Unemployment Gets Worse

Mark Noonan

I know, I know – the MSM says that the unemployment rate stayed steady at 10% in December – and thus it hasn’t gotten worse. But behind the numbers is this:

53,000 construction and 27,000 manufacturing jobs were lost last month – we continue to lose out where its most important, in the wealth-creating jobs. Things are not getting better – not by a long shot. The whole “recovery” has been smoke and mirrors – bogus numbers put out by idiots and/or con artists who are trying to sucker us in to disbelieving our lying eyes. For crying out loud, a net of 10,000 retail jobs were lost in December! During December. That doesn’t happen if the economy is in any way, shape or form on the mend.

You can go ahead and believe the happy talk, if you like. I know you Democrats will because you’re worried sick about massive losses and think that the “recovery” will set things right before November. You believe this because you really think that a bankrupt nation can borrow itself back in to prosperity. Fine. Believe that. But when the “re-crash” hits, you just remember what I and others told you – and then, please, wake the heck up.

UPDATE: Another way to understand the unemployment numbers:

Then will come the second-take stories that will notice the shrinking labor force, which dropped by nearly 700,000 from November. Had it stayed stable for last month, the jobless rate would have been 10.4 percent. Had it stayed stable since August, the jobless rate would be 11 percent!

But wait, there’s more! The U-6 rate rate which combines the basic jobless rate, discouraged workers, part-timers-who-would-rather-be-full-timers climbed to 17.3 percent. And the average duration of unemployment rose to a record high 29.1 weeks.

And now the report that the BLS is underestimating the number of people actually getting unemployment compensation makes far more sense – if you’re a Democrat, better to have 10% unemployment than 11%. And if you have to lie to get the lower number, what is there in Democrat politics to make you think you shouldn’t?

UPDATE II: Why would Democrats want to lie about unemployment? Here’s why.