TruthSpeak

Neal Boortz

HAVE WE REALLY LOST JOBS UNDER GEORGE BUSH?

John Kerry is responding to a slide in his poll numbers by stepping up the rhetoric against George Bush on issues economic. Kerry is saying that Bush has created "more excuses than jobs." Very clever. Kerry is now calling the last four years the "Excuse presidency."

Let's play with jobs numbers a bit. If you're new to Nealz Nuze, or if you aren't a listener to my show, you're going to learn a few things you didn't know before.

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics produces two separate jobs reports. One is called the Establishment Survey, the other is the Household Survey [pdf]. These two surveys use different methodologies in measuring the number of people working and the rate of job growth or job loss. The Establishment Survey questions a set list of established businesses every month on their employment numbers. The Household Survey questions thousands of American households to see if household members are working, not working, looking for jobs, retired, etc.

There is a fairly big problem with the Establishment Survey. Since the list of businesses canvassed every month for this survey is fairly static, any new businesses out there that have started in the last year or so won't be included. Let's say you have a mythical town with three employers. One large manufacturing plant that employs 1000 people, and two small businesses that have a combined employment of 60. The large manufacturing facility has been in operation for 20 years and is a part of the government's monthly Establishment Survey. The two small businesses were only formed late last year and are not on the Establishment Survey. So ... let's say that in August the plant dismisses 5 people, but the small businesses hire those five people and about five more. Additionally, four other residents have started businesses from their homes. The Establishment Survey would show a net job loss in this town of five jobs in the September report. The Household Survey, on the other hand, would show a net job increase of nine jobs.

Remember now, politicians generally like to use government statistics to prove the need for more government or to prove that their political foes are doing a bad job. This means, of course, that the Democrats and the Kerry campaign will eagerly point to the Establishment Survey to prove that George Bush is losing jobs, not creating them.

By now I would bet that you're just screaming for me to get to the point. What figures do we get from the latest Household Survey?

Hold on ... let's go back to Kerry for a moment. Kerry says that Bush is the first president in 72 years to record a net loss of jobs during his term. Kerry puts that number at 900,000 jobs. NOW is the time to compare the two survey totals.

On September 3rd the Bureau of Labor Statistics published it's numbers. The Establishment Survey showed that 131.5 million people were employed in non-farm jobs during August. The Household Survey showed a total employment figure of 138.7 million. That's a difference of 8.2 million jobs ... 8.2 million more Americans actually working than the numbers Kerry cites. That sort of wipes out Kerry's 900,000 job loss, don't you think?

Come on, folks. How in the world can you ignore small businesses when you report job numbers? Most of the jobs in this country are in small businesses, the very businesses that can take up to two years to register on the government's Establishment Survey. Job growth numbers in the small business private sector lag for a year or more behind than job numbers in large employers. In other words ... the numbers Kerry is relying on are meaningless in the short term.

One more thing ... Bush inherited an economic recession that began under Bill Clinton --- then you had the dot-com bust and the terrorist attacks of 9/11. By any measure that's a tough hand to play. I wonder how The Soufflé would have performed?

griftadan

yah, everytime i argue with democrats they always throw around numbers that dont really mean anything. for instance:

"under bush, 45 million poeple dont have healthcare!"

i do some research, and it turns out that if you changed jobs during the year and you healthcare switches between the companies, and there are a few days where you dont have healthcare, than you are on the list. that would eliminate atleast 2/3 of that number

you gotta wonder, what other numbers do they exxagerate?

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TruthSpeak

Not to mention...the last time I checked, the U.S. government isnt a healthcare provider.

mtnbiker

Coupled with all the the percentage of Americans with health care is actually higher.

ChrisF202

In the eyes of the left we should be, its one of their excuses to institute universal health care.

And your right, health care should be up to the individual, not the govt.

TruthSpeak

They dont really care about the people. Its all about the politics.

When the government controls your healthcare, they control your vote.
When liberals control your healthcare first, they control your vote first.

Confed999

Yep, same reason welfare families vote Dem.

__________________
No man is free until all men are free - John Hossack
I agree completely with this Administration’s goal of a regime change in Iraq-John Kerry
even if that enforcement is mostly at the hands of the United States, a right we retain even if the Security Council fails to act-John Kerry
He may even miscalculate and slide these weapons off to terrorist groups to invite them to be a surrogate to use them against the United States. It’s the miscalculation that poses the greatest threat-John Kerry

barrowaj

That's a cynical point of view.

And how does the government controlling your healthcare lead to the government controlling your vote? Thats a total non-sequitur.

Static Caster

How about job outsourcing???? It displaced the U.S. steel industry and now it's taking a toll an all aspects of the I.T. industry and call centers etc. etc.

Isn't this a big threat to the NORTH AMERICAN economy???? Does either political candidate have an idea on how they can make create a more competitive America?

TruthSpeak

Because when the next election comes around...the liberals just scream "if you vote republican you wont get free healthcare anymore"

once you've given something to someone, they rarely let you take it back.

TruthSpeak

No...outsourcing is good for the economy.

first of all, 5 million jobs were insourced to our country, which the job numbers dont count.

second, if we didnt have outsourcing, products in the u.s. would cost about 40-60% more, which would kill spending and the economy. It would also cause businesses to spend more to make products, which decreases production. Add that to the fact that they would have to pay more in wages to get the same ammount of products on the market, whcih would drive the cost up even further.

So yes, if you get rid of outsourcing, you may have more jobs, but you have less wealth among those workers because all their money goes right back to the system when they buy that overpriced product. When outsourcing stops, prices go up, but income stays the same, thats a problem.

donnie

in addition, outsourcing also allows corperations to spend more on product development, keeping skilled labor, like engineers, designers, pharmicist, and chemist employed. which translates into higher REAL wages, and higher REAL GDP growth.

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Confed999

Liberalism in action. Tax and regulate the companies until they can no longer compete, then blame outsourcing.
There are only two ways, be more conservative, or subsidize.

barrowaj

Its great that you beleive that, but dogma is one thing, and facts are another. In practice, outsourcing has not produced increases in investment and development. However, executive salaries have increased a lot. So where is that money saved going? Into the pockets of the execs...

Pay of top 50 outsourcing companies increases by 46%...
http://www.forbes.com/work/managemen...31topnews.html

Its interesting that CEOs in 2003 earn more than 300 times the pay of an average worker, where in 1980, that ratio was only 42:1. This exponentially growing gap is the reason the tax curve is progressive.

donnie

let me rephrase, outsourcing CAN be a good thing, if used properly.

when we outsourced our collections department, our operating cost went way down, (we did not even outsource outside the country) we had 23 employees 1 facilty and a whole lot of operating cost. when 6 employees left for "better" jobs we thought it was time to adjust, so we decided to outsource. of the people that were left we promoted 12 of them, made lateral moves on 8, and 3 chose to go to green pastures. those that stayed earned higher wages, those that left are making higher wages, and we saved enough to open a new branch (that now employes some of those employee's). that means new underwriters, and term writers, and managers earning real wages.

CAN outsourcing be a bad thing if done improperly, sure, anything done wrong could be bad, ( well not everything )



our operation cost went down enough to allow us to open a new branch