The brisk hiring since the Affordable Care Act went into effect also serves to undermine the Republican argument that the measure has stripped millions of jobs from the economy.
Jobs Report Shows Brisk U.S. Hiring in February
Now before the usual suspects start going off on these numbers let’s try a ‘thought experiment’.
Warning: * 'Cognitive Dissonance Zone' ahead.
* Pressure felt in the brain pan when hypocrisy, double standards and economic illiteracy confront reality.
President Romney is running for re-election unopposed. The numbers are exactly as described below.
Mittens sheepishly admitts that he was too pessimistic in his ’12 campaign prediction of an unemployment rate of 6%, by the end of his first term.
Would any of you Teashadists REALLY be beating him over the head with your ‘real rates of unemployment’ and % of the workforce employed shtick? F no! "Pretty, pretty, pretty good, considering what Obummer handed off", you would say with no small amount of snark!
Jobs Report Shows Brisk U.S. Hiring in February
Now before the usual suspects start going off on these numbers let’s try a ‘thought experiment’.
Warning: * 'Cognitive Dissonance Zone' ahead.
* Pressure felt in the brain pan when hypocrisy, double standards and economic illiteracy confront reality.
President Romney is running for re-election unopposed. The numbers are exactly as described below.
Mittens sheepishly admitts that he was too pessimistic in his ’12 campaign prediction of an unemployment rate of 6%, by the end of his first term.
Would any of you Teashadists REALLY be beating him over the head with your ‘real rates of unemployment’ and % of the workforce employed shtick? F no! "Pretty, pretty, pretty good, considering what Obummer handed off", you would say with no small amount of snark!
Quote:With anxiety about the economy bubbling up on Wall Street and at campaign rallies around the country, the government reported on Friday that employers added 242,000 workers in February, a hefty increase that highlighted the labor market’s steady gains.
“We’ve got a real strong job market going,” said Carl Tannenbaum, chief economist at Northern Trust. “It does suggest that fears about a U.S. recession have been greatly overdone.”
Over the last two years, the employment-population ratio has been growing steadily, and it's now up by a full percentage point since February 2014. This is very positive news: more and more people are re-entering the labor force and finding jobs.
Four years ago, at this point in the last presidential election cycle, the jobless rate was 8.3 percent and the economic recovery was in a relatively early stage. Then, worries centered on rising gas prices, deep consumer debt and government layoffs.
Now, the recovery is in its seventh year, the unemployment rate has dropped sharply to 4.9 percent and the private sector has chalked up 72 months of uninterrupted job gains, the longest streak on record.
Oil prices may still be causing ulcers, but this time it is primarily producers who are feeling the pain, because prices have plunged.
“Why do we have this persistent gloom about the economy, when you have below-average unemployment rates?” asked Neera Tanden, president of the left-leaning Center for American Progress.
“It is really a product of anxiety about what we call the middle-class squeeze, the ability of your income and wages to keep up with the staples of a middle-class life.”
“If you look at many Trump voters, they generally are people who have not been winning economically for a long time as the country is diversifying,” Ms. Tanden said. Whites without a college education provide the core of support for Mr. Trump.
The brisk hiring since the Affordable Care Act went into effect also serves to undermine the Republican argument that the measure has stripped millions of jobs from the economy.
“Our businesses have created jobs every single month since I signed that ‘job killing’ Obamacare bill,” for a total of 14.3 million private sector jobs, President Obama told reporters at the White House.
Thomas E. Perez, the secretary of labor, underscored the point. “There’s an undeniable Eeyore caucus out there of fear-mongers and fact-deniers who want people to believe there is no job creation,” he said.
(Eeyore is a favorite amongst most admirers of Winnie the Pooh characters and he is an unbelievably loveable donkey who is dismally gloomy for almost eternity.)
(Closely related to the present day conservative 'ass-on-fire caucus'.)
Certainly, the law is spurring job creation in the health care industry, with 38,000 jobs added in February.
Edward Fleischman, chief executive of the Execu/Search Group, a professional recruiting firm based in New York, said he had seen outsize demand for health care professionals, including urgent care physicians, nurses, therapists and technicians. “A lot of that has to do with Obamacare,” he said.
Mr. Fleischman, whose firm opened three new offices last year, added that hiring — particularly for digitally adept workers — had been strong across the board.
Friday’s report is the first of three estimates of February’s job creation by the Labor Department. Revisions for December and January showed a total of 30,000 more jobs than previously reported.
William Spriggs, chief economist at the A.F.L.-C.I.O., contrasted the palpable dissatisfaction of many voters with the record of unbroken job creation.
“This is one of those times when the economic cycle has hit a weird political cycle,” he said.
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