February 26, 2012
The workforce is disappearing. Zerohedge reports that the Department of Labor Statistics is deliberately making the workforce disappear to bring unemployment numbers down.
The Bureau claims that the reason the workforce has gone from roughly 64% to 59% of the population is that the census figures hit in January and the population changes reflect a declining workforce (for those who don’t know, 1.2 million people disappeared from the U.S. workforce in one month – January).
The BLS also claims that they adjusted the figures for age and retirement and the 1.2 missing workers did not affect the unemployment percentage. I have a problem with this because people are retiring at the rate of 10% more than in prior years and they are going out on disability at an 18% higher rate than in prior years. That tells me people cannot find jobs so they are retiring or going out on disability. The other figure which the BLS does not count is youth 16 -24 and I would like to know why. I do know youth suffer the highest unemployment rate, particularly among minorities.