Thank you for an intelligent reply, although tossing out your tinfoil hat barb at the end wasn’t necessary to make your point. Sorry, but I do think that the numbers are probably cooked for political reasons - by both parties, not just the dems. It’s all a matter of managing expectations. Pretty hard to get everyone thinking that the economy is turning around if the official numbers don’t support that idea. Why put out numbers that highlight weakness? Tossing in imaginary jobs that someone assumes must be there based on historical studies means that they believe that the economy is static when obviously it is not. My tinfoil theories also apply to the calculation of inflation. Since inflation is used to determine quite a few government expenses, there is an obvious motivation to skew the numbers downward. After elimination of things that show actual inflation, the dark art of hedonic pricing takes care of the final calculation. Lo and behold, inflation is contained and the actions of the fed can be justified. I don’t deny that printing trillions for the banking cartel has done something in the actual economy and even more for stock market asset inflation (cheered in the media as wealth creation). However, I’m very skeptical of all government issued numbers and view them as simple propaganda.
Human nature being what it is, I imagine there is always the chance that some economists at the BLS may succumb to the temptation to infuse bias intu their statistical models and sampling techniques. But it is all but impossible for that organization to do so on a wholesale, concerted basis.
The reality of the situation is that the staff are dedicated to the voluminous task of producing reliable data for the benefit of economic actors, investors, students and researchers like me. They are egg-headed academics for the most part with a high degree of professional integrity.
But that doesn’t mean we should be unwary consumers of their product. I am skeptical when the agency introduces new methodologies or redefines statistical categories or metrics. I have seen instances when data that cannot be collected is imputed based on statistical analyses that are not well explained, if not evidently biased.
Yes, they could do a better job of sharing raw data so independent researchers may validate their work. But no, there is no evidence of systematic bias.
I think many on the Right are angered by the way in which the media report economic data. The reportage is biased in a way the benefits the Left and the statists. But this isn’t the data’s fault and we don’t do ourselves any favors by blaming the data or those who toil thanklessly to collect and report it.