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Faked census to show higher employer data pre election 2012

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  • Faked census to show higher employer data pre election 2012

    In the home stretch of the 2012 presidential campaign, from August to September, the unemployment rate fell sharply — raising eyebrows from Wall Street to Washington.

    The decline — from 8.1 percent in August to 7.8 percent in September — might not have been all it seemed. The numbers, according to a reliable source, were manipulated.

    And the Census Bureau, which does the unemployment survey, knew it.

    Just two years before the presidential election, the Census Bureau had caught an employee fabricating data that went into the unemployment report, which is one of the most closely watched measures of the economy.

    And a knowledgeable source says the deception went beyond that one employee — that it escalated at the time President Obama was seeking reelection in 2012 and continues today.

    “He’s not the only one,” said the source, who asked to remain anonymous for now but is willing to talk with the Labor Department and Congress if asked.

    The Census employee caught faking the results is Julius Buckmon, according to confidential Census documents obtained by The Post. Buckmon told me in an interview this past weekend that he was told to make up information by higher-ups at Census.

    Ironically, it was Labor’s demanding standards that left the door open to manipulation.

    Labor requires Census to achieve a 90 percent success rate on its interviews — meaning it needed to reach 9 out of 10 households targeted and report back on their jobs status.

    Census currently has six regions from which surveys are conducted. The New York and Philadelphia regions, I’m told, had been coming up short of the 90 percent.

    Philadelphia filled the gap with fake interviews.

    “It was a phone conversation — I forget the exact words — but it was, ‘Go ahead and fabricate it’ to make it what it was,” Buckmon told me.

    Census, under contract from the Labor Department, conducts the household survey used to tabulate the unemployment rate.

    Interviews with some 60,000 household go into each month’s jobless number, which currently stands at 7.3 percent. Since this is considered a scientific poll, each one of the households interviewed represents 5,000 homes in the US.

    Buckmon, it turns out, was a very ambitious employee. He conducted three times as many household interviews as his peers, my source said.

    By making up survey results — and, essentially, creating people out of thin air and giving them jobs — Buckmon’s actions could have lowered the jobless rate.

    Buckmon said he filled out surveys for people he couldn’t reach by phone or who didn’t answer their doors.

    But, Buckmon says, he was never told how to answer the questions about whether these nonexistent people were employed or not, looking for work, or have given up.

    But people who know how the survey works say that simply by creating people and filling out surveys in their name would boost the number of folks reported as employed.

    Census never publicly disclosed the falsification. Nor did it inform Labor that its data was tainted.

    “Yes, absolutely they should have told us,” said a Labor spokesman. “It would be normal procedure to notify us if there is a problem with data collection.”

    Census appears to have looked into only a handful of instances of falsification by Buckmon, although more than a dozen instances were reported, according to internal documents.

    In one document from the probe, Program Coordinator Joal Crosby was ask in 2010, “Why was the suspected … possible data falsification on all (underscored) other survey work for which data falsification was suspected not investigated by the region?”

    On one document seen by The Post, Crosby hand-wrote the answer: “Unable to determine why an investigation was not done for CPS,” or the Current Population Survey — the official name for the unemployment report.

    With regard to the Consumer Expenditure survey, only four instances of falsification were looked into, while 14 were reported.

    I’ve been suspicious of the Census Bureau for a long time.

    During the 2010 Census report — an enormous and costly survey of the entire country that goes on for a full year — I suspected (and wrote in a number of columns) that Census was inexplicably hiring and firing temporary workers.

    I suspected that this turnover of employees was being done purposely to boost the number of new jobs being report each month. (The Labor Department does not use the Census Bureau for its other monthly survey of new jobs — commonly referred to as the Establishment Survey.)

    Last week I offered to give all the information I have, including names, dates and charges to Labor’s inspector general.

    I’m waiting to hear back from Labor.

    I hope the next stop will be Congress, since manipulation of data like this not only gives voters the wrong impression of the economy but also leads lawmakers, the Federal Reserve and companies to make uninformed decisions.

    To cite just one instance, the Fed is targeting the curtailment of its so-called quantitative easing money-printing/bond-buying fiasco to the unemployment rate for which Census provided the false information.

    So falsifying this would, in essence, have dire consequences for the country.
    Census ‘faked’ 2012 election jobs report | New York Post

    Who'd have guessed?

  • #2
    you know, you're not doing your credibility any wonders when you source from the New York Post and from Zerohedge.
    There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that "My ignorance is just as good as your knowledge."- Isaac Asimov

    Comment


    • #3
      Originally posted by astralis View Post
      you know, you're not doing your credibility any wonders when you source from the New York Post and from Zerohedge.
      NICE. That's all you got? I know you to be intellectually dishonest and blind to Reality as the rest of us experience it, but this is what you're down to: criticizing the source of documented and reported facts from an entity that your sniffy sense of superiority doesn't like, because you can't assail the facts themselves. The rest of us see exactly who you are when you do that.

      And you speak of anybody else's cred? Dude, you made this once-excellent Board into a wasteland.

      Comment


      • #4
        I don't like the "kill the messenger" attitude, too, but what credibility Post has these days?
        No such thing as a good tax - Churchill

        To make mistakes is human. To blame someone else for your mistake, is strategic.

        Comment


        • #5
          Originally posted by Doktor View Post
          I don't like the "kill the messenger" attitude, too, but what credibility Post has these days?
          As compared to say the NYT or any other NY based media outlet?

          Comment


          • #6
            Originally posted by zraver View Post
            As compared to say the NYT or any other NY based media outlet?
            Well I had general US media scenery in mind. I know some time ago Post was declared less credible NY printed medium. Or something to that extent.
            No such thing as a good tax - Churchill

            To make mistakes is human. To blame someone else for your mistake, is strategic.

            Comment


            • #7
              How 'bout we discuss the facts as reported, and not who told 'em to us?

              And by the way, did you notice that attempt at mis-direction? The effort to drag the OP off-topic? I did.

              Comment


              • #8
                blues,

                NICE. That's all you got? I know you to be intellectually dishonest and blind to Reality as the rest of us experience it, but this is what you're down to: criticizing the source of documented and reported facts from an entity that your sniffy sense of superiority doesn't like, because you can't assail the facts themselves. The rest of us see exactly who you are when you do that.
                so, let's discuss the facts "as reported".

                an article that bases its accusation on one anonymous source; that cites ONE employee whom can't remember details of a conversation he had.

                and oh, that employee left in 2011.

                NY Post Source Julius Buckmon Left Census In 2011 - Business Insider

                ok. i certainly hope you did your job better than this clown of a NY Post reporter (but i repeat myself).

                as for WAB being a wasteland, that begs the question why you continue to ghost this site and then occasionally pop in to drop self-righteous "i told you so's" and venomous one-liners. it's not needed, it's not appreciated, and if it continues i'll really regret having to make sure this is not repeated again.
                There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that "My ignorance is just as good as your knowledge."- Isaac Asimov

                Comment


                • #9
                  Originally posted by Bluesman View Post
                  How 'bout we discuss the facts as reported, and not who told 'em to us?

                  And by the way, did you notice that attempt at mis-direction? The effort to drag the OP off-topic? I did.
                  We have The New York Post (I'll leave it to others to discuss the quality of their journalism, as I don't believe I've ever read that particular paper) citing an anonymous source claiming to have evidence that some unknown number of surveys from the Philadelphia region were fabricated.

                  The Census Bureau employee, for his part, said he never answered the part of the survey that asks if the respondent is ‘employed or not, looking for work, or have given up.’”

                  “It’s important to note that the Post’s anonymous source — not Buckmon — was supposedly involved in the September 2012 jobs report.”

                  If These Claims by ‘Reliable Sources’ Are Proven True, the Obama Administration Will Be Dealing With Another Huge Scandal | TheBlaze.com

                  In other words, the fabricated surveys did not add to nor subtract from the underlying data. On this basis, we are supposed to believe beyond a shadow of a doubt that President Obama ordered this falsification.

                  Case not proven.
                  Trust me?
                  I'm an economist!

                  Comment


                  • #10
                    Originally posted by DOR View Post

                    Case not proven.
                    There could be video of Obama throwing babies into the mouth of Moloch and you'd deny any wrong doing.

                    Obama is a disrespectful of the Constitution as Bush 43, as egotistical as Clinton, wedded to a vision of a new world order like (but a different order) Bush 41, sees himself as visionary as Reagan, is as inept as Carter, less forgiving than Ford and as corrupt as Nixon. One could only wish he had as much honor as LBJ, or that he felt like JFK that it was the peoples job to do for the country, not the country's job to do for the people.

                    Comment


                    • #11
                      Originally posted by Bluesman View Post
                      Dude, you made this once-excellent Board into a wasteland.
                      Keith why are you doing this?
                      “He was the most prodigious personification of all human inferiorities. He was an utterly incapable, unadapted, irresponsible, psychopathic personality, full of empty, infantile fantasies, but cursed with the keen intuition of a rat or a guttersnipe. He represented the shadow, the inferior part of everybody’s personality, in an overwhelming degree, and this was another reason why they fell for him.”

                      Comment


                      • #12
                        Originally posted by TopHatter View Post
                        Keith why are you doing this?
                        Because I won't tolerate fools calling me foolish. I knew, and so did Jack Welch, that those numbers were bogus. And the blind faithful, like your esteemed Admin, were only too happy to carry water for a criminal gang that masquerades as a political party. They should be called on it. By this late date, NObody can claim innocence or ignorance of what they are supporting, and what they enable, and the consequences of all the ruination they abet.

                        Screw 'em if they don't like what I say or how I say it. One thing they cannot avoid is the fundamental truth that they're Bad Guys, and I don't care a dam' bit if they know I loathe them for it.

                        Comment


                        • #13
                          This Board is for the purpose of debate and discussion. The faked census report is all over the media today and i have read the same article on 7 different media outlets. Is there a "list" of "credible" sources we are mandated to use now when linking our sources? Are there certain topics that can not be discussed even though it is the hot news item of the day?

                          If there is one thing to say about Bluesman, he has always thoroughly sourced his data, and 9 times out of 10, he was also correct in his opinion as to the topic. So when the chickens come home to roost, I see nothing wrong with anyone making note that he was right in his prior debate of the subject.

                          I am a prime example of the eye-rolling when he was right, but hey, that's what changed me from a Democrat to a Republican. Bluesman always proved his point, and it almost always proved correct. Everyone here knows Blues expresses his opinions with much passion, and that always kept this Board lively, and I miss it.

                          So, if you want to keep trolls around for play toys, and deny this Board the liveliness and passion in the mere truth that Blues brings to this place, go ahead, because that just shows you are not intellectual enough for the challenge. In other words, that makes you the idiot in the room.

                          I also know I just violated a WAB rule. A rule that I had passed years ago. But, I am tired of seeing the partisan swing of this place and it bores me. Now, give me my suspension.

                          Comment


                          • #14
                            This is getting rather interesting. As long as it's not getting personal I am all for the Bluesstorms ;)

                            Blues, do you believe that 4% (that's the difference from 7.8 to 8.1 if i calculated it correctly) error, falsification, or whatever you want to name it, seriously changed the outcome of the elections? Because, IMV, that's the bottom line.

                            And is there an ongoing investigation about this?
                            No such thing as a good tax - Churchill

                            To make mistakes is human. To blame someone else for your mistake, is strategic.

                            Comment


                            • #15
                              It seems that this actually started in October of 2012 when the conservative Jack Welsh (former CEO of General Electric) charged that the September unemployment numbers "defy logic".

                              Jack Welch: Unemployment rate cooked - Oct. 5, 2012

                              So far, all of the various media articles point to the New York Post root story. An investigation has been requested...

                              WASHINGTON — The Labor Department has contacted the Census Bureau about allegations in a New York Post article that the jobs data heading into the 2012 presidential election were manipulated. "We have contacted the Census Bureau about the allegations and we understand that the matter has been referred to the Commerce Department for an investigation," Stephen Barr, a senior managing director in the Labor Department's Office of Public Affairs, said Tuesday in an interview.
                              Labor Department says it contacted Commerce on jobs charges - chicagotribune.com
                              sigpic

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