Friday, April 6, 2012 – 08:00 a.m.
As expected, U.S. job growth slowed dramatically in March.
Just 120,000 jobs were added across the country.
The U.S. Department of Labor, in keeping with election year politics, reduced its estimate of the size of the workforce.
That reduction caused the unemployment rate to come in at 8.2% in Fridays report.
The lowest in three years.
Without that reduction, the rate would have climbed.
Gallup, which generates an unadjusted estimate, places the unemployment rate at 10.0% and the underemployment rate at 19.3%.
Gallup’s numbers are probably a lot closer to reality. The problem with the Department of Labor’s statistics is that they are currently counting 8.8 million fewer people than they were four years ago and 2.6 million fewer than they were a year ago. Does anyone think that the labor force is actually getting smaller?
People are only classified as unemployed if they do not currently have a job, have actively looked for work during the past four weeks, and are currently available to work. If they do not meet those criteria, they are classified as “not in the labor force.” The government is playing some serious games with statistics.