look at lot like Reagan's "Morning in America" first term. In fact, I'd argue this graph makes Obama look BETTER, because things were falling apart more in January 2009 vs. January 1981, and Obama stopped the bleeding a whole lot quicker.

As for the non-farm payroll survey- it showed a relatively mediocre 114,000 new jobs created in September, but when you add in upward revisions for July and August, we really had 200,000 more jobs created, which is pretty good. It also counteracted the 41,000 in downward revisions in the last report, worthy of mention as well because it means only +45,000 in revisions over the last 2 reports, which isn't all that much and certainly doesn't indicate any messing with the numbers.

In fact, the non-farm payroll numbers illustrate the steady recovery we've had from the worst economic collapse in the last 80 years, and Obama's first term continues to outpace the first term of George Bush's without the boost in war/government employment that Bushie got.

So after looking at this data, I have 2 simple statements.

1. Yes, the decrease in unemployment and job growth reported by BLS is REAL. Unlike the numerous quarters of inflated profits that Jack Welch reported at GE, BLS statisticians didn't lie, and have no reason to lie.

2. Since we've been going in the right direction for the better part of 3 years, why would you want to go back to the failed GOP/ trickle down policies that got us in the mess that we had to get out of?

Yeah, I think we should stay the course with Obama. How bout you?

And with that, it's time to tailgate.