The Real US Unemployment Rate Under Obama is 11%

When the recession supposedly officially ended in June, 2009, the labor force participation rate was still 65.7% [Just as when Obama took office in Jan 2009 _ ed.].

In the latest, much celebrated, unemployment report, the labor force participation rate had plummeted to 63.7%, the most rapid decline in U.S. history. That means that under President Obama nearly 5 million Americans have fled the workforce in hopeless despair. _Forbes

In a dishonest government, official statistics can be tweaked to say anything the regime wants them to say. It is fair to say that the current US administration is far to the dishonest side of the spectrum, so we are not particularly surprised to see dishonest and misleading employment statistics coming from this particular administration. We are now forced to wonder if everything we are being told by Washington is a lie.

The trick is that when those 5 million are not counted as in the work force, they are not counted as unemployed either. They may desperately need and want jobs. They may be in poverty, as many undoubtedly are, with America suffering today more people in poverty than in the entire half century the Census Bureau has been counting poverty. But they are not even counted in that 8.3% unemployment rate that Obama and his media cheerleaders were so tirelessly celebrating last week.

If they were counted, the unemployment rate today would be a far more realistic 11%, better reflecting the suffering in the real economy under Obamanomics.

Just last month, while the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported finding 243,000 new jobs, they also reported in the same release that an additional 1.2 million workers had dropped out of the work force altogether, giving up hope under Obama.

...Some additional facts highlight how misleading the reported unemployment rate, and the political rhetoric around it, can be. One year ago, 99 million Americans were unemployed or otherwise not working, and the unemployment rate was 9.1%. Today, while the reported unemployment rate is 8.3%, over 100 million Americans are unemployed or otherwise not working.

In January, 2009, 11.6 million Americans were unemployed, with 23% of those unemployed for more than 6 months. By January, 2012, 12.8 million were unemployed, with 43% of those out of work more than 6 months.

At the official end of the recession in June, 2009, America was 12.6 million jobs short of full employment. By January, 2012, we were 15.2 million jobs short, falling behind by another 244,000 in that month alone.

The time has come to begin to raise questions about the precipitous decline in the labor force assumed by BLS. Are the career bureaucrats there partial to President Obama, and favorable towards promoting his political chances for reelection? Or has the Obama Administration placed someone in a leadership slot over at the BLS or the unemployment statistics branch that is imposing this assumed sharp decline? Because of the oddness of this record setting decline, coinciding with President Obama’s ascension to office, these questions bear further investigation. _Forbes

This government is rotten to its core, but it is so huge that there is very little that anyone or any group can do about it. Even with the election of a competent and conscientious new president and congress, the dead weight of governmental bureaucracies would prevent meaningful change in the direction of honest and responsible government.

It is a problem that will require a great deal of thought.