Another weekly unemployment claims report...January 7 2009

[c1ue]

Another 'green shoot'?

Supposedly unemployment claims at 425,000 or less means actual new jobs being created...

But of course no comment on the possibility that: a) unemployment benefits are just running out b) the 425,000 number is complete crap

Secondly a glance at the overall numbers for both unadjusted and vs. year ago shows hardly a rosy green picture.

http://www.dol.gov/opa/media/press/eta/ui/current.htm

UNEMPLOYMENT INSURANCE DATA FOR REGULAR STATE PROGRAMS

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	Advance				Prior1
WEEK ENDING	Jan. 2	Dec. 26	Change	Dec. 19	Year

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Initial Claims (SA)	434,000	433,000	+1,000	454,000	488,000
Initial Claims (NSA)	645,571	557,571	+88,000	565,243	731,958
4-Wk Moving Average (SA)	450,250	460,500	-10,250	465,750	528,000

	Advance				Prior1
WEEK ENDING	Dec. 26	Dec. 19	Change	Dec. 12	Year

---

Ins. Unemployment (SA)	4,802,000	4,981,000	-179,000	5,038,000	4,529,000
Ins. Unemployment (NSA)	5,479,110	5,090,381	+388,729	5,345,467	5,317,388
4-Wk Moving Average (SA)	5,005,750	5,101,000	-95,250	5,223,250	4,421,500

[we_are_toast]

Re: Another weekly unemployment claims report...January 7 2009

It's going to take a lot less than 425,000 weekly claims to turn this shoot green.

[dummass]

Re: Another weekly unemployment claims report...January 7 2009

It's going to take a lot less than 425,000 weekly claims to turn this shoot green.

Cheap Peak Employment?

[doom&gloom]

Re: Another weekly unemployment claims report...January 7 2009

i wonder what it would all look like if they built in the additions to the workforce who have never worked and thus cannot claim unemployment or being unemployed...

[flintlock]

Re: Another weekly unemployment claims report...January 7 2009

I'd like to know if there are any reliable figures on the number of people directly affected by unemployment. For example, Daddy loses his job, it affects Mom and the kids, plus grandma who lives with them. A lot of people see 10% unemployment and think, "that's not so bad". But you have to remember all the others affected by it, especially if its a one breadwinner household. Are most unemployed single? Married with kids? Old? Young? I could see our 10% unemployment level having a serious impact on perhaps 25% of the population.

[Rajiv]

Re: Another weekly unemployment claims report...January 7 2009

The interesting number would be to extract out families with two or more full time employees when comparing to years before 1987

I believe that the number of two earning member families took a sharp upturn somewhere in the 1980s

[Rajiv]

Re: Another weekly unemployment claims report...January 7 2009

Also this - Why the government's job figures won't add up

The charade continues this Friday.

That's when the Labor Department will announce how many jobs it claims were lost in the US economy during December.

The number is essentially worthless to anyone who really wants to know what's cooking in the job market. But it is worse than worthless -- it's harmful -- to policymakers who are trying to determine what to do about things like interest rates and the latest incarnation of the stock market bubble.

For the record, Wall Street thinks that the department will report that no jobs were lost -- zero -- during December. This comes after only 11,000 jobs were reported lost in November, the first pleasant surprise in months for those who foolishly care about these statistics.

If December does end up with zero job losses -- and don't count on it -- this would be the first time the labor market hasn't had a monthly contraction since January 2008.

Please pay close attention because this is complicated.

But if I can explain it well enough you will know better than Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke himself why the American public is so glum about the employment situation even as Wall Street and Washington think the problem has been licked.

Here goes.

Whatever is announced this Friday -- whether it's zero loss of jobs, a gain or maybe even another decline -- that figure will have been attained only after the Labor Department does some Class A razzmatazz on the numbers.

First, there will be invisible seasonal adjustments that will skew the figures.

Since so few jobs were created in December 2008, the Labor Department's computers were probably expecting the same pattern in this latest Christmas season, meaning that few jobs would be created in 2009 as well.

So even a small increase in jobs last month compared with December 2008 could be magnified in the accounting into something much bigger.

As I said, it's statistical razzmatazz.

And that one isn't even the biggie.

Friday's figure will also be altered by job growth that the Labor Department is pretending has occurred at newly formed companies. The department calls this its birth/death model and by itself this assumption could be more destructive to the US economy than any terrorist attack could ever be.

For instance, in December 2008 the Labor Department assumed that 60,000 jobs were created by infant companies that couldn't be surveyed, and weren't contacted, by its workers. Without that assumption, the job losses that month would have been worse than the almost incomprehensible figure of 681,000 that was publicly announced.

The trouble is, those extra 60,000 jobs don't exist.
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[c1ue]

Re: Another weekly unemployment claims report...January 7 2009

Actually I am less irritated by the Birth/Death model's machinations than by the size of the work force machinations.

The former is understandable as any (simplistic) model will always overestimate job creation during a recession, while underestimating during recoveries.

But the workforce machinations seem much less transparent; I've published previously showing how the overall numbers are reasonable but that there seem to be a clear tendency to shrink the work forces in the years before elections. The previous analysis was only since 2000, but if real then this would be one clear example of outright manipulation - since there should not be any such 'natural' 4 year cycle.