Back to Basics

The St. Louis Federal Reserve has released a study showing $3.3 billion was made in over payments for unemployment insurance.  It seems to me that this is just one type of fraud, not the type where people are lying about whether they are eligible and that all the information is properly reported.  Identity fraud might also be occurring.  With all the concern of the $44 billion in budget cuts from the sequester, this one type of fraud in one program equals almost one percent of those cuts.  You would think that this would get some attention.  From the St. Louis Fed:

The unemployment insurance program in the U.S. offers benefits to workers if they lose their jobs through no fault of their own. In 2011, this program cost $108 billion, of which nearly $3.3 billion was spent on overpayments due to fraud.

Unemployment insurance fraud occurs when an ineligible individual collects benefits after intentionally misreporting his or her eligibility. Recent headlines have brought attention to extreme forms of fraud, such as the collection of unemployment benefits by prisoners. The dominant form of unemployment insurance fraud, however, is what’s called concealed earnings fraud. This fraud occurs when individuals collect unemployment benefits while they are employed and are earning wages. The overpayments due to concealed earnings accounted for almost $2.2 billion in 2011, two-thirds of the total overpayments due to all categories of fraud. . . .

In regards to the latest jobs report, the White House will put much of their focus on the slight drop in the unemployment rate. The reason for that however isn’t because America is going back to work.

Tyler Durden at Zero Hedge:

Moments ago the March Non-farm payroll hit and it was a doozy, printing at 88K, below the lowest forecast of 100K, well below the expected number of 190K, and a tragedy compared to the February revised print of 268K (was 236K). This was the biggest miss to expectations since December 2009 and the worst print since June 2012. The unemployment rate declined to 7.6%, but this was due entirely to the collapse in the labor force participation rate, which declined by 20 bps to 63.3%, a new 30 year low.

Start the spin machine.

To where is the workforce disappearing? Here’s one place:

The number of American workers collecting federal disability payments climbed to yet another record of 8,853,614 in March, up from 8,840,427 in February, according to newly released data from the Social Security Administration.

That means there are more than 3 times as many Americans taking disability payments as there are people living in the city of Chicago, which according to the Census Bureau has a population of 2,707,120.

For the White House, “sequester” is the new “Bush’s fault”:

It is important to bear in mind that the March household and payroll surveys are the first monthly surveys to look at employment since the beginning of sequestration. While the recovery was gaining traction before sequestration took effect, these arbitrary and unnecessary cuts to government services will be a headwind in the months to come, and will cut key investments in the Nation’s future competitiveness. The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that the sequester will reduce employment by 750,000 full-time equivalent jobs by the end of the year.

In that case, maybe the White House shouldn’t have proposed the idea for sequestration.

Over at Hot Air, Ed Morrissey shoots down the scapegoats:

Sequestration didn’t create this, and for that matter, neither did the payroll tax cut. Consumer spending rose in January and consumer sentiment rose in February, remember? We just have a lousy economy, strangled by regulation that keeps investors from putting capital into efforts that create jobs.

I’m sure things will pick up once the economy fully absorbs Obamacare — or, most likely, the other way around.

Question to ponder over the weekend: What would Barack Obama had to have done in order to not be re-elected? Maybe we don’t want to know the answer.

From Noel Sheppard at Newsbusters:

The Bureau of Labor Statistics released jobs numbers for January Friday showing that nonfarm payroll employment increased by 157,000 and the unemployment rate rose to 7.9 percent.

Lost in these headline numbers was another rise in the number of people not in the labor force.

This number now stands at a staggering 89 million, up from 80.5 million when President Obama took office.

This means that there are currently 8.5 million more Americans not in the labor force than just four years ago.

Put another way, in Obama’s first term, the size of the US workforce shrunk by more than the entire populations of Wyoming, Washington DC, Vermont, North Dakota, Alaska, South Dakota, Delaware, Montana, Rhode Island, New Hampshire and Maine.

And of course with a shrinking labor force comes a shrinking tax base — a difference that the Dems laughingly want everybody to believe can be made up by making those at the top of the income chart pay their “fair share” while reckless spending continues.

So what happens when the size of the workforce undergoes a massive drop? The unemployment rate goes up — unless those people can be allowed to easily slip out of the workforce and not be counted as unemployed. That’s why the government actually encourages and recruits people to go on public assistance, because the more people who give up looking for work, the fewer are counted in unemployment statistics.

In some states, such as Maine, the number of welfare recipients are greater than the number of taxpayers. The left loves the word “sustainability” when it refers to the environment, but they don’t give a damn about it as far as economic health is concerned.

The latest BLS JOLT numbers came out yesterday and they remain depressing.  While the numbers had improved slightly from September, companies were still hiring fewer people in October than they were during the recession and of course a lot fewer than they were prior to the recession.  People are also still afraid of quitting their jobs at a lower rate than during the recession.

Democrat’s plans would increase unemployment and reduce growth rates.  For Republicans opposing the Democrat’s proposals help the Democrats because the economy is better than it otherwise would have been.  At the same time, Democrats beat up on Republicans for being mean.

This is just the beginning.

In case you missed it, Boeing announced massive layoffs and facilities closures yesterday. More: Small business owners are dropping the axe as they brace for the costs and burdens of Obamacare.

In case you missed it, I reported on Obama’s layoff bomb last week.

Refresher:

Obama’s Layoff Bomb
October 31, 2012
by Michelle Malkin
Creators Syndicate

In June, a diffident and self-deluded President Obama claimed that “the private sector is doing fine.” Last week, the private sector responded: Speak for yourself, buster. Who needs an “October Surprise” when the business headlines are broadcasting the imminent layoff bomb in neon lights?

The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported last Tuesday that employers issued 1,316 “mass layoff actions” (affecting 50 workers or more) in September; more than 122,000 workers were affected overall. USA Today financial reporter Matt Krantz wrote that “(m)uch of the recent layoff activity is connected to what’s been the slowest period of earnings growth since the third quarter of 2009.” Some necessary restructuring is underway in response to the stagnant European economy. But more and more U.S. businesses are putting the blame — bravely and squarely — right where it belongs: on the obstructionist policies and regulatory schemes of the blame-shifter-in-chief.

Last week, Ohio-based auto parts manufacturer Dana Holding Corp. warned employees of potential layoffs amid “looming concern” about the economy. President and CEO Roger Wood specifically mentioned the walloping burden of “increasing taxes on small businesses” and the need to “offset increased costs that are placed on us through new laws and regulations.”

Case in point: Obamacare. The mandate will cost Dana Holding Corp., which employs some 24,500 workers, “approximately $24 million over the next six years in additional U.S. health care expenses.” As Ohio Watchdog blogger Maggie Thurber reported, the firm’s Toledo area corporate offices laid off seven white-collar employees last Friday; company insiders told her more were on the way. They are not alone.

On Tuesday, Consol Energy issued a federally mandated layoff disclosure announcing its “intent to idle its Miller Creek surface operations near Naugatuck, W.Va.” The move will affect the company’s Wiley Surface Mine, Wiley Creek Surface Mine, Minway Surface Mine, Minway Preparation Plant and Miller Creek Administration Group, all in Mingo County, W.Va. Despite state approval, cooperation with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and myriad other agencies, and a stellar safety record, Obama’s EPA dragged its feet on the permit approval process. The impasse has forced layoffs of 145 Consol Energy employees that will hit at the end of the year. They are not alone.

In August, Robert E. Murray, founder and CEO of Murray Energy Corporation in Ohio, blasted the White House anti-coal agenda for the layoffs and closure of his company’s mine. He told Obama water-carrying CNN anchor Soledad O’Brien that “the many regulations that (Obama) and his radical appointees and the U.S. EPA have put on the use of coal, there are dozens of them and collectively by his own energy administration, have closed 175 power plants.” As O’Brien barked at her guest about purported environmental objections, Murray explained that “we cannot get permits for these mines. They are delaying the issuance of permits. If you can’t get the permit, you can’t have the mine. … I created those jobs, and I put the investment in that mine.

President Obama is spinning the latest jobs report as proof positive that he deserves another four years in the Oval Office to deal with the nation’s economic and unemployment woes.

For the record, the latest jobs report indicates an overall unemployment rate of 7.9%, which is higher than in January 2009 when Obama took office.

Notwithstanding the human misery his policies have wrought, the president said, “We have made real progress.”

Real progress, sir?

With all due respect, what about the job numbers for African-Americans and Latinos, sir?

Although the economy added 171,000 jobs in October, the overall unemployment rate inched up to 7.9%.

Significantly, the conditions for African-Americans and Latinos worsened as the unemployment rate for blacks went up from 13.4% to 14.3%, and for Latinos from 9.9% to 10%.

This is REAL PROGRESS?

Where is the outrage and the street riots over the fact that Obama believes real progress can be achieved without easing the suffering of people of color? Where are Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson?

With just four lying days left before the election, Obama still has not answered the basic question: Where are the jobs, sir?

John W. Lillpop
San Jose, California

My newest piece starts this way:

More bad news for the president, as yet another lackluster jobs report was announced this morning. 

After a severe recession, job growth is normally quite strong. We are now 40 months into a recovery, but job growth is only about a quarter what it has been during the average recovery since 1970.

Unemployment rose up to 7.9 percent. Jobs are being created, 171,000 of them, but the pace is still just keeping up with the growing working age population. With 209,000 working-age people added to the labor force last month, 133,000 jobs were needed just to tread water and keep the same percentage of the population working. 38,000 net new jobs is good, but it is trivial in a country where the civilian work force amounts to 156 million.

The unemployment rate is back up to what it was when Barack Obama became president. To put it differently, while 194,000 more people are at work now than in January 2009, our population has grown and there are now 8,822,000 more working-age people. Unfortunately, most of that difference represents people who have simply given up looking for work and now classified as: “not in the labor force.”

No wonder real median family income keeps falling each year during the “recovery.” . . .

Folks will spin this morning’s jobs report every which way but truth.

At the end of the day the main statistic is 7.9 percent, the BLS measure of those remaining in the labor market but unable to find jobs. The number was 7.6 percent when Obama took office in January 2009. Here’s the New York Times’ spin, “Modest Job Growth in Final Report Before Election” (via Memeorandum), but see Fox News, “Last jobs report before election shows economy in ‘virtual standstill’“:

The final monthly jobs report before Election Day offered a mixed bag of economic evidence that quickly became political putty for the presidential candidates, with the unemployment rate ticking up to 7.9 percent but the economy adding a better-than-expected 171,000 jobs.

At the same time, the number of unemployed grew by 170,000, roughly the same amount — to 12.3 million.

The October numbers allow President Obama to argue the economy is technically growing under his watch. But they also allow Mitt Romney to argue that the new jobs are not making much of a dent in the unemployment problem. Both campaigns quickly set to work putting their spin on data that, if nothing else, underscores the slow pace of the recovery.

“That’s 9 million jobs short of what (Obama) promised,” Romney said at a rally in Wisconsin shortly before noon. “Unemployment is higher today than when Barack Obama took office.”

The rate was 7.8 percent the month Obama took office. “Today’s increase in the unemployment rate is a sad reminder that the economy is at a virtual standstill,” Romney said in a separate written statement. “When I’m president, I’m going to make real changes that lead to a real recovery, so that the next four years are better than the last.”

James Pethokoukis has an analysis, “Is this as good as it gets? | October’s dismal ‘New Normal’ jobs report“:

1. If we suddenly had a string of months where job growth was the same as in October, it would take 7 more years — until 2019 ! — to get back to the Bush unemployment low of 4.4%. Even if we averaged 210,000 jobs a month, we wouldn’t close jobs gap until 2021.

2. We are now 41 months into the recovery, and we have recovered just 55% of the 8.9 million lost private sector jobs from the Great Recession. During the Reagan recovery, it took just 10 months.

3. Back in early 2009, White House economists Christina Romer and Jared Bernstein predicted the unemployment rate would be 5.2% in October 2012 if Congress passed the $800 billion stimulus. As the above chart shows, they weren’t even close.

More at the link. And see Gateway Pundit, “October Unemployment Jumps to 7.9% – Making Obama Worst Jobs President Since Great Depression.”

We’re stuck in the middle of the Obama Depression. The administration’s economic recovery programs have failed to revive the economy. Frankly, economic growth would have returned just as fast — perhaps even faster — without Obama’s economic stimulus and the drag of the ObamaCare monstrosity. What growth and recovery we’re seeing reflects the resilience of the economy despite the heavy hand of Democrat Party regulation. If Mitt Romney’s elected we’ll have a much better chance of jump-starting more robust economic growth and employment activity.

First, a little background from the from the Daily Caller for those of you who have been otherwise preoccupied with trying to keep from becoming unemployment statistics yourselves:

On Oct. 11, the federal government reported that weekly jobless claims were down significantly, suggesting a dramatic national increase in economic growth and a steep decline in layoffs. Jobless claims, according to the Labor Department, had fallen by 30,000 to 339,000, their lowest level since February 2008.

The good news for the Obama administration spread quickly, with outlets like CNN and Bloomberg declaring, “Jobless claims fall to four-year low.”

But within hours, the Bureau of Labor Statistics and Labor Department analysts announced that one major state had failed to fully document jobless claims. They declined to name the state.
[...]
Early Thursday, the federal government finally revealed that California had, in fact, under-reported jobless data, skewing the national jobless claims results. This week’s updated jobs report corrected the error and showed unemployment claims spiking back up by 46,000 to 388,000..

With Jack Welch’s hunch pretty much confirmed, what else could there be? The Daily Caller also notes that last year California Governor Jerry Brown appointed a man named Marty Morgenstern to head the California Labor & Workforce Development Agency, which oversees the Employment Development Department that “failed to fully document” jobless claims.

Here’s the total coincidence part that will shock the hell out of you — Morgenstern’s campaign donations in 2008:

Granted, this is California we’re talking about, which means there are better odds that Jerry Brown’s Train to Nowhere will actually lead somewhere and come in under budget than of a state official who made an unemployment numbers “oversight” favorable to a Democratic administration’s re-election hopes turning out to be Republican.

Bryan Preston at PJ Media:

Why are you so suspicious? Surely it doesn’t mean anything that California’s unemployment numbers man takes up lefty union causes and donates to the president.