About That Economic Recovery . . . .

Well, we all have heard that the economy is “recovering”. Hell, seems to me we’ve been hearing that for around 5 years now. (smile)

But I’m not really sure I wanna buy that. Irrespective of the fact that I’d look outside at 10AM if the current Administration told me it was daytime, there are a few other troubling indicators.

Like what? Well, like the fact that the US labor participation rate has been mired in the 62.8 to 63.0 percent range for nearly a year (since October of last year, or for the past 11 months). Prior to October 2013, the last time the civilian labor participation rate was that low was during the Carter Administration – in April 1978.

In contrast, in January 2009 the labor participation rate was 65.7 percent. The “so what”?  That means that there are between 5 and 6 million fewer people working today than would be working if the economy was in as good a shape, employment-wise, as it was in January 2009.

That doesn’t sound much like a recovery to me.  But what do I know?

The reason for the drop in the fraction employed? A sh!tload of people have simply become discouraged, left the US labor force, and are no longer even bothering to look for work. In fact, so many people quit the labor force last month that unemployment actually fell a bit last month – in spite of the fact that job creation last month was the lowest in any month this year, and was far below expectations.

Oh, and BLS job creation figures for June and July were revised downward by 28,000, too.  That (downward revision of previously-published job creation figures) seems to be happening a lot, too.

Again:  doesn’t sound much like a recovery to me.

This Carteresque economic malaise is mirrored in the activities of those who are currently counted as “officially unemployed”. The situation regarding finding work is so bad that an “officially unemployed” person is actually statictically more likely to be found spending time shopping for items other than groceries or gas or engaging in recreational/leisure activities than in looking for work.  Seems to me that someone needing a job to support themselves and their family would spend more time looking for employment than shopping for nonessential items or recreation – but that’s just me.

If there were any significant number of jobs to be had, that is.

However, I do wonder how anyone seeking a job can manage to come up with the money to keep doing that for months or years at a time – I certainly wish I could.  Like the man said: “Oh, that ain’t workin’ – that’s the way to do it . . . . “

But I guess I can understand why the unemployed are shopping for things other than groceries with the few dollars or benefits they can scrape together. Milk futures have now hit an all-time high, having risen 24% this year alone. This means that we can expect to see milk – already at $3.65 a gallon – to rise in price in the coming months.  Ditto anything that has milk or dairy products as a primary ingredient.

This is really no surprise to anyone who’s been buying groceries this year.  Inflation for food is outstripping inflation in general substantially.

You know, if I didn’t know better I’d ask, “What freaking recovery?”  But the Administration says the economy is recovering nicely.  So I must be wrong.

. . .

Yeah, those “happy days” are truly here again. We should all bow down before the all-knowing current Administration and paean their efforts to restore the US economy!

Category: "Your Tax Dollars At Work", Economy