New job numbers

[Chuckie]

Well, that kind of makes sense logically, but it's not reality. Obama had a low unemployment rate, but record low labor participation rate. The higher the labor participation rate, the more people as a percentage of the population is working.

Logic and reality are not equal. For these days, no truer words were ever spoken /LOL/

 

[Rooster1971]

I'm not sure about that. Looks like you are not employed or unemployed per the definitions below from the bls.
https://www.bls.gov/cps/cps_htgm.htm#unemployed

What are the basic concepts of employment and unemployment?
The basic concepts involved in identifying the employed and unemployed are quite simple:

• People with jobs are employed.
  
• People who are jobless, looking for a job, and available for work are unemployed.
  
• The labor force is made up of the employed and the unemployed.
  
• People who are neither employed nor unemployed are not in the labor force.

The survey excludes people living in institutions (for example, a correctional institution or a residential nursing or mental health care facility) and those on active duty in the Armed Forces. The survey is designed so that each person age 16 and over (there is no upper age limit) is counted and classified in only one group. The sum of the employed and the unemployed constitutes the civilian labor force. People not in the labor force combined with those in the civilian labor force constitute the civilian noninstitutional population 16 years and over. Under these concepts, most people are quite easily classified. For example, consider these fictional scenarios:

1. Elena reported to the interviewer that last week she worked 40 hours as a sales manager for a beverage company. Elena is employed.
2. Steve lost his job when the local plant of an aircraft manufacturing company closed down. Since then, he has been contacting other businesses in town trying to find a job. Steve is unemployed.
3. Linda is a stay-at-home mother. Last week, she was occupied with her normal household activities. She neither held a job nor looked for a job. Her 80-year-old father who lives with her has not worked or looked for work because of a disability. Linda and her father are not in the labor force.

From the link...

There are about 60,000 eligible households in the sample for this survey. This translates into approximately 110,000 individuals each month, a large sample compared to public opinion surveys, which usually cover fewer than 2,000 people. The CPS sample is selected so as to be representative of the entire population of the United States. In order to select the sample, all of the counties and independent cities in the country first are grouped into approximately 2,000 geographic areas (sampling units). The Census Bureau then designs and selects a sample of about 800 of these geographic areas to represent each state and the District of Columbia. The sample is a state-based design and reflects urban and rural areas, different types of industrial and farming areas, and the major geographic divisions of each state.

Every month, one-fourth of the households in the sample are changed, so that no household is interviewed for more than 4 consecutive months. After a household is interviewed for 4 consecutive months, it leaves the sample for 8 months, and then is again interviewed for the same 4 calendar months a year later, before leaving the sample for good. As a result, approximately 75 percent of the sample remains the same from month to month and 50 percent remains the same from year to year. This procedure strengthens the reliability of estimates of month-to-month and year-to-year change in the data.

Not sure 60.000 households can give them a firm grasp on the numbers.

I guess if Obama can tweak the BLS numbers like has been stated, Trump surely could also. I'm not sure how much influence the sitting president has over the pollsters and staticians.