Numbers described in detail: http://www.examiner.com/article/an-overview-of-the-october-2015-jobs-report
But I thought ObamaCare was evil
Isn't the participation rate expected to stay kinda meh due to baby boomers retiring?
jesus Christ some of you people are negative. Were you this negative when un-employment was at fucking 10% I'd imagine all these other numbers of under employment, labor participation were all worse or not much better at 10%.
Yes and no. We'd generally expect a decline in LFP because, as you say, there's an age bump caused by the boomers; but unfortunately the LFP is growing faster than that demographic ages, which implies it's not just them.
Interestingly, the participation rate of people in the 55+ age range has actually been going up steadily over the past ~20 years. The 25-55 group has been dropping, and the 20-24 group has been dropping even more, but the one that's been absolutely crashing is the 16-19 age group.
One of the big problems with the labor market during and really since the recession is that baby boomers aren't retiring, because they really can't afford to.
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Interestingly, the participation rate of people in the 55+ age range has actually been going up steadily over the past ~20 years. The 25-55 group has been dropping, and the 20-24 group has been dropping even more, but the one that's been absolutely crashing is the 16-19 age group.
One of the big problems with the labor market during and really since the recession is that baby boomers aren't retiring, because they really can't afford to.
While this is good news and better than any GOP leadership could have accomplished, true employment is U6. That should be reduced to 5%
Interestingly, the participation rate of people in the 55+ age range has actually been going up steadily over the past ~20 years. The 25-55 group has been dropping, and the 20-24 group has been dropping even more, but the one that's been absolutely crashing is the 16-19 age group.
One of the big problems with the labor market during and really since the recession is that baby boomers aren't retiring, because they really can't afford to.
I wonder how much of the drop in the sub 24 is due to more people being in college than before, since it's become more or less a prerequisite even for the most basic of jobs.
America continues its transformation into a nation of part-time waiters and burger flippers.
Couldn't this be added to every US labor statistic for the past six to ten years? I mean, I agree with you and your facts but let's not rain on anybody's parade.Heh. Ooh, shiny figure.
Let's not talk about the details in which job security is down, labour rates are down, employment hours down, benefits down, labour force participation is down.
But at least that doctored unemployment number is looking good.
"Man just think how much stronger employment would be with a Republican in the White House instead of a tax and spend communist liberal"
I wish facts changed people's minds.
So why is the S&P going down then?
So why is the S&P going down then?
So why is the S&P going down then?
It would be interesting to see the college enrollment rates for the different age groups next to the labor force participation rates for the same. I know the big thing right at the time of the recession was everybody on the edge of graduating college making the decision to stick around for a master's that they probably wouldn't have gone for if they had good job prospects. That's just anecdotal on my part though, I'd have to dig around to see if I can find the statistics.
Edit: Wow, preliminary research seems to be showing that college enrollment is down during the past few years. Let me keep digging and see if I can get some clean numbers.
Couldn't this be added to every US labor statistic for the past six to ten years? I mean, I agree with you and your facts but let's not rain on anybody's parade.
Every thread we ignore this. Why?
http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2012/05/23/romney-promises-to-bring-unemployment-down-to-6/
Obama, you done screwed up. Americans should have elected Romney.
We should have elected Newt to get that sweet $2.50 a gallon gas
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Now we only have $2.22 a gallon gas under Obama
It's doctored in the sense that the way its been calculated has changed. The requirements relaxed in order to maintain the figure.
How was it changed?
The conservative media will continue to only focus on the labor force participation rate and blame the Obama economy. They'll completely ignore the decade long trend and that BLS and CBO has been telling us for 10 years (even longer) that the participation rate was going to decline regardless of economic factors. I expect if the economy continues to do well over the next year the conservative media cries will grow louder about this.
It's seasonally adjusted. Unadjusted, the US added over 1 million jobs last month.Every thread we ignore this. Why?
Really? Private polling firm Gallup records unemployment at 5.6%. Underemployment (unemployed + those working part-time who wish to work full-time) is at 13.8%, a decline from above 20% in February 2010.Great and all, but the real unemployment rate is still 20% or more.
Doing a bit of cursory research, it would appear that I'm overextending the claim... but Workforce labour participation rates have spiked significantly in the last decade compared to previous norms. Is everyone that's dropped out of the workforce someone that's truly dropped out? Or simply discounted conveniently to maintain a less worrying general unemployment figure?
Yeah, Bams really has no direct blame for the last ten years. TPP though will seal the coffin of doom for the next 30.
Labour force participation rate, and by extension total labour hours have just been going down as a symptom of the drive for outsourcing and automation.
All the lower skill jobs that traditionally the younger demographics take because they don't have the experience and need those jobs to build them have gone away due to automation revolution - if not directly through more efficient manufacturing processes (and outsourcing), then indirectly by forcing labour pools to shift to jobs with traditionally good career paths, causing an oversupply of labour at the low levels, with much fewer spots relative to the total pool for people to move up to.
With all that said... you can't take the unemployment figure at face value while ignoring the participation rate. It's not like that participation rate is going down because people are becoming so wealthy that they no longer have to work and can retire.
1) The aging of baby boomers. A lower percentage of older Americans choose to work than those who are middle-aged. And so as baby boomers approach retirement age, it lowers the labor force participation rate.
2) A decline in working women. The labor force participation rate for men has been declining since the 1950s. But for a couple decades, a rapid rise in working women more than offset that dip. Womens labor force participation exploded from nearly 34 percent in 1950 to its peak of 60 percent in 1999. But since then, womens participation rate has been displaying a pattern of slow decline.
3) More young people are going to college. As BLS noted, Because students are less likely to participate in the labor force, increases in school attendance at the secondary and college levels and, especially, increases in school attendance during the summer, significantly reduce the labor force participation rate of youths.
Below are the primary reasons I've read contribute to the low participation rate. The article has links to federal reports that predate Obama stating the participation rate will decline no matter what. I'm sure the economy plays some small role in higher than expected numbers, but not what the typical Washington Times, Blaze, Breitbart, and Fox News article makes it out to be.
http://www.factcheck.org/2015/03/declining-labor-participation-rates/
Below are the primary reasons I've read contribute to the low participation rate. The article has links to federal reports that predate Obama stating the participation rate will decline no matter what. I'm sure the economy plays some small role in higher than expected numbers, but not what the typical Washington Times, Blaze, Breitbart, and Fox News article makes it out to be.
http://www.factcheck.org/2015/03/declining-labor-participation-rates/
So no matter who was president, and independent of the health of the economy, BLS projected in 2006 that labor force participation rates were going to go down.
But its also true that the decline has been even steeper than projected. For example, in that 2006 report, BLS projected the participation rate would decline to 64.5 percent in 2020. Its already 1.7 percentage points below that in 2015.
According to an analysis by the Congressional Budget Office in February 2014, [T]he unusually low rate of labor force participation in recent years is attributable to three principal factors: long-term trends, especially the aging of the population; temporary weakness in employment prospects and wages; and some longer-term factors attributable to the unusual aspects of the slow recovery of the labor market, including persistently low hiring rates.
It's interesting that this goes against the Census and BLS reports I've found stating that the labor participation rate of "boomers" has actually been going up, and college enrollment has been going down.
As you see in the graphs way above, the college and grad school rates have been going up over the longer period. You have to look at the longer term not a year or two.
Right, but we're trying to explain what's happening to labor participation rate over the short term past.
I don't think we have enough data for enrollment in 2014 to now to tell. The projected enrollment trend was up at the 2013 point, so if it did go up, that would in part explain the lowered participation.
Thanks Romney.
Maybe but the general perception would still be that McCain is a successful president. When it comes to unemployment rate it's just a matter of perception and I think this should be seen as a win under Obama, particularly against people who were all too giddy about predicting doom for America when he was elected/when the stimulus bill passed/when Obamacare was passed/when the Bush tax cuts were reversed/etc. etc. etc.The funniest part of news items like this is that you just know that if we were in President McCain's second term with identical numbers, many of the "Based Emperor Obama" people would be posting "well this is actually quite worrying if you look at this and this and that", and the current "well this is actually quite worrying, Obama is still a screwup" people would be posting about "Based Emperor McCain"
Maybe but the general perception would still be that McCain is a successful president. When it comes to unemployment rate it's just a matter of perception and I think this should be seen as a win under Obama, particularly against people who were all too giddy about predicting doom for America when he was elected/when the stimulus bill passed/when Obamacare was passed/when the Bush tax cuts were reversed/etc. etc. etc.
Shit, was this today?