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JOBS REPORT
POSTED BY EIZ ON THURSDAY, 19 JANUARY, 2012, 7:14 AM
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By Don Lee With the economy the most important issue in the presidential campaign, it was no
surprise that President Obama's Republican opponents tried to take some of the shine off Friday's
surprisingly bright jobs report. The Labor Department report ...
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JOBS REPORT
Posted byo Eiz n Thursday, 19 January, 2012, 7:14 AM
Newt Gingrich speaks at a news
conference in Las Vegas after the results
of Saturday's Nevada caucuses were
released. (Stan Honda / AFP / Getty
Images)
February 5, 2012, 10:03 a.m.Reporting
from Washington— With the economy the
most important issue in the presidential
campaign, it was no surprise that
President Obama's Republican
opponents tried to take some of the shine
off Friday's surprisingly bright jobs report.
The Labor Department report said that the economy added 243,000 jobs in January, the most in
nine months, and that the unemployment rate dropped to a three-year low of 8.3%. But former
Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, fresh from his big win Saturday in the Nevada caucuses, told a
throng of supporters that the jobless rate has now been above Obama's own "red line of 8%" for 36
months.
On Sunday, Romney's economic advisor, Glenn Hubbard, and former House Speaker Newt
Gingrich, in separate TV appearances, both spoke about the departure of many people from the
labor force. If so many people hadn't quit looking for work, Gingrich said on ABC's "This Week" that
the unemployment rate would now be 12% or 13%.
It's true that the deep recession and slow recovery have pushed many Americans to give up job
searches, and thus aren't counted as officially unemployed. Some of them have gone back to
school, and others have simply decided to stay at home or retire earlier than planned. In fact, the
total civilian labor force – those who are working or looking for work – last month was essentially
unchanged from January 2008, a month after the recession officially began. If the labor force had
grown at the same rate as the prior four years, it would be about seven million people bigger today.
Even so, the Labor Department report Friday indicates that the dip in the jobless rate last month,
from 8.5% in December, wasn't because of a drop in the labor force. It was because more people
were employed. And while Gingrich has a point that the latest jobless rate understates the pain
among workers, the unemployment figure still wouldn't be as high as he says it would be if