Lying With Statistics (Calling Them ‘Adjustments’)

On Saturday, The American Thinker posted an article about the economic numbers the Biden administration is currently bragging about. President Biden has tamed inflation and created massive growth in the economy–or so he says. I wonder how Americans who are paying double for gasoline and more than double to heat their homes feel about being told how great the economy is. I expect to hear how well we are doing in the State of the Union address, but I truly wonder if Americans will actually believe what they are told.

The American Thinker reports:

Bloomberg, which exists to serve active traders on Wall Street, is throwing shade on the January jobs report that “surprised” a lot of people with its positive numbers. Before addressing the technical factors used to produce the rosy numbers, consider the buried lede hundreds of words into the piece: Stripped of all the technical jargon is this stark reality:

On an unadjusted basis, payrolls actually fell by 2.5 million last month.

The article continues:

Molly Smith writes:

Employers added 517,000 jobs in January — nearly double the prior month’s advance and above all estimates in a Bloomberg survey. The unemployment rate also unexpectedly retreated to 3.4%, the lowest since 1969, according to Labor Department data released Friday.

Those are the numbers that grabbed headlines and enabled Team Biden to claim credit for what they want to bamboozle the public into thinking we have a great economy.  But it turns out that there were changes in the way the data were gathered and reported that made things look rosier:

…“If it seems too good to be true, that’s because it is too good to be true — the gain is mostly due to seasonal factors and revisions to past data. Still, it can’t be denied that the labor market remains tight. The Fed won’t place too much weight on this headline jobs number when formulating policy.”
— Anna Wong and Eliza Winger, economists

Hang on to your hats. I truly believe that 2023 may be a difficult year economically for all Americans. I believe we will get through it, but I believe there will be serious economic challenges for both individuals and for the nation.