Our financial system is crumbling this week.

[Hungary Jack]

Btw, I am headed to Davos to plot the destruction of what remains of the fabric of America. Then we'll have some raclette.

[heyzeus]

Hiring up, unemployment down to 8.3%, lowest since Feb '09

[Hungary Jack]

Labor force participation trending down...

[longhornbaseball]

Labor force participation trending down...

Party pooper.

[SHOW]

[TimeForGuinness]

U3 dropped down to 8.3%
U6 dropped down to 15.1%

Something I found on another site that helps a bit:

U1 Rate : Percentage of labor force unemployed 15 weeks or longer.
U2 Rate : Percentage of labor force who lost jobs or completed temporary work.
U3 Rate: Official unemployment rate.
U4 Rate: U3 + "discouraged workers", or those who have stopped looking for work because current economic conditions make them believe that no work is available for them.
U5 Rate: U4 + other "marginally attached workers", or "loosely attached workers", or those who "would like" and are able to work, but have not looked for work recently.
U6 Rate: U5 + Part time workers who want to work full time, but cannot due to economic reasons.

[Arthur Dent]

Also worth pointing out that at the current rate, we would get back to full employment around 2020. We need to do much better. On the other hand, this report is significantly better than a lot of dismal crap previously spun as good news.

[Freed Roger]

I've always been skeptical of the usefulness of the UE rate. Back when I did quartely payroll reports for clients- I'd always throw away the DOL statistical surveys (no fine for not doing). I realize they now have better ways of getting the info direct from ADP, etc - but there are always a lot of variables factored or not factored in the #s.

Same goes for all the statistics for leading economic indicators-- I'd like to see some good economic journalist (like planet money-are they good?) do a plain english story on how these #s and %s are come up with. I'm betting there are some weird stories behind it all.

i.e The rate of inflation - do they figure it without the constantly fluctuating fuel prices.? -sure seems like groceries and meat costs a lot more than used to. The practical cost of living for certain people has gone up(cost of housing, food, cost of education, insurance). But the overall COLA is neutral. Weird to me. Or GDP rate - we've clearly seen not all growth that we've had in this country is good sustainable growth- i.e.- Growth largely on borrowed money and braindead consumption. I'm admittedly a statistics dumbass.

Reason I'd like to see it, is because I remember reading how Greenspan would pour over the economic indicators, then obsess on inflation and then would decide to lower interest rates -repeatedly. The process seemed a bit like using a ouiji board. Who's the statistic man behind the curtain?

[Arthur Dent]

I've always been skeptical of the usefulness of the UE rate. Back when I did quartely payroll reports for clients- I'd always throw away the DOL statistical surveys (no fine for not doing). I realize they now have better ways of getting the info direct from ADP, etc - but there are always a lot of variables factored or not factored in the #s.

Actually, the ADP series is total crap. The main jobs stats that you hear about come primarily from two surveys. The household survey is used to compute the unemployment rate and is based on calling a huge number of people each month to ask about employment status. The establishment survey, used to tally monthly job creation, is completed by employers. The response rate for both is not perfect, but there are statistical methods of compensation, and the data is cross-checked against other sources, for example the unemployment insurance system. Certainly, there is room for improvement in the timeliness of the data and to reduce to size of revisions for example, but economic statistics and data collection is actually one of the things the U.S. government does very well.

[Socnorb11]

Dow Jones closes at its highest level since before the 2008 financial crisis.

[AdmiralKird]

It's also worth noting many people who have had jobs are doing so at reduced salaries and those being hired are taking jobs at pay in the 10-30 percentile range. Those positive numbers are certainly a start, but they aren't so golden when you take a magnifying glass to the situation.