4 ms·
> I don’t believe those who went into this past election taking pride in the unemployment numbers understood that the near-record low unemployment figures — the
by jhp123 2y ago
> I don’t believe those who went into this past election taking pride in the unemployment numbers understood that the near-record low unemployment figures — the figure was a mere 4.2 percent in November — counted homeless people doing occasional work as “employed.” But the implications are powerful. If you filter the statistic to include as unemployed people who can’t find anything but part-time work or who make a poverty wage (roughly $25,000), the percentage is actually 23.7 percent. In other words, nearly one of every four workers is functionally unemployed in America today — hardly something to celebrate.
But U6 unemployment is also near a 20-year low[0], as is the poverty rate[1].
[0] https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/U6RATE https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/U6RATE
[1] https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/PPAAUS00000A156NCEN https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/PPAAUS00000A156NCEN
- lapcat 2y agoGiven the discrepancy in measures—24% vs. 7%—I'm guessing that the "poverty wage" factor is the crucial difference? The official US poverty definition is about $13k for a 1 person household and $26k for a 4 person household. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-2020-01-17/pdf/2020-00858.pdf https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-2020-01-17/pdf/2020-0...
- bryanlarsen 2y agoAnd poverty levels are essentially at record low levels: https://www.statista.com/statistics/200463/us-poverty-rate-since-1990/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/200463/us-poverty-rate-s...
- bryanlarsen 2y agoYeah, let's call their number U7. It seems like it's U6 + those on a poverty wage. It's a fairly reasonable argument that U6 is a better measure of unemployment than U3. And I'd accept a similar argument for their U7, or the other U7's out there that add people like the discouraged. But I suspect that their U7 is likely at a 20 year low, just like U3 and U6 are. Which would invalidate their argument, in my opinion.
- lapcat 2y agoI think it's extremely unlikely that this team, led by a U.S. Comptroller of the Currency, just messed up something obvious: https://www.lisep.org/team https://www.lisep.org/team
- tensor 2y agoThe "data" either supports their claim or it doesn't. They've defined a new metric, now they can back up their claim by showing how this metric has changed over the last 20 years.
- lapcat 2y agoTheir website has white papers, methodology, and data.
- bryanlarsen 2y agoIt's likely the problems are all in the politico framing of it. U7 seems useful. U7 being 24% feels right-ish. That's on Ludwig. Implying that 24% is worse than normal when it's likely one of the best values we've had in decades? That's on Politico.
- lapcat 2y agoThe article with authored by Eugene Ludwig, so I'm not sure there's any separate Politico framing.
- sobellian 2y agoAFAICT the article was written by the guy that germinated the concept in the first place. You can see the paper at https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/63ba0d84fe573c7513595d6e/63c1bb4dc740e1acb5d3b6dd_TRU%20White%20Paper.pdf https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/63ba0d84fe573c7513595d6e/... tl;dr It is very highly correlated to U-3. The paper doesn't include 2024 in the data series but the figure the article cites, 23.7%, is very near all-time best. That's pretty deceptive framing IMO.
- vaidhy 2y agoIt is even worse if you consider the actual reality. US poverty measures OPM and SPM both underestimates the actual poverty. OPM is set to 3x USDA "low cost" food plan and was created in 1960s. It has only been adjusted for inflation. SPM is better, but is not official. If you tie poverty as the bottom quartile (adjusted per person + addl. impact of children), you are likely to have a poverty wage of around $32,000 (a bit higher than SPM and much higher than OPM). That makes the functionally unemployed much higher. Add to the fact that your benefits like SNAP have a steep drop-off.. you earn $5 more per hour and suddenly, you lose all the benefits and you can see this in the making.
- gruez 2y ago>It has only been adjusted for inflation. What else are you expecting? Raises every couple of years for a job well done?
- edmundsauto 2y agoInflation doesn't typically cover cost of living, does it? A poverty line basket of goods is different than someone wealthy. And is rent/real estate cost increases and insurance covered?
- nradov 2y agoYes, the CPI includes rent (and owner's imputed rent).
- nothercastle 2y agoPoorly, because of the owners imputed rent it lags a lot.
- nradov 2y agoWhatever. No inflation metric will ever be perfect. You can take the raw CPI input data and recalculate without owner's imputed rent if you want. The final result won't change much.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]