O-blah-ma: DNC Dud & Dismal Jobs Report
There’s ample reason to suspect that Barack Obama copped a sneak peak at the August jobs report before delivering his DNC acceptance speech last night, which would go a long way in explaining his wholly lackluster and anemic performance.
The magic is gone, and so are the jobs. One word can sum up both Obama’s latest rhetoric and the latest unemployment numbers: blah.
First the jobs report, released this morning and surely adding to the DNC hangover: the unemployment rate inched downward to 8.1 percent, which at first blush should seem good news for Team BO. It isn’t. A scant 96,000 jobs were added to the economy, with the dip in unemployment largely attributable to people leaving the workforce, which shrunk by 368,000 and hit a 30-year low for workforce participation.
As James Pethokoukis over at AEI notes, “If the labor participation rate was the same as when Obama took office in January 2009, the unemployment rate would be 11.2%. If the participation rate had just stayed the same as last month, the unemployment rate would be 8.4%.”
And it gets even worse. The number of Americans that the U.S. Department of Labor counts as “not in the civilian labor force” hit a record high of nearly 89 million in August. This as Mr. I Am The President tried to convince voters last night that the country is headed in the right direction.
Obama flopped miserably on both fronts, rehashing old promises that only served to highlight the dramatic shortcomings of his tenure in office. Just as O-blah-ma delivered a downsized dose of his usual rhetoric, in a downsized venue during a downsized convention, today’s jobs report downwardly revised employment numbers from the previous two months. This from CNBC:
But job reports for June and July were revised lower. The June count fell from 64,000 to 45,000, while July’s number came in at 141,000 from an originally reported 163,000.
“The unemployment rate remains elevated, and the duration of joblessness is unprecedented for many,” said Kathy Bostjancic, director of macroeconomic analysis at The Conference Board. “These conditions could easily stretch into the early months of 2013.”
The Labor Department’s birth-death model, which approximates jobs created by new businesses during the month, added 87,000 to the total, making it primarily responsible for the net job gains.
Despite hopes that job creation would be better than expected, the monthly nonfarm payrolls report fell short of economist estimates that 125,000 jobs were added for the month. The government said private payrolls increased by 103,000, about half the 201,000 that ADP reported Thursday.
And what do we get from the man who four years ago offered the nation hope and change? A worn speech that delivered more of the same with absolutely zero substantive plan for moving forward.
Blah.
We need your help! If you like PunditHouse, please consider donating to us. Even $5 a month can make a difference!
Short URL: https://pundithouse.com/?p=11425
