Unemployment

  Even on Fox News they are talking about the economic recovery showing signs of life. However, if you are looking around and watching, you might be wondering just how much life. Today when the whole 9.4% unemployment rate came out, you might have be skeptical. Here's what Professor Jacobsen thinks:

Needless to say, administration supporters will be touting that the unemployment rate released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics this morning dropped from 9.8% to 9.4%.  Politically, this is good news for Obama, at least in the short run.

Dig just a bit deeper, and you will see that 0.2% of that drop (or half the total drop) was from a decrease in the "participation rate" from 64.5 to 64.3 of the population.  So half of the good news reflects that people have dropped out of the work force and have given up looking for work.