The Truth behind the 4.5 million jobs

If I see one more post on FB or tweet on Twitter about how this adminstrtation has created 4.5 million jobs, I am going to scream! This number does not tell the whole story. From the Daily Herald:

While that figure has become a White House talking point, it’s only part of the story. It’s a cherry-picked number that refers just to private sector jobs created in the last 29 months, from the trough of the recession through July. Governments — especially state and local ones — have continued shedding jobs.

The economy lost 8.8 million jobs from the time employment peaked in January 2008 until it hit bottom in February 2010. Between then and this July — the most recent month for which there are figures — just 4 million jobs have been recovered. Never since World War II has the economy been so slow to recover all the jobs lost in a downturn.

So as you can see the Obama administration is not telling the whole truth. Now I realize that is not a surprise to many of you, but the next time you hear a lib scream how this administration has created 4.5 million jobs you can take them to task. You may also want to point out to them that the jobs that are being created are low wage jobs. From the NY Times: (emphasis mine)

“The overarching message here is we don’t just have a jobs deficit; we have a ‘good jobs’ deficit,” said Annette Bernhardt, the report’s author and a policy co-director at the National Employment Law Project, a liberal research and advocacy group.

Higher-wage occupations — those with a median wage of $21.14 to $54.55 — represented 19 percent of job losses when employment was falling, and 20 percent of job gains when employment began growing again. Lower-wage occupations, with median hourly wages of $7.69 to $13.83, accounted for 21 percent of job losses during the retraction. Since employment started expanding, they have accounted for 58 percent of all job growth.
The occupations with the fastest growth were retail sales (at a median wage of $10.97 an hour) and food preparation workers ($9.04 an hour). Each category has grown by more than 300,000 workers since June 2009.

So this administration likes to talk about jobs being created and in reality they are just entry level retail jobs.

Finally the labor force participation rate has been shrinking since Obama took office.  Neal Lipschutz of the Wall Street Journal does a great job of explaining this:

First a definition: The labor force participation rate is that percentage of the adult population that is employed or actively seeking employment.
In August, this group was 63.5% of the population. That was the lowest figure since September 1981, when it also stood at 63.5%, according to the Labor Department‘s Bureau of Labor Statistics.
For men, the August participation rate figure was 69.8%. That’s the lowest on record. The records of the Labor Department began in 1948.

So to recap the 4.5 million number is cherry picked, the jobs created are low wage jobs, and the labor participation rate has been shrinking. Now that you are armed with the truth you can point out facts to all of your liberal friends!

RR