Listen to businessman Leo Hinderman of the New American Foundation discuss the disparity between the government's official unemployment statistic and the real unemployment rate in this CNN news video:
Leo covers ground that American politicians need to hear such as we need a great many good paying full-time jobs right now to solve the unemployment problem in the U.S. yet are currently actually losing net full time jobs in this country when population growth is considered.
In other words, we are going from a bad to worse unemployment situation despite the government claiming that the unemployment rate is going down. That is, again, because they simply don't count entire groups of people as being unemployed anymore in the media's favored rate of unemployment.
That unemployment rate does not adequately take into account those who have lost their jobs and become discouraged over time from actively looking for work, those who are self-employed such as tradesmen or building contractors or IT consultants making a shadow of what they once did, involuntary early retirees, those on disability pensions who still wish to work in occupations suitable for their medical conditions, those who work for payment for as little as one hour per week but would like to work full-time, the available working population incarcerated in U.S. prisons (who may or may not be working while incarcerated), the "involuntary minimum-wage part-time" workers who are grossly underemployed (e.g. a middle-aged computer networker or programmer who is working in a retail store because he cannot find a permanent job for example), involuntary stay-at-home mothers who would prefer to work, and graduate and professional school students who were unable to find worthwhile jobs after they graduated with their Bachelor's degrees doing odd jobs or working part-time, etc...
"Hidden, or covered, unemployment is the unemployment of potential workers that is not reflected in official unemployment statistics, due to the way the statistics are collected. In many countries only those who have no work but are actively looking for work (and/or qualifying for social security benefits) are counted as unemployed.
Those who have given up looking for work (and sometimes those who are on Government "retraining" programs) are not officially counted among the unemployed, even though they are not employed. The same applies to those who have taken early retirement to avoid being laid off, but would prefer to be working.
The statistic also does not count the "underemployed" - those with part time or seasonal jobs who would rather have full time jobs. In addition, those who are of working age but are currently in full-time education are usually not considered unemployed in government statistics. Because of hidden unemployment, official statistics often underestimate unemployment rates." -Wikipedia.
The government unemployment rate is not a measure of the percentage of people that need reasonable income and don't have it.
"They are not counted as unemployed because they had not searched for work in the prior 4 weeks, for the specific reason that they believed no jobs were available for them."
http://www.bls.gov/lau/stalt.htm
Update: Bureau of Labor Statistics Data show Americans dropping out of the labor market.
Labor Force Statistics from the Current Population Survey:
Leo covers ground that American politicians need to hear such as we need a great many good paying full-time jobs right now to solve the unemployment problem in the U.S. yet are currently actually losing net full time jobs in this country when population growth is considered.
In other words, we are going from a bad to worse unemployment situation despite the government claiming that the unemployment rate is going down. That is, again, because they simply don't count entire groups of people as being unemployed anymore in the media's favored rate of unemployment.
That unemployment rate does not adequately take into account those who have lost their jobs and become discouraged over time from actively looking for work, those who are self-employed such as tradesmen or building contractors or IT consultants making a shadow of what they once did, involuntary early retirees, those on disability pensions who still wish to work in occupations suitable for their medical conditions, those who work for payment for as little as one hour per week but would like to work full-time, the available working population incarcerated in U.S. prisons (who may or may not be working while incarcerated), the "involuntary minimum-wage part-time" workers who are grossly underemployed (e.g. a middle-aged computer networker or programmer who is working in a retail store because he cannot find a permanent job for example), involuntary stay-at-home mothers who would prefer to work, and graduate and professional school students who were unable to find worthwhile jobs after they graduated with their Bachelor's degrees doing odd jobs or working part-time, etc...
"Hidden, or covered, unemployment is the unemployment of potential workers that is not reflected in official unemployment statistics, due to the way the statistics are collected. In many countries only those who have no work but are actively looking for work (and/or qualifying for social security benefits) are counted as unemployed.
Those who have given up looking for work (and sometimes those who are on Government "retraining" programs) are not officially counted among the unemployed, even though they are not employed. The same applies to those who have taken early retirement to avoid being laid off, but would prefer to be working.
The statistic also does not count the "underemployed" - those with part time or seasonal jobs who would rather have full time jobs. In addition, those who are of working age but are currently in full-time education are usually not considered unemployed in government statistics. Because of hidden unemployment, official statistics often underestimate unemployment rates." -Wikipedia.
The government unemployment rate is not a measure of the percentage of people that need reasonable income and don't have it.
"They are not counted as unemployed because they had not searched for work in the prior 4 weeks, for the specific reason that they believed no jobs were available for them."
http://www.bls.gov/lau/stalt.htm
Update: Bureau of Labor Statistics Data show Americans dropping out of the labor market.
Labor Force Statistics from the Current Population Survey:
0 comments:
Post a Comment