Op-ed:

The new jobs numbers are NOT what they seem 

By: Diane Sori

Isn’t it oh so convenient that with just a few weeks before the election the jobs numbers ‘suddenly and miraculously’ go down below 8% for the first time in 43 months...I mean right after Obama is delivered a knock-out punch in the debates...come on, do the powers that be really think ‘We the People’ are that gullible...I mean really.

While non-farm payroll employers added 114,000 jobs in September, showing an unemployment rate falling from 8.1% to 7.8%, this rate was calculated from a totally different survey than the official employment numbers surveys previously used.  The survey used, a so-called household survey, showed an 873,000 increase in people employed and a 456,000 decline in the number of people unemployed.  However, many of those job gains were in part-time and self-employed positions NOT in what’s considered full-time employment.

And it does NOT calculate in the number of people who have left the work force voluntarily or who have just given up looking for work nor does it take into account the first-time jobless benefit claims which went up to 367,000.  

Also, and most importantly, hiring slowed in the service sector which makes up 80% of the economy.  And this 'supposed' drop in number to 7.8% cannot keep up with or reflect the growth in population to remain sustainable.

So when all this is factored in, the actual unemployment number is 11% NOT 7.8%.

And while this lower number will give Obama’s spin meisters much needed fodder for his re-election campaign, Mitt Romney issued this statement, “This is not what a real recovery looks like.  We created fewer jobs in September than in August, and fewer jobs in August than in July, and we’ve lost over 600,000 manufacturing jobs since President Obama took office.  If not for all the people who have simply dropped out of the labor force, the real unemployment rate would be closer to 11%.  The results of President Obama's failed policies are staggering – 23 million Americans struggling for work, nearly one in six living in poverty and 47 million people dependent on food stamps to feed themselves and their families.  The choice in this election is clear. Under President Obama, we’ll get another four years like the last four years.  If I’m elected, we will have a real recovery with pro-growth policies that will create 12 million new jobs and rising incomes for everyone.”

Now those are real numbers NOT numbers based on a supposed ‘household survey.’  Add into that figure that only 63% of those eligible to work are now in the work force compared to 67% in 2007, and that tells a very simple story as witnessed by this statement by former GE CEO Jack Welch said, “Obama Is manipulating the jobs numbers because his debate performance was awful.”

How right he is.

Going on to say via tweet, “Unbelievable jobs numbers...the Chicago guys will do anything...can’t debate so change numbers.”  Mr. Welch hit the nail on the head as it now becomes clear for all thinking people to see that this skewing of the numbers is dirty politics at it’s very best.

And as jobs numbers can make or break as well as help define a presidential campaign, a sluggish unemployment rate in the 7.5% range doomed Gerald Ford in 1976, Jimmy Carter in 1980, and George H.W. Bush in 1992.  So no matter how Obama tries to manipulate the numbers using a ‘household survey’ instead of the other types of surveys previously used, the fact is that most voters do NOT base their vote on surveys but on their own personal employment and/or financial situation.

And guess what...most Americans, even wealthy Americans, are still hurting under the failed economic policies of Barack HUSSEIN Obama and that, my friends, is the bottom line.