>>http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/money/us-jobless-rate-falls-to-6-year-low-of-59-pct/ar-BB7eEdY
>>
>>Ah, yes. when you go off of unemployment and onto welfare or disability, you are not longer unemployed. And this is good news?
>
>I don't have a cite for this (haven't looked), but I'm pretty sure I heard that September was the first month in a long time where the number of new jobs was larger than the number of people leaving the job market.
>
>Tamar

First, if that were completely true (# of new jobs > people leaving job market), then the labor participation rate would not have dropped. There is some question as to how much of the drop is structural (people retiring) but the bottom line is that declines in unemployment AND declines in participation rate are not compelling indicators of an improving economy. And that's what's been happening for some time now.

In September the # of people who left the labor force increased by 315,000, which brings it to an all time high of 92.6 million.

I certainly don't put all the blame on the current administration. But this conversation started because of a disingenuous speculation that amounted to "geez, wonder why Fox news didn't report that unemployment went down", coupled with our current president doing a celebration dance on the September report where celebration wasn't exactly called for.

Second, the Federal Reserve predicted that the # of new jobs would go up last month, in part because of the expiration of extended unemployment benefits.


If you want to read something interesting - read George Will's recent analysis of Obama and "Trickle down" economics.

We continue to be in a very very slow recovery.