With the March 17 report, the Obama Administration began playing a shell game with first time benefit claims numbers; I am talking about the count of those applying for unemployment benefit claims for the first time. This blog holds the more recent reports on its "Labor Stats" page which allows the reader to verify anything we might say in posts such as this.
Prior to the March 17 report, the Feds and the Department of Labor would issue an initial report for "the week ending . . ." and revise that report a week later. The adjustment typically presented an upward trend of between 2,000 and 4,000. A "week ending on . . . ." might have been 390,000, but would be adjusted up to 392,000 or 393,000 or 394,000. This has been the pattern for well over two years.
But, with the campaign season at full throttle and beginning with the middle of March, this pattern changed. Understand that "news headline" will reflect the initial report for "week ending . . ." You never find the adjustment (a week later) as "headline news." Obama and his minions know the "headline cycle" very well, and have been using it to reflect a positive unemployment benefits report when, in fact, the report is a negative one.
I.e.
March 17 found the press and Obama drooling over the "lowest report in 8 years." The number reported? 348,000. Within 30 minutes of this report making the news cycle, Obama, in typical childish fashion, ran to the press room and announced, again, that the back had been broken with regards to the recession. Now, no one is arguing against a recovery. We are in "recovery," but nearly all analysts I have read, from the Left and the Right, tell us this is the slowest recovery in American history. Having said that and as it turns out, March 17 was a terrible week, but THAT did not make the news headlines. Seven days after that initial report, March 17 stats were moved up by 16,000 applicants !!! That does not happen without a deliberate effort to deceive, at least for a short period of time. At no time in recent years, has such an error in reporting been the case.
March 24 was not much different in terms of reporting strategies. This initial report came in at 359,000. Seven days later, the Administration had to move that number up 11,000 applicants, to 363,000.
March 31 was no different in terms of strategy. Its initial report was 357,000, but was adjusted upwards by 10,000.
April 7 came in at a whopping 380,000, up 13,000 from the week before. Understand this number will be adjusted next week, on April 19. I believe the April 19 adjustment will be "downward" for the sake of getting ahead of the news cycle. In other words, I believe this week's total (380,000) is slightly inflated for the benefit of a positive adjustment next week. If I am wrong and the "380,000" is a real number, the economy as measured in jobs creation is taking a dump. Time will tell.
For certain, the reporting strategy regarding first time claims has changed rather dramatically and in such a way as to benefit the Administration. If the Feds are sitting on top of a ticking time-bomb, the Administration will not be able to "keep the lid" on things, and the resulting bad news (for Obama and Friends) will come out.
It is very possible that we are looking at the two or three most important weeks of claims reporting for this entire campaign year. Like I always say, "Time will tell."
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