Posted on 02/07/2004 11:11:29 AM PST by Capitalist Eric
Benjamin Disraeli , the prime minister of the British Empire from 1874-1880, was reported by Mark Twain to have uttered this brilliant quote on statistical analysis: “There are three kinds of lies: lies, damn lies, and statistics.”
Check it out HERE.
My apologies for the misunderstanding.
Be well.
Your comment in post #3
Maybe I'm dense but this seems like a NET gain of about two and a half million jobs in three years on Bush's watch, even using the BLS formula. What am I missing here?
There are two surveys you have conflated in your question.
Your article quote is from the establishment survey showing a loss of 3M jobs, but your comment and numbers on post#3 are the household survey numbers which shows a gain.
That difference is the point of the article - two surveys with dissilmilar results. The answer (which has been known for some time - Mauldin either recently found out, or is only now getting around to writing about it) is in how the household survey counts "employed".
The household survey does not care if one is employed but not paid, ie a self-employed person is counted as "employed" whether they're unbillable or billable as long as they are working (looking for customers, or just cleaning the office) even if they're not earning money. Many people will say they're self-employed even though they may not actually be working or billable - hence the househld survey tends to "over report" as 'employed' laid off people who claim to be self-employed.
The establishment survey OTOH, is drawn from regular large businesses, wherein an employee is typically paid full-time. If they're not earning money, they establishment will, sooner or later, lay them off. Hence the establishment survey tends to report as 'employed' only those people who in fact have actual jobs.
So over time, the establishment survey tends to report full time paid people, whereas the household survey reports as employed anyone who says they're employed.
Bearing out the validity of the establishment survey reporting a loss of 3M jobs (and/or replacement with low paying jobs), is that tax receipts have in fact been falling.
Part of the problem is the household survey is not intended to measure 'employment'. It was intended to measure 'unemployment' (since, logically, the unemployed tend to be found at home, not in establishments). The establishment data is quite precise whereas the household data tends to get confused. People will say they're self-employed (even though they've not billed a dime in months nor looked for customers, all they've done is post some handbills around town or bought an ad in the yellow pages. OTOH, there are people who say they're unemployed because they haven't actually found any customers to work for (and be paid), even though they are in fact doing all the things self-employed people do.
But the BLS and us folk would like to see a closer reconciliation, so the BLS has started a new quarterly report Business Employment Dynamics (BDM) with the charter to reconcile these differences.
I'd imagine that a number of people that answered that survey feel the same way.
My 2002 taxes had relatively little self-employment income: you tend to get paid 30 to 60 days after submitting an invoice, and I was only self-employed 2 months in 2002, and most of that income actually came to me in 2003. My 2003 self employment taxes will be a lot higher.
I have been asked by two clients to be full-time, but the self-employment thing is working great for me, and I'm doing much better than as a normal employee. One client gave me a snazzy new laptop and a blackberry...
Not everyone who is self-employed is upset by their status. Some of us are doing quite well, although never intended to be self-employed.
The bureau of the census says - one net new person increase every 12 seconds. Some are born, some die, some enter work force, some retire or are disabled; some immigrate other emmigrate.
I don't wanna beat a dead horse, but that doesn't mean every one of those net new persons are of working age. It's not the size of the general population that's important in figuring the need for jobs...it's the size of the working age population.I will give you that the size of that population is currently increasing faster than the current increase in (BLS defined) jobs.
But the point I was originally trying to make was that the Democrats are fond of of saying jobs have been lost under the Bush Administration. It sounds pretty dramatic. But NET jobs have NOT been lost - there has, in fact, been a net gain of over 2.5 million jobs even by the BLS's questionable accounting method of not including the newly self-employed.
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