No Truth to Obama "Job Gains" Reports - How the Obama Administration Lies With Statistics!

Published on TheHill.com on March 13, 2012

Obama’s
entire claim that the economy is reviving is based on phony numbers and
rigged statistics. Nothing is more misleading than the recent
administration claims that the economy added over 200,000 jobs during
each of the past three months and that unemployment is stable at 8.3
percent.

Dr. John Hussman of
the Hussman Fund says that the claims of job gains are based entirely on
weighted figures. “Total non-farm employment in the U.S., before
seasonal adjustments, fell by 2,689,000 jobs in January.” Then the spin
doctors at the Bureau of Labor Statistics went to work. Hussman
explains: “because it’s typical for the economy to lose a large number
of jobs after the holidays, largely in retail trade, construction and
manufacturing, the BLS estimated that the ‘normal’ seasonal decline in
employment should have been 2,932,000 jobs in January. The difference
between the two numbers … was 243,000 jobs, which was reported as an
increase in employment.”

Hussman notes that this “adjustment” in
2011 and 2012 was far more extreme than in any previous year since the
1960s. Had the standard adjustment been used, instead of the souped-up
figure BLS applied, the total number of new jobs created would be only
about 60,000 for January.

And even that might be an overestimation.

Hussman
points out that “moreover, we’ve had a remarkably mild winter in the
U.S., particularly in January, and it’s clear that this has favorably
affected both construction and retail activity. Ironically, however,
nothing in the seasonal adjustment actually adjusts for this purely
seasonal effect.”

The stable-unemployment-rate fantasy is also
based on a steady decline in the number of people in the labor force,
despite population increases. The current number of people in the labor
force — the denominator in determining the unemployment rate — is the
lowest since 1981. Economist Peter Morici writes that “if the adult
participation rate [in the labor force] was the same today as when Obama
became president, unemployment would be 11 percent.”

Morici also
notes that “adding adults … who say they [would] re-enter the labor
market if conditions improved and part-time workers who would prefer
full-time positions, the unemployment rate becomes 15.2 percent.
Factoring in college graduates in low skill positions, like counterwork
at Starbucks … unemployment is closer to 20 percent.”

Such is the happy math upon which the administration bases its claims of economic recovery.

Gallup,
which predicts election results with incredible accuracy, uses the same
survey methodology to develop its own unemployment rate and now reports
that it stands at 9.1 percent, a 0.6 percentage-point increase since
last month.

Fortunately, the American people are using their own
eyes, not Obama’s statistics, to figure out what is really going on.
Obama’s approval ratings, as measured most accurately by Gallup and
Rasmussen, show a drop from 51 percent a month or two ago to the low 40s
now. And Rasmussen shows Romney beating Obama by 4 to 6 points. At 42
percent of the vote in the trial heat, the president is facing a
crushing defeat, because the vast bulk of the undecided vote always goes
against the incumbent. [The head-to-head matchup between Romney and Obama varies from day to day - Yesterday Romney was up by three points, today they are tied.]

With gas prices surging, the economic data
will only get worse. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) report on
the economy predicts slow growth and higher unemployment in the near
future, and Hussman says that “overall, an economic downturn remains the
most likely prospect.”

The ability of my former Democratic
brethren at self-deception is legendary, but the current optimism about
both the economy and their chances of holding the White House and the
Senate — and regaining the House?! — is downright nuts.