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http://www.shadowstats.com/alternate_data/unemployment-charts



https://i.imgur.com/iMCdmc9.gif




Many of you know how butthurt I get over the use of the U3 unemployment statistic. I think it is not only misleading, it is dishonest and it should be discontinued as "good measure."


We have Trump claiming he is reducing unemployment, Obama taking credit for the drop in employment, and people blaming Bush Jr. for unemployment. All using the U3 stat.

Some economists were reporting that the economy did not recover fully and there there is a poisonous left over bunch that do not show up in the U3 but some show up in the U6. And people, such as the gent who runs Shadow Stats, say that not even the U6 is picking up the unemployed.



Shadow Stats has been criticized. However, I think unemployment is much higher than 4.3%.

I'm not terribly well versed when it comes to employment numbers so excuse me if I'm incorrect, but don't the official numbers not really take into account under employment? Meaning if someone has a job working 2 hours a week for minimum wage they are considered employed to the same degree as someone working full time with benefits? If so that's obviously a silly statistic to base much on and shouldn't really have much worth.

From what I understand about the recession, we lost a lot of good paying jobs, and the ones that came in and replaced those jobs were low wage jobs. So a lot of people who lost their good jobs had to take shittier jobs. So while those people are still "employed" it's not really at the numbers we should be aiming for.

So anyways, yeah the official employment numbers from what I understand do seem to be fairly misleading if the things I said are true.

Trump's claimed unemployment rate was a 42% at one point in 2016. Lolz. Almost half the country unemployed; think someone would have noticed,

Originally posted by BackFire
I'm not terribly well versed when it comes to employment numbers so excuse me if I'm incorrect, but don't the official numbers not really take into account under employment? Meaning if someone has a job working 2 hours a week for minimum wage they are considered employed to the same degree as someone working full time with benefits? If so that's obviously a silly statistic to base much on and shouldn't really have much worth.

From what I understand about the recession, we lost a lot of good paying jobs, and the ones that came in and replaced those jobs were low wage jobs. So a lot of people who lost their good jobs had to take shittier jobs. So while those people are still "employed" it's not really at the numbers we should be aiming for.

So anyways, yeah the official employment numbers from what I understand do seem to be fairly misleading if the things I said are true.


You're correct. That's the problem with the U3 statistic. The U6 is much better but is still critcized by some economists. Which is why that guy created the Shadow Statistic.


I would like to know what comprises that number but I assume he is counting every single able bodied, not working, and not working as much as they'd like, adult.

Originally posted by Robtard
Trump's claimed unemployment rate was a 42% at one point in 2016. Lolz. Almost half the country unemployed; think someone would have noticed,

That's....


He's clearly an idiot. Sorry, there's no way to put it nicely. Clearly, he put 0 thought into saying that aloud.

Originally posted by BackFire
I'm not terribly well versed when it comes to employment numbers so excuse me if I'm incorrect, but don't the official numbers not really take into account under employment? Meaning if someone has a job working 2 hours a week for minimum wage they are considered employed to the same degree as someone working full time with benefits? If so that's obviously a silly statistic to base much on and shouldn't really have much worth.



That's more of what the U6 number is for, underemployed, part-time etc

Originally posted by Robtard
Trump's claimed unemployment rate was a 42% at one point in 2016. Lolz. Almost half the country unemployed; think someone would have noticed,

They kind of have.

I was working for the United Way for a time. It's an unpaid job, and got over 400 applications a day.

Many were hoping it would lead to something.

It totally would not surprise me if the unemployment and underemployment rate was much, much higher then anyone wants to admit.

Originally posted by cdtm
They kind of have.

I was working for the United Way for a time. It's an unpaid job, and got over 400 applications a day.

Many were hoping it would lead to something.

It totally would not surprise me if the unemployment and underemployment rate was much, much higher then anyone wants to admit.

Unemployment may not be at the 5-6%, it's certainly possible that number is skewed because it's not factoring in everything. But nearly half the country unemployed? No way, it would be beyond noticeable.

Look at it this way, let's say you shared a house with someone, say someone close to you like a brother and that lazy ass didn't work, he just sat on his ass all day on the computer, playing video games and smoking weed while scamming the government where he could to eek by. Now you'd certainly notice when it came time to pay the bills and 50% or so was a no-show. You'd notice.

Pretty sure the 4-6% number only includes able-bodied people who are actively looking for work, too.

IIRC, that's because of Baby boomers, people in school, college ect.

I did some digging the the Shadow Stat for unemployment does control for some things:


People in school do not count.
Retired do not count.
Too young do not count.


But I cannot find other figures.


Does he count stay at home moms and dads?



I definitely think unemployment is far higher than 6% and definitely even more than the U6 stat. But perhaps not as high as 22% such as the Shadow Stat.

Originally posted by Robtard
Unemployment may not be at the 5-6%, it's certainly possible that number is skewed because it's not factoring in everything. But nearly half the country unemployed? No way, it would be beyond noticeable.

Look at it this way, let's say you shared a house with someone, say someone close to you like a brother and that lazy ass didn't work, he just sat on his ass all day on the computer, playing video games and smoking weed while scamming the government where he could to eek by. Now you'd certainly notice when it came time to pay the bills and 50% or so was a no-show. You'd notice.

My sister's actually unemployed and living her boyfriend.

But that's kind of her fault, because he told her he could support them both and persue her ambitions. And then they discoverer they both suck at budgeting, and family had to step in with various bailouts..

However, there are about a half dozen people I went to school with who live at home, so there's that.

Might not be 50%, or anywhere close, but I bet it's pretty high.

This seems unlikely, Trump is doing an excellent job for the countries prosperity.

Without even checking, I see I screwed up "pursue", among other things.

I hate mini phones. Even children have fingers way too fat for these things.

Originally posted by cdtm
Without even checking, I see I screwed up "pursue", among other things.

I hate mini phones. Even children have fingers way too fat for these things.

It's okay, just look at my posts with the wrong words, missing words, etc. Makes me frustrated to read them.


This is why I think it's dumb as hell to be a grammar or spelling Nazi on the internet. As long as you can understand someone's point, there's no need to criticize someone's posts for grammar and spelling mistakes.

"Shadow Statistics" ???

Yeah they sound totally REPUTABLE!!!

Making America Great Again!!!

Yea, no main-stream economist finds shadowstats reputable. I happen to find their inflation numbers interesting, however. Here is a blog which carefully debunks Shadowstats's unemployment ratings: https://www.themaven.net/economonitor/emerging-markets/deconstructing-shadowstats-part-2-in-search-of-an-alternative-measure-of-unemployment-1jGh1VQ7MEOtFIbiiKzS4Q?full=1

Originally posted by DarthSkywalker0
Yea, no main-stream economist finds shadowstats reputable. I happen to find their inflation numbers interesting, however. Here is a blog which carefully debunks Shadowstats's unemployment ratings: https://www.themaven.net/economonitor/emerging-markets/deconstructing-shadowstats-part-2-in-search-of-an-alternative-measure-of-unemployment-1jGh1VQ7MEOtFIbiiKzS4Q?full=1



Originally posted by dadudemon
Shadow Stats has been criticized. However, I think unemployment is much higher than 4.3%.



I think the unemployment number is much closer to 22% than 4.6%, of course. But how close Shadow Stats is to being correct, I don't know. Their numbers are behind a paywall. I am not paying for it.

And from the criticism found here:

https://www.themaven.net/economonitor/emerging-markets/deconstructing-shadowstats-part-2-in-search-of-an-alternative-measure-of-unemployment-1jGh1VQ7MEOtFIbiiKzS4Q?full=1





And with the Kaiser Survey, as he's using it, he purposefully omits all disabled people and 20% of the working population (older than 52 but younger than 64) that may also be long-term discouraged workers, too. So, to him, to fulfill his critique, he had to eliminate well over 20 million people so his critique of Shadow Stats numbers would work. Seems quite dishonest and his bias is showing. However, what also seems dishonest is that Williams, from Shadow stats, still won't release his method/and numbers breakdown for proper critique, according to that writer. Which would explain why I am not able to find anything to breakdown his numbers. And getting through his paywall wouldn't work, either, it seems. And I would rather buy pizza than $125 worth of unexplained data from Shadow Stats.

The "missing gap" in Williams' numbers is 26,114,100. Or about 26 million people to get to his 22-23% unemployment rate he reports for his unemployment Shadow Stat.


He concedes a major point:



Let's skip to the end. Based on his concessions, that's 4.6 million + 9 million = 13.6 million. That's gets us much closer to the 26 million figure Williams has and is clearly far more than the U6 statistic. Hence why I am critical of the Ux stat series for informing labor policy.

Can the remaining math be explained by the missing gap in disabled - who are being summarily dismissed by the critic - and the elderly who are over 52 to 64? Seems quite readily, in fact. Seems there is more than a comfortable enough margin of people left to get 13 more million. Again, Williams will not reveal the details on his modeling and surveying methods which is always a red flag. Regardless, even the critic is finding explanations that fill more than have the the 26 million people gap.

Regardless of this particular argument, the critic summarizes his position as follows:



Based on the 13.6 million additional people he found, that's gets him more than halfway. If we consider how he dismissed 20% of the population and the disabled, we have more than the missing 12.4 million needed to bridge that gap even if we assume most of those people just simply cannot work.

If I had access to data related to retirement rates by age, because there are some that retire in their 50s and early 60s, I could better estimate that remaining 12 million person gap to get us to the 26 million the critic outlines.


In conclusion, the Shadow Stat figure needs to be consumed with caution. However, it is much closer to reality when it comes to summarizing true unemployment in the US. The reason why many people, when considering unemployment, thinks 4.6% seems woefully low, is because their personal experiences are much closer to 1/4 people being unemployed, not 1 in 20 as the U3 statistic would have us believe.

Anything but figures from President Trump himself is wrong.

Shadow Stats still shows unemployment at 21.5%.


With how well the economy seems to be doing, I'd be interested to know what the true unemployment is.


According to Shadow Stats, we still have not recovered from the 2008 recession: not even close. And the U6 statistic, which is a more accurate unemployment number than U3, is nowhere near as bad as the Shadow Stat.

And actual unemployment (those who are working age, over 16) is 40.2%:

http://fortune.com/2015/09/14/donald-trump-unemployment-rate-jobs/



So the truth is somewhere between the 3.9% U3 statistic and the 40% actual unemployment of working age Americans.






21.5% vs. 40% is a huge difference. 18.5% difference.

18.5% of the population is ~50.0 million Americans who are not working that are excluded from shadow stats. That's stay at home parents that don't need to work, for example.



I'd like to see if Shadow Stats is really accurate. The only way we can find true unemployment stats is by going door-to-door asking how many adults are there and how many are employed. As part of a census....


Because I'd like to know what the true unemployment numbers are.

I said Trump claimed that unemployment was 42%; you literally quoted Trump saying "42%".

Originally posted by Robtard
I said Trump claimed that unemployment was 42%; you literally quoted Trump saying "42%".

Ah, so you don't at all feel what you just did was misleading, because of course you don't.

Solid trolling, a B+

Let me guess, when Trump said "I even heard recently 42 percent", he didn't really mean it and wasn't pushing bullshit as truth; as he often does. Trump's never the one misleading; it's everyone else cos reasons.

Neat, don't care. Your initial statement was misleading, the person you made it to now knows it. Moving on.

You and your lies, Pinocchio.

Originally posted by Robtard
I said Trump claimed that unemployment was 42%; you literally quoted Trump saying "42%".

The fact is true, though. It's a bit more than 40%. That's if you include every working age adult, 16 and older. But that figure does not take into consideration stay at home parents or the extremely disabled.

Not sure we should be factoring in people who are not looking for employment as "unemployed". eg if you're a full-time student

Originally posted by Robtard
Not sure we should be factoring in people who are not looking for employment as "unemployed". eg if you're a full-time student

I have a problem with that stat.



What should be included in a true unemployment stat?


The top level premise of the stat would need to be:

Unemployment is defined as:
0. Currently unemployed or underemployed
1. Not currently extremely disabled that prevents working in any form (ie. extreme deformities and cognitive impairments)
2. Not currently a fulltime student and a. Fully financially supported by another adult/household. b. Not on any type of public assistance programs. c. Not obtaining financial support from public funds for education.
3. Not below the age of 16.
4. Not above the age of 67 where point 0 also does not apply (ie. post 67 wants to be employed but cannot obtain employment or is underemployed).



To me, those would be all the conditions that need to be met to create a "one number fits all" unemployment number. And that number does look a lot closer to 20% than the U6 stat.


We could easily find the numbers on most of the above list. However, the problem is, there is overlap in some of those and eliminating the numbers from the total as an absolute will subtract too many from the list.


What do you think? Maybe I should do that.

Originally posted by Robtard
You and your lies, Pinocchio.

It's not a lie, what you said was misleading.

Originally posted by Robtard
Let me guess, when Trump said "I even heard recently 42 percent", he didn't really mean it and wasn't pushing bullshit as truth; as he often does. Trump's never the one misleading; it's everyone else cos reasons.

Well, I'm not an expert in tax data here, but 42 and 40 (the number ddm mentioned) isn't too far apart.

Plus, it's sleazy but the "I heard X" claim is similar in credibility to "we heard from an anonymous source" claim that the media likes to use, and I've had ppl here defending those and using articles that have that level of credibility in their claims going "lol" as long as its some hit piece against Trump.

Originally posted by dadudemon
I have a problem with that stat.



What should be included in a true unemployment stat?


The top level premise of the stat would need to be:

Unemployment is defined as:
0. Currently unemployed or underemployed
1. Not currently extremely disabled that prevents working in any form (ie. extreme deformities and cognitive impairments)
2. Not currently a fulltime student and a. Fully financially supported by another adult/household. b. Not on any type of public assistance programs. c. Not obtaining financial support from public funds for education.
3. Not below the age of 16.
4. Not above the age of 67 where point 0 also does not apply (ie. post 67 wants to be employed but cannot obtain employment or is underemployed).



To me, those would be all the conditions that need to be met to create a "one number fits all" unemployment number. And that number does look a lot closer to 20% than the U6 stat.


We could easily find the numbers on most of the above list. However, the problem is, there is overlap in some of those and eliminating the numbers from the total as an absolute will subtract too many from the list.


What do you think? Maybe I should do that.

Unemployed should be people who are actively looking for a job, but are jobless.

I don't see it as being realistic if we include:

-16 to say 22/23 who are full-time students and not looking, they're waiting to graduate to find a job (edit: or any full-time student, regardless of age)

-People who have retired early due to wealth/security

-People who have permanent providers, eg stay-at-home moms/dads, trophy wives/husbands, a sex/companionship arrangement etc

-People incapable of working (mentally ill, commas, certain handicaps etc)

Though we should include people who can work but are not looking because they're content leeching off the system, like year round welfare abusers, workers comp abusers etc.

Like I said, unemployment may not be in the single digits, but 42%, it would be very noticed. Even the 20ish seems a bit high to me, but possible.

Originally posted by Surtur
It's not a lie, what you said was misleading.

Stop lying, okay?

I'm not sure what Shadow Statistics is. All the sites I've Googled have given me a few different answers. But from what I've managed to gather it's basically a look at the labor workforce participation rate against the current employment rate.

So, current unemployment charts only counts those who are seeking employment. Whether that be structural, cyclical, or frictional is irrelevant to the unemployment data. But those who don't have jobs and aren't actively looking for work won't be counted in that chart.

I thought Shadow Statistics is the Real Unemployment Rate which is the unemployed, underemployed and the discouraged. But the graph that dadudemon provided has a different line for Shadow Statistics and Real Unemployment Rate.

Maybe someone listed it here and I just didn't see, but what exactly is Shadow Statistics? Sorry, I'm not super informed on economic terms. My exposure to economics is a few university classes and listening/reading to some of the more well-known economists out there.

Originally posted by Robtard
Unemployed should be people who are actively looking for a job, but are jobless.

No, that's the dishonest stat. It should also include people depending on the state (SNAP and the like), people who gave up looking because they couldn't find jobs.

I don't see it as being realistic if we include:

Originally posted by Robtard
-16 to say 22/23 who are full-time students and not looking, they're waiting to graduate to find a job (edit: or any full-time student, regardless of age)

You exclude those if and only if they are not state dependents and/or fully supported by guardians. Else, they are unemployed and state burdens.

Originally posted by Robtard
-People who have retired early due to wealth/security

Gotcha. I forgot about those. But these types are less than 1% of the population.

Originally posted by Robtard
-People who have permanent providers, eg stay-at-home moms/dads, trophy wives/husbands, a sex/companionship arrangement etc

I mentioned this prior but did not include it in my concise list. I need to update with this, too.

Originally posted by Robtard
-People incapable of working (mentally ill, commas, certain handicaps etc)

Got that listed. A doctor determines this and it can be 100% disabled listing which makes them a state dependent who cannot work and cannot be counted as unemployed. So the good news is, unless you can prove that the person committed fraud, this 100% disabled person will always be excluded.

Originally posted by Robtard
Though we should include people who can work but are not looking because they're content leeching off the system, like year round welfare abusers, workers comp abusers etc. Right. This are not very common, however. More common than your independently wealthy types by a large number, however. Still very uncommon.

Originally posted by Robtard
Like I said, unemployment may not be in the single digits, but 42%, it would be very noticed. Even the 20ish seems a bit high to me, but possible.

I agree with everything, here. I basically want to see how he comes up with his shadow stat. It could very well be close to 21.5% and the U6 stat is nigh worthless. Why is it that the Shadow Stat was very near the U6 stat until the Great Recession? The economist who runs Shadow Stats thinks his number is far more accurate and protests people parading the economy as doing well because he says his data points to a sick economy with pseudo-employment stats that are highly misleading (another bubble).

And I think he is right but the degree to which he is right is what I want to determine. Your input is helpful.

Originally posted by Playmaker
I'm not sure what Shadow Statistics is. All the sites I've Googled have given me a few different answers. But from what I've managed to gather it's basically a look at the labor workforce participation rate against the current employment rate.

So, current unemployment charts only counts those who are seeking employment. Whether that be structural, cyclical, or frictional is irrelevant to the unemployment data. But those who don't have jobs and aren't actively looking for work won't be counted in that chart.

I thought Shadow Statistics is the Real Unemployment Rate which is the unemployed, underemployed and the discouraged. But the graph that dadudemon provided has a different line for Shadow Statistics and Real Unemployment Rate.

Maybe someone listed it here and I just didn't see, but what exactly is Shadow Statistics? Sorry, I'm not super informed on economic terms. My exposure to economics is a few university classes and listening/reading to some of the more well-known economists out there.

He won't reveal how he comes up with that. On purpose. He's secretive. Which makes me butthurt.

"people who gave up looking because they couldn't find jobs." -ddm

Agreed. We should include those. Edit: And the students who are getting a state ride.

Originally posted by BackFire
I'm not terribly well versed when it comes to employment numbers so excuse me if I'm incorrect, but don't the official numbers not really take into account under employment? Meaning if someone has a job working 2 hours a week for minimum wage they are considered employed to the same degree as someone working full time with benefits? If so that's obviously a silly statistic to base much on and shouldn't really have much worth.

From what I understand about the recession, we lost a lot of good paying jobs, and the ones that came in and replaced those jobs were low wage jobs. So a lot of people who lost their good jobs had to take shittier jobs. So while those people are still "employed" it's not really at the numbers we should be aiming for.

So anyways, yeah the official employment numbers from what I understand do seem to be fairly misleading if the things I said are true.

It's worse then that. They counted stints on certain temperary jobs as seperate jobs flooding the market.

So you get let go and rehired every four months for a year, then rehired, that's three jobs to the tally for the year..

A job I had with the post office use to do that, to skirt around union labor laws. They can't hire someone for more then a few months, so you're cut loose for two weeks, then let back on. Rinse-repeat.

Originally posted by cdtm
It's worse then that. They counted stints on certain temperary jobs as seperate jobs flooding the market.

So you get let go and rehired every four months for a year, then rehired, that's three jobs to the tally for the year..

Is Trump doing this in his "press releases" and statements? Obama did this and some people correctly pointed out how misleading and dishonest Obama was for saying he's added jobs.

Originally posted by cdtm
A job I had with the post office use to do that, to skirt around union labor laws. They can't hire someone for more then a few months, so you're cut loose for two weeks, then let back on. Rinse-repeat.


Oh boy. That should get a fine.

Originally posted by dadudemon
people who gave up looking because they couldn't find jobs.

Isn't that what the U-6 does?

Originally posted by ESB -1138
Isn't that what the U-6 does?

Partially. But they stop tracking them after a certain period of time. They call these "discourged" and this is what the U5 adds. The U6 adds on the underemployed (combines all "these).

"I need a job but cannot get one" counts and I believe only for 6-12 months (I don't remember). But if you report that you need a job and are looking but have no been employed for...say..2 years, you are not counted.



A very telling sign of the health of the economy is labor force participation rates. When people tell me the economy has healed, we just have to take a look at labor force participation rates and median household incomes (adjusted for inflation) to see we have still not recovered from the .com bubble bust.



Take a look at labor force participation rates:


https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CIVPART


Does it look like we've healed from the Great Recession? What about median household income?

https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MEHOINUSA672N

Says we are up.



If fewer people are working, how is it possible that income has gone up? That clearly indicates that income is more concentrated to fewer wage earners.


What I'd like to see is "True Mean Income - Individual" over time. That's a stat that would be telling. And it needs to include all working-age adults. All of them.