🚀 go-pugleaf

>Jim Blair wrote:

>> 
>> Lets keep "facts" (data) and theory/speculation separate. One fact is that
>> less people are now employed in manufacturing. See thread title.
>> Another fact is that the number of people AND the percent of the
>> population employed has also been increasing since 1962.
....

>> What is the unemployment rate today?  
>>What was it 20 years ago?  Or 30 years ago?
>>Or 40 years ago?

>>What were family incomes during the above listed years?

B J Foster <bjfoster@yahoo.com> wrote:

>
>I don't know what planet you're living on. The official stats for USA, Earth are at bls.gov
>
>US Initial unemployment claims from January to July were 1.3m (vs 1.4m). 
>The rate is slowing but if it keeps "stabilizing" at this rate layoffs will cease in 4 years, 
>just in time for the next recession.

etc.

Hi,

Same planet (and same country: USA). But different time frames. You are 
looking at the last several quarter and the next 4 years (assumed data for 
the future I assume ;-)

I was reading the thread title and considering long term trends over the 
last 40 years.

So look up the unemployment rate in the US over the last 40 years. And the 
"employment rate" (Labor force participation rate I think they call it). 
And real family incomes (corrected for inflation).

Do you see trends in those figures that are counter to my generalizations?

If your theories about what "ought to be" are contrary to those facts, 
(and assuming you cannot reject your theories) then you must find a way to 
discredit the BLS and Census data. What I call Coburnworld, where people 
in the US have become ever poorer over the last 40 years because of the 
JKF/Reagan top rate income tax reductions.

You could claim that the rise in US "real" unemployment, and the declines 
in US "real" employment levels and family incomes since 1962 are because 
of automation.

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