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Payroll employment increases by 321,000 in November; unemployment rate unchanged

Kushinator

I'm not-low all the time
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Total nonfarm payroll employment increased by 321,000 in November, and the unemployment
rate was unchanged at 5.8 percent, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today.
Job gains were widespread, led by growth in professional and business services, retail
trade, health care, and manufacturing.

This is probably one of the strongest reports in the past two years, given the upward revisions from previous months and the rise in earnings. YoY, average hourly earnings have increased 2.1% year over year, which is actually higher than CPI inflation of 1.6% in the same time frame.

The rest of the report can be found here.
 
This is probably one of the strongest reports in the past two years, given the upward revisions from previous months and the rise in earnings. YoY, average hourly earnings have increased 2.1% year over year, which is actually higher than CPI inflation of 1.6% in the same time frame.

The rest of the report can be found here.

As usual, you (and other Keynesians/big government lovers) refuse to look past the headlines.

Check the household survey.

Number of additional Americans employed...JUST 4,000!!!


Employment Situation Summary Table A. Household data, seasonally adjusted


Then, check the number of full time Americans employed.

150,000 fewer Americans were full time employed.

Table A-9. Selected employment indicators


This is not a great report...it is, IMO, a lousy one.
 
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As usual, you (and other Keynesians/big government lovers) refuse to look past the headlines.

Check the household survey.

Number of Additional Americans employed...JUST 4,000!!!


Employment Situation Summary Table A. Household data, seasonally adjusted


Then, check the number of full time Americans employed.

150,000 fewer Americans were full time employed.

Table A-9. Selected employment indicators


This is not a great report...it is, IMO, a lousy one.

labor force went up 119,000, employed went up 4,000, unemployed went up 115,000. Must be nice to pick which report you pull your data from for you headline.
 
labor force went up 119,000, employed went up 4,000, unemployed went up 115,000. Where did they get the 321k number?

You're using OLD math... you need to use common core math you see. :joke:
 
You're using OLD math... you need to use common core math you see. :joke:

They use qualitative words like "bigger" and "smaller". Makes like lots more easier. :2razz:
 
Horribly bad numbers that will be twisted and celebrated by the mainstream media all day today.
 
If we keep creating the same jobs we are creating now, it will take 10s of millions of more employment gains just to return average hourly wages to pre recession levels of 3.7%.
 
labor force went up 119,000, employed went up 4,000, unemployed went up 115,000. Must be nice to pick which report you pull your data from for you headline.

It's always the same. The official jobs numbers ("new jobs" or "jobs created") comes from the Current Employment Statistics (CES) a monthly survey of "about 144,000 businesses and government agencies, representing approximately 554,000 individual worksites..."
This is a payroll survey and excludes agriculture, the self employed, those working in other's houses, unpaid family workers, and those working under the table. The reference period is the Pay Period that includes the 12th of the month.

The unemployment and other labor force data (including total employed) comes from the Current Population Survey (CPS) a monthly survey of 60,000 households (around 110,000-120,000 individuals) that includes everyone age 16 and older not in the military, prison, or an institution. The reference period is the Week that contains the 12th.

So the CES employment data, while more limited, is much more accurate and is benchmarked each year to the Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages. The CES has always been the official jobs data.
 
It's always the same. The official jobs numbers ("new jobs" or "jobs created") comes from the Current Employment Statistics (CES) a monthly survey of "about 144,000 businesses and government agencies, representing approximately 554,000 individual worksites..."
This is a payroll survey and excludes agriculture, the self employed, those working in other's houses, unpaid family workers, and those working under the table. The reference period is the Pay Period that includes the 12th of the month.

The unemployment and other labor force data (including total employed) comes from the Current Population Survey (CPS) a monthly survey of 60,000 households (around 110,000-120,000 individuals) that includes everyone age 16 and older not in the military, prison, or an institution. The reference period is the Week that contains the 12th.

So the CES employment data, while more limited, is much more accurate and is benchmarked each year to the Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages. The CES has always been the official jobs data.

Oh, come on now.

You know full well that your statement is impossible to prove. You would have to have the actual, 100% accurate number to compare it to, but that is presently impossible to calculate.
The BLS says the CES it is more accurate based on it's calculations...which means virtually nothing since they came up with the calculation process and it is NOT an exact science.

Plus, the CES uses all kinds of models and guesstimates (like the Net Birth/Death model...which even the BLS admits is often wrong).

Asking a bunch of businesses how many people they hired or fired and then putting your own estimates and models to those numbers is hardly an accurate way to measure employment.

It's a way (like the household survey)...nothing more.

And it is impossible to know how accurate it is. You can guess, hope, prey, estimate how accurate it is. But you cannot know.

So I strongly suggest to you that in the future you do not make matter-of-fact statements that you should know full well are impossible to prove...just a suggestion.
 
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You know full well that your statement is impossible to prove.

Do you know how to respond to a counter-position without invoking an argument from ignorance fallacy? The CES survey is more accurate because it draws from a much larger sample size. This is a fundamental principle of statistics; as the sample size increases, the ability to accurately depict the central tendency increases.
 
Do you know how to respond to a counter-position without invoking an argument from ignorance fallacy? The CES survey is more accurate because it draws from a much larger sample size. This is a fundamental principle of statistics; as the sample size increases, the ability to accurately depict the central tendency increases.

:lol:

More accurate?

So, you are saying that the CES is 80 TIMES more accurate then the household survey (321K to 4K)? That the household survey was off by over 98%?!?

Are you really that far gone on the 'rose colored glasses' train?

I guess so.

Noted.


Good day.
 
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Oh, come on now.

You know full well that your statement is impossible to prove. You would have to have the actual, 100% accurate number to compare it to, but that is presently impossible to calculate.
While not 100%, because there are always flaws in every measuring techniqe, the Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages is a COUNT (not a survey) of businesses covered by Unemployment Insurance and of government agencies, so it's as close to 100% as is possible.

The BLS says it is more accurate based on it's calculations...which means virtually nothing since they came up with the calculation process and it is NOT an exact science.
Much larger sample size, and benchmarked to the actual numbers from a near total census. How could it not be more accurate?

Plus, the CES uses all kinds of models and guesstimates (like the Net Birth/Death model...which even the BLS admits is often wrong).
Each month, approximately 554,000 worksites are surveyed. In order to aggregate that to the total number of employed, you have to use the total number of worksites in each industry. But new businesses pop up every month and other businesses fail, so how do you know how many businesses there are? You can just ignore births and deaths and use the number from a set date, but that's obviously inaccurate. Or you can use a birth/death model based on previous observed patterns and trends. This is better, though obviously not perfect (which is why benchmarking to the QCEW is still necessary).

During the recession, the birh/death model, which was updated yearly, was clearly off, so BLS changed to a quarterly basis of updating the model.

The Household survey does a similar thing, using estimates of population growth. Those are adjusted every January, but the previous numbers are not revised....it's just a jump between December and January data.

Asking a bunch of businesses how many people they hired or fired and then putting your own estimates and models to those numbers is hardly an accurate way to measure employment.
That's a differnt survey. The CES asks "How many people were on your payroll for the pay period that contains the 12th of the month". And that's aggregated out based on a model of current number of businesses.

What do you suggest would be more accurate?
 
While not 100%, because there are always flaws in every measuring techniqe, the Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages is a COUNT (not a survey) of businesses covered by Unemployment Insurance and of government agencies, so it's as close to 100% as is possible.


Much larger sample size, and benchmarked to the actual numbers from a near total census. How could it not be more accurate?

Each month, approximately 554,000 worksites are surveyed. In order to aggregate that to the total number of employed, you have to use the total number of worksites in each industry. But new businesses pop up every month and other businesses fail, so how do you know how many businesses there are? You can just ignore births and deaths and use the number from a set date, but that's obviously inaccurate. Or you can use a birth/death model based on previous observed patterns and trends. This is better, though obviously not perfect (which is why benchmarking to the QCEW is still necessary).

During the recession, the birh/death model, which was updated yearly, was clearly off, so BLS changed to a quarterly basis of updating the model.

The Household survey does a similar thing, using estimates of population growth. Those are adjusted every January, but the previous numbers are not revised....it's just a jump between December and January data.

That's a differnt survey. The CES asks "How many people were on your payroll for the pay period that contains the 12th of the month". And that's aggregated out based on a model of current number of businesses.

What do you suggest would be more accurate?

You did no say it is probably more accurate (which I still do not agree with).

You said it 'is' more accurate...and that is impossible to know.

I am not going to explain statistics and mathematics and physics to you...your matter-of-fact statement is IMPOSSIBLE to prove. Period. This should be obvious.

Come on man, you went too far. You exaggerated. We all do it. No big deal. If you had said 'I believe it is more accurate'...I might not have said a thing.


That was the only point I was making (that and an indirect point at how much the Bureau of Laboured Statistics sucks, nothing personal. But w have been down there before).

We are done here, for now.


Good day.
 
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U.S. factory orders fall for third straight month

'(Reuters) - New orders for U.S. factory goods fell for a third straight month in October, pointing to a slowdown in manufacturing activity.

The Commerce Department said on Friday new orders for manufactured goods declined 0.7 percent after a revised 0.5 percent drop in September.'

U.S. factory orders fall for third straight month | Reuters

So, factory orders have fallen for three months in a row?

Oh yeah...America is just humming along.
 
U.S. factory orders fall for third straight month

'(Reuters) - New orders for U.S. factory goods fell for a third straight month in October, pointing to a slowdown in manufacturing activity.

The Commerce Department said on Friday new orders for manufactured goods declined 0.7 percent after a revised 0.5 percent drop in September.'

U.S. factory orders fall for third straight month | Reuters

So, factory orders have fallen for three months in a row?

Oh yeah...America is just humming along.

I'll just this, regardless of the report this last election, the voters didn't look at all the rosy reports or buy into the economy is improving. What they did was look around, at themselves, their families, their neighbors and friends and assessed their own situation and voted accordingly.

45% of those who voted said the economy was their number one issue. 78% of those who voted said they were worried about their and this nation's financial future. Now those are how the people look at these things, how they feel. Not how a statistical report said or was spun if it was. This last election was decided upon each individuals own pocket book and how they saw the future, their own and friends and family financial future.
 
Btw, according to the NOT seasonally adjusted household survey, there were actually 270,000 FEWER Americans employed in November compared to October.

Plus a whopping (again NOT seasonally adjusted) 735,000(!) less Americans employed in November compared to October.

Table A-9. Selected employment indicators

This report just gets uglier and uglier.
 
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Btw, according to the NOT seasonally adjusted household survey, there were actually 270,000 FEWER Americans employed in November compared to October.

Plus a whopping (again NOT seasonally adjusted) 735,000(!) less Americans employed in November compared to October.

Table A-9. Selected employment indicators

This report just gets uglier and uglier.

I'd have to agree. In addition, I've have to agree that these numbers will be proclaimed as positive with tortured reasoning and justification by the Biased Lame Stream Media, in support of Obama and the very programs and policies that have made this recovery as tepid and stretched out as it has been, all to be gobbled up and accepted as truth and fact by the Obama and party faithful, without reasoning and further, more detailed inspection.

But then, what did you expect from the ideologues in the electorate, in the party, and in the Lame Stream Media?
 
You did no say it is probably more accurate (which I still do not agree with).

You said it 'is' more accurate...and that is impossible to know.

I am not going to explain statistics and mathematics and physics to you...your matter-of-fact statement is IMPOSSIBLE to prove. Period. This should be obvious.

No it's not impossible to prove. The Household survey samples approximately 0.05% of the population. the Establishment survey samples approximately 32% of employed people. There is no doubt that that much larger a sample is going to be more accurate. That's basic math. Standard error for Household Survey employment is about +/- 300,000 and for the Establishment survey it's +/- 74,000 While statistics is not an exact science, it is a science, and that large a difference in sample size is inarguabley more accurate.


And that's not even including non-sample error, which will be more prevelant in the Household Survey.



Come on man, you went too far. You exaggerated. We all do it. No big deal. If you had said 'I believe it is more accurate'...I might not have said a thing.
It's not a question. It IS more accurate. But go ahead, and show your math that a sample of .05% of the universe is not for sure less accurate than a sample of 32% of the universe. Or that the standard errors are wrong.
 
Great jobs news.

I can tell you that in my field, I've been getting bombarded with recruiter calls and they tell me that my sector in pharma actually has a negative unemployment rate. More positions than qualified candidates. That hasn't happened in years.
 
What DA60 is saying about part time jobs may be true, but as long as the average workweek is increasing, I think that we are headed in the right track.

From today's report:

In November, the average workweek for all employees on private nonfarm payrolls rose
by 0.1 hour to 34.6 hours. The manufacturing workweek rose by 0.2 hour to 41.1 hours,
and factory overtime edged up by 0.1 hour to 3.5 hours.

The average workweek has been shrinking for over a hundred years, I see no reason why anyone would expect that this trend would change now. Today's forty hour a week job would have been considered "part time" a hundred years ago, when the average workweek was 70 hours.
 
The CES is considered more accurate, but it has its flaws, which is why we have CPS.

For example, the CES counts one person holding two jobs as two different payroll prints. The CPS counts the same person as one employed person. This is why I tend to look at multiple job holders, which has had an upward spike as of recently, the most growth since 2010.

fredgraph.png


Not really a significant portion of the labour force, but noteworthy when determine the type of jobs being created in the economy.
 
I'll just this, regardless of the report this last election, the voters didn't look at all the rosy reports or buy into the economy is improving. What they did was look around, at themselves, their families, their neighbors and friends and assessed their own situation and voted accordingly.

45% of those who voted said the economy was their number one issue. 78% of those who voted said they were worried about their and this nation's financial future. Now those are how the people look at these things, how they feel. Not how a statistical report said or was spun if it was. This last election was decided upon each individuals own pocket book and how they saw the future, their own and friends and family financial future.

Wages were considered the most important issue in the economy, not job growth. This is why many states held referendums in favor of minimum wage increases.

fredgraph.png


Despite the job gains, average hourly wages haven't budged, which gives you an idea of the types of jobs the economy has created within the last 6 years.

Quality, not quantity.
 
No it's not impossible to prove. The Household survey samples approximately 0.05% of the population. the Establishment survey samples approximately 32% of employed people. There is no doubt that that much larger a sample is going to be more accurate. That's basic math. Standard error for Household Survey employment is about +/- 300,000 and for the Establishment survey it's +/- 74,000 While statistics is not an exact science, it is a science, and that large a difference in sample size is inarguabley more accurate.


And that's not even including non-sample error, which will be more prevelant in the Household Survey.



It's not a question. It IS more accurate. But go ahead, and show your math that a sample of .05% of the universe is not for sure less accurate than a sample of 32% of the universe. Or that the standard errors are wrong.

I will say this one final time because you seem a decent chap and you are usually polite.

It is impossible to know how accurate a measurement of a number is compared to another measurement of the same number is unless you know what that number you are measuring actually is.

Since it is presently impossible to determine the actual number of unemployed persons in America with a 100% certainty, then it is impossible to determine how accurate a measurement is compared to another measurement.

You can guess, estimate or even hope...but you cannot know.

It's like if I think of a number and you come up with two methods to estimate what that number is. Then you say that method 'a' is more accurate then method 'b'...even though you have absolutely no idea what the number is.
It is impossible to know which method is more accurate since you do not even know the number you are trying to determine.


I am guessing you still don't agree.

Hey, I tried.


Now, if you will excuse me, there are a TON of things I should/would rather do then this...no offense.


Good day.
 
I will say this one final time because you seem a decent chap and you are usually polite.

It is impossible to know how accurate a measurement of a number is compared to another measurement of the same number is unless you know what that number you are measuring actually is.
That is untrue. A larger sample size has a smaller margin of error than a smaller sample size (up to a certain point). This is true regardless of anything else.

Since it is presently impossible to determine the actual number of unemployed persons in America with a 100% certainty, then it is impossible to determine how accurate a measurement is compared to another measurement.[/qutoe] First, you're changing the topic from Employed to Unemployed. Second you are again ignoring the issue of different sample sizes. Third, you're ignoring that, for the Establishment survey we do have a near exact count from the QCEW.

It's like if I think of a number and you come up with two methods to estimate what that number is. Then you say that method 'a' is more accurate then method 'b'...even though you have absolutely no idea what the number is.
It is impossible to know which method is more accurate since you do not even know the number you are trying to determine.
No, it is nothing like that. It's like there is a giant jar with about 1 million marbles in it of red, white, and blue. You pick a sample of 500 marbles, count the number of each color, and use the percent of your sample to estimate the total number of each color (for example, out of the 500 you pick, there are 100 white, which is 20%....20% of of 1 million is 200,000 so that's your estimate). I pick a sample of 320,000 marbles and get a count of 48,000 white marbles (15%) giving me an estimate of 150,000 white marbles.
Whose estimate is more likely to be closer to the true number?
Do you really want to claim sample size doesn't matter and we could go with a sample of 100 households and get the same accuracy as the current 60,000 households?
 
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