[EconProf]

Socratt, good question. If 550,000 (net) jobs were lost last month, why did unemployment rate only rise by two-tenths of a percent? Answer: some of the unemployed stopped looking for work. The household survey compiles the # of unemployed. The # of jobs is more of a payroll total coming from employers.
By the way, your chance of being interviewed in any given month are about 1 in 3000.
Arraya, your reference to that blog is a good one, as it brings up one valid complaint to the way the BLS compiles their statistics. The Birth/Death allowance supposedly allows for the imputed jobs created or destroyed monthly by the birth of new businesses or the death of same. Their model is greatly flawed because it overstates job creation. It recently, for example, claimed that construction jobs are still growing in the U.S. A Barron’s columnist, Gene Epstein, has frequently mocked the BLS for these conclusions.
Still, the erroneous numbers are not large in the scheme of things, and are due more to bureaucratic sloth than dark conspiracy.

[EconProf]

Socratt, good question. If 550,000 (net) jobs were lost last month, why did unemployment rate only rise by two-tenths of a percent? Answer: some of the unemployed stopped looking for work. The household survey compiles the # of unemployed. The # of jobs is more of a payroll total coming from employers.
By the way, your chance of being interviewed in any given month are about 1 in 3000.
Arraya, your reference to that blog is a good one, as it brings up one valid complaint to the way the BLS compiles their statistics. The Birth/Death allowance supposedly allows for the imputed jobs created or destroyed monthly by the birth of new businesses or the death of same. Their model is greatly flawed because it overstates job creation. It recently, for example, claimed that construction jobs are still growing in the U.S. A Barron’s columnist, Gene Epstein, has frequently mocked the BLS for these conclusions.
Still, the erroneous numbers are not large in the scheme of things, and are due more to bureaucratic sloth than dark conspiracy.

[EconProf]

Socratt, good question. If 550,000 (net) jobs were lost last month, why did unemployment rate only rise by two-tenths of a percent? Answer: some of the unemployed stopped looking for work. The household survey compiles the # of unemployed. The # of jobs is more of a payroll total coming from employers.
By the way, your chance of being interviewed in any given month are about 1 in 3000.
Arraya, your reference to that blog is a good one, as it brings up one valid complaint to the way the BLS compiles their statistics. The Birth/Death allowance supposedly allows for the imputed jobs created or destroyed monthly by the birth of new businesses or the death of same. Their model is greatly flawed because it overstates job creation. It recently, for example, claimed that construction jobs are still growing in the U.S. A Barron’s columnist, Gene Epstein, has frequently mocked the BLS for these conclusions.
Still, the erroneous numbers are not large in the scheme of things, and are due more to bureaucratic sloth than dark conspiracy.

[EconProf]

Socratt, good question. If 550,000 (net) jobs were lost last month, why did unemployment rate only rise by two-tenths of a percent? Answer: some of the unemployed stopped looking for work. The household survey compiles the # of unemployed. The # of jobs is more of a payroll total coming from employers.
By the way, your chance of being interviewed in any given month are about 1 in 3000.
Arraya, your reference to that blog is a good one, as it brings up one valid complaint to the way the BLS compiles their statistics. The Birth/Death allowance supposedly allows for the imputed jobs created or destroyed monthly by the birth of new businesses or the death of same. Their model is greatly flawed because it overstates job creation. It recently, for example, claimed that construction jobs are still growing in the U.S. A Barron’s columnist, Gene Epstein, has frequently mocked the BLS for these conclusions.
Still, the erroneous numbers are not large in the scheme of things, and are due more to bureaucratic sloth than dark conspiracy.

[EconProf]

Here are some basic facts about how the unemployment rate is calculated.
The labor force consists of all people working (including self-employed), plus unemployed.
“Unemployed” means out of work AND actively seeking work.
Each month canvasers spread out and knock on 50,000 American doors and ask a bunch of questions. They chose a cross-section of cities and neighborhoods, and return a few times if no one answers.
Among the many questions are buried the following:
How many in this houshold?
Who is working? (defined as working as little as one day per week, last I checked)
Who is not working but wants to?
Is that person actively seeking work…i.e. making applications, asking friends about leads, checking want ads & following through, etc., etc. If so, bingo, they are classified as unemployed.
The current work force is about 153 million, of which about ten and one-quarter million are unemployed. 6.7%
Given these definitions, many people are not working by choice–stay-at-home Moms (& Dads), full time students, institutionalized, retired, etc.
A couple more definitions:
Underemployed generally means those working way under their potential, such as part-timers who would rather work full time. Also includes those working way below what their education and experience would suggest, such as Political Science majors flipping hamburgers (though I would
suggest they have maxed out).
Discouraged Workers is a category of people who have supposedly given up looking for work, but would take it if offered. Given the series of questions posed above, one can imagine a lot of people in this category, but that is a subjective call.
Journalists and hand-wringers like to point to an army of underemployed and discouraged workers as the government’s way to understate our problems. The government does put out estimates of these categories, but rightly sticks to objective questions when doing these surveys so the statistics have meaning over time. They tweak their survey methods to try to keep them relevant and meaningful. They are constantly challenged by suspicious critics so have to prove their validity constantly. Overall, a pretty good system.

[EconProf]

Here are some basic facts about how the unemployment rate is calculated.
The labor force consists of all people working (including self-employed), plus unemployed.
“Unemployed” means out of work AND actively seeking work.
Each month canvasers spread out and knock on 50,000 American doors and ask a bunch of questions. They chose a cross-section of cities and neighborhoods, and return a few times if no one answers.
Among the many questions are buried the following:
How many in this houshold?
Who is working? (defined as working as little as one day per week, last I checked)
Who is not working but wants to?
Is that person actively seeking work…i.e. making applications, asking friends about leads, checking want ads & following through, etc., etc. If so, bingo, they are classified as unemployed.
The current work force is about 153 million, of which about ten and one-quarter million are unemployed. 6.7%
Given these definitions, many people are not working by choice–stay-at-home Moms (& Dads), full time students, institutionalized, retired, etc.
A couple more definitions:
Underemployed generally means those working way under their potential, such as part-timers who would rather work full time. Also includes those working way below what their education and experience would suggest, such as Political Science majors flipping hamburgers (though I would
suggest they have maxed out).
Discouraged Workers is a category of people who have supposedly given up looking for work, but would take it if offered. Given the series of questions posed above, one can imagine a lot of people in this category, but that is a subjective call.
Journalists and hand-wringers like to point to an army of underemployed and discouraged workers as the government’s way to understate our problems. The government does put out estimates of these categories, but rightly sticks to objective questions when doing these surveys so the statistics have meaning over time. They tweak their survey methods to try to keep them relevant and meaningful. They are constantly challenged by suspicious critics so have to prove their validity constantly. Overall, a pretty good system.

[EconProf]

Here are some basic facts about how the unemployment rate is calculated.
The labor force consists of all people working (including self-employed), plus unemployed.
“Unemployed” means out of work AND actively seeking work.
Each month canvasers spread out and knock on 50,000 American doors and ask a bunch of questions. They chose a cross-section of cities and neighborhoods, and return a few times if no one answers.
Among the many questions are buried the following:
How many in this houshold?
Who is working? (defined as working as little as one day per week, last I checked)
Who is not working but wants to?
Is that person actively seeking work…i.e. making applications, asking friends about leads, checking want ads & following through, etc., etc. If so, bingo, they are classified as unemployed.
The current work force is about 153 million, of which about ten and one-quarter million are unemployed. 6.7%
Given these definitions, many people are not working by choice–stay-at-home Moms (& Dads), full time students, institutionalized, retired, etc.
A couple more definitions:
Underemployed generally means those working way under their potential, such as part-timers who would rather work full time. Also includes those working way below what their education and experience would suggest, such as Political Science majors flipping hamburgers (though I would
suggest they have maxed out).
Discouraged Workers is a category of people who have supposedly given up looking for work, but would take it if offered. Given the series of questions posed above, one can imagine a lot of people in this category, but that is a subjective call.
Journalists and hand-wringers like to point to an army of underemployed and discouraged workers as the government’s way to understate our problems. The government does put out estimates of these categories, but rightly sticks to objective questions when doing these surveys so the statistics have meaning over time. They tweak their survey methods to try to keep them relevant and meaningful. They are constantly challenged by suspicious critics so have to prove their validity constantly. Overall, a pretty good system.

[EconProf]

Here are some basic facts about how the unemployment rate is calculated.
The labor force consists of all people working (including self-employed), plus unemployed.
“Unemployed” means out of work AND actively seeking work.
Each month canvasers spread out and knock on 50,000 American doors and ask a bunch of questions. They chose a cross-section of cities and neighborhoods, and return a few times if no one answers.
Among the many questions are buried the following:
How many in this houshold?
Who is working? (defined as working as little as one day per week, last I checked)
Who is not working but wants to?
Is that person actively seeking work…i.e. making applications, asking friends about leads, checking want ads & following through, etc., etc. If so, bingo, they are classified as unemployed.
The current work force is about 153 million, of which about ten and one-quarter million are unemployed. 6.7%
Given these definitions, many people are not working by choice–stay-at-home Moms (& Dads), full time students, institutionalized, retired, etc.
A couple more definitions:
Underemployed generally means those working way under their potential, such as part-timers who would rather work full time. Also includes those working way below what their education and experience would suggest, such as Political Science majors flipping hamburgers (though I would
suggest they have maxed out).
Discouraged Workers is a category of people who have supposedly given up looking for work, but would take it if offered. Given the series of questions posed above, one can imagine a lot of people in this category, but that is a subjective call.
Journalists and hand-wringers like to point to an army of underemployed and discouraged workers as the government’s way to understate our problems. The government does put out estimates of these categories, but rightly sticks to objective questions when doing these surveys so the statistics have meaning over time. They tweak their survey methods to try to keep them relevant and meaningful. They are constantly challenged by suspicious critics so have to prove their validity constantly. Overall, a pretty good system.

[EconProf]

Here are some basic facts about how the unemployment rate is calculated.
The labor force consists of all people working (including self-employed), plus unemployed.
“Unemployed” means out of work AND actively seeking work.
Each month canvasers spread out and knock on 50,000 American doors and ask a bunch of questions. They chose a cross-section of cities and neighborhoods, and return a few times if no one answers.
Among the many questions are buried the following:
How many in this houshold?
Who is working? (defined as working as little as one day per week, last I checked)
Who is not working but wants to?
Is that person actively seeking work…i.e. making applications, asking friends about leads, checking want ads & following through, etc., etc. If so, bingo, they are classified as unemployed.
The current work force is about 153 million, of which about ten and one-quarter million are unemployed. 6.7%
Given these definitions, many people are not working by choice–stay-at-home Moms (& Dads), full time students, institutionalized, retired, etc.
A couple more definitions:
Underemployed generally means those working way under their potential, such as part-timers who would rather work full time. Also includes those working way below what their education and experience would suggest, such as Political Science majors flipping hamburgers (though I would
suggest they have maxed out).
Discouraged Workers is a category of people who have supposedly given up looking for work, but would take it if offered. Given the series of questions posed above, one can imagine a lot of people in this category, but that is a subjective call.
Journalists and hand-wringers like to point to an army of underemployed and discouraged workers as the government’s way to understate our problems. The government does put out estimates of these categories, but rightly sticks to objective questions when doing these surveys so the statistics have meaning over time. They tweak their survey methods to try to keep them relevant and meaningful. They are constantly challenged by suspicious critics so have to prove their validity constantly. Overall, a pretty good system.

[EconProf]

Rustico, my point was that many sellers delude themselves into thinking their property is worth more than the market says because they “improved” it in some half-assed way. To bring them down to earth, they should discover on their own what remediation involves.
You are quite right that there could be opportunity in such cases. Especially if buyers have spurned properties with these handicaps and they are priced accordingly.

[EconProf]

Rustico, my point was that many sellers delude themselves into thinking their property is worth more than the market says because they “improved” it in some half-assed way. To bring them down to earth, they should discover on their own what remediation involves.
You are quite right that there could be opportunity in such cases. Especially if buyers have spurned properties with these handicaps and they are priced accordingly.

[EconProf]

Rustico, my point was that many sellers delude themselves into thinking their property is worth more than the market says because they “improved” it in some half-assed way. To bring them down to earth, they should discover on their own what remediation involves.
You are quite right that there could be opportunity in such cases. Especially if buyers have spurned properties with these handicaps and they are priced accordingly.

[EconProf]

Rustico, my point was that many sellers delude themselves into thinking their property is worth more than the market says because they “improved” it in some half-assed way. To bring them down to earth, they should discover on their own what remediation involves.
You are quite right that there could be opportunity in such cases. Especially if buyers have spurned properties with these handicaps and they are priced accordingly.

[EconProf]

Rustico, my point was that many sellers delude themselves into thinking their property is worth more than the market says because they “improved” it in some half-assed way. To bring them down to earth, they should discover on their own what remediation involves.
You are quite right that there could be opportunity in such cases. Especially if buyers have spurned properties with these handicaps and they are priced accordingly.

[EconProf]

Whatever Mike92104 does with this, there is a lesson here for all of us.
Non-permitted work, esp. if there is an abatement order outstanding, can seriously erode the value of a property. Beware of handyman projects, especially additions, that the owner/seller thinks have added to the value of the house. More likely it has subtracted value. Mike is talking here about an engineer, draftsman, contractors, etc., all costing money and time to fix the problem. The seller would have gained so much more by getting the work permitted in the first place. Then, when selling, he can say “all work permitted”, show the paperwork, and make it a selling point. The work would probably be better too.
One last point: when negotiating to buy such a property, add a clause stating seller must bring up to code. Let him or her research it to discover the high cost of compliance. They may not fix it all, but will have to accept a much lower price to sell it as is.

[Author]

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