http://money.cnn.com/2012/12/07/news/economy/november-jobs-report/?hpt=hp_t3
They should really say "A bunch more people STOP looking for Work". Maybe it's "spin" so to speak - but highlighting "a drop" in unemployment here is really quite illogical and misleading. The "kicker" or "dirty little secret" one must read to discover is - the number people that just flat out dropped out of labor market by choosing not to seek employment rose considerably. In more technical terms, "the labor participation rate" decreased, AGAIN. We have already "tanked" to about the same labor force numbers as in the early 80's or so - we just simply keep going deeper into the hole. This btw, would also explain some of the increased profits and "enhanced" report earnings becoming a bit more prevalent as of late. Essentially, businesses have lowered their operating costs, including those related to labor, thereby appearing to be more profitable. The truer sign is the volume of business activity as measured by services provided and/or products manufactured. Back to the point of the unemployment rate, further "digging" in the economic data would reveal more jobs were actually cut in the manufacturing and construction sectors. This is not exactly great news as manufacturing is often considered one of the "bulwarks" of the economic recovery. And, let's not forget that the increase in hiring, such as it was (about 177k) was within the retail sector and presumed to be mostly "seasonal". This most likely needs to be qualified or "discounted" to some degree as causing a mere short term "boost" (if one wants to call it that) ; this sadly, is far from indicating a sign of authentic economic improvement. The below passage has the "nuts and bolts" on why the unemployment rate dropped. The short version - a reportedly 350k people dropped out of the labor force. It is generally said that about somewhere in the 150-200k range of new hires is required to just to keep the unemployment rate steady, no increase or decrease. As it turns out, this "assumption", as it were, more or less stays in line with the particular situation now. The 350, 000 people dropping out would be enough to "lower" the unemployment rate about a tenth of a point, maybe a little more; in this case, we get a .2% drop.
"Why the unemployment rate fell
The payrolls number and the unemployment rate come from two separate surveys conducted by the Labor Department, and the data don't always match up. While businesses largely reported they hired workers, a survey of households said just the opposite.
Households claimed they had 122,000 fewer jobs in November, and also showed 350,000 people dropped out of the labor force.
The unemployment rate fell because there were fewer people looking for work. The Labor Department only counts people who have searched for a job in the last four weeks as officially unemployed.
About 12 million people were counted as unemployed in November, down from 12.3 million a month earlier.
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