Procrastinet

Job Report: Now, watch this spin

filed under: Hey, What's The Big Idea

We have today an excellent chance to study the Administration Machine at work. They received a body blow today: a jobs report well below all projections. By "well below," I mean economists were expecting 215,000 and got 32,000. At the same time, the reports for May and June were retroactively revised downwards by a total of 61k jobs. From MSN:

The stock market reacted immediately and decisively, selling off 85 points within minutes of the open.

“It’s a disaster all around if you think about it,” Jack Bouroudjian, principal at Brewer Investment Company, told CNBC’s “Squawk Box.”

This report is so bad it's the lead on all the news websites and on the home page of msn.com (Okay, not *all* the websites: Foxnews buries it at the bottom of the page under the laughably understated "July Job Growth Slows." Sigh.)

Now, I am NOT saying this jobs report is the Administration's "fault." The concept that the White House, under any President, has *direct* control over the economy in general and jobs in particular is an election-year myth. This is something Brad DeLong has posted about at length, including today's must-read post on the poor report. Here's the key paragraph:

And somebody else should ask Bush today why he adopted a "jobs and growth" program of shifting taxes from the present into the future that got us only about half the bang per buck of deficit that we would have received from a normal Keynesian fiscal stimulus program. He didn't make the lousy labor market. But he and his team sure did pass up a lot of chances to buy insurance against the bizarrely weak job market we now find ourselves in.

Here's my over-simplified understanding of it: let's say the economy = bowling. The President can't control where the ball goes or how many pins it hits. What he *can* do is, say, put up the bumpers so at least you can't roll a gutter ball. Or wax the lane so the ball moves faster. Or coach the bowler on proper technique. After that, it's up to forces more complex than the Prez can control.

So the criticism of Bush shouldn't be the low score. It should be that, trusted with the responsibility to try to raise the score, he has ignored the methods listed above, which might have actually helped, and instead has invested in "better bowling" by putting new carpet in the lobby, better liquor at the bar, and a jacuzzi in the owners' suite.

And he's done it all on credit cards. Which we will, eventually, have to repay.

Anyway - none of this is really my main point. My main point isn't about the economic situation we find ourselves in. It's about how this Administration handles problems like the one they find themselves in today. Just last week, Bush claimed that we had "turned a corner" in the economy. This report makes him look like a deluded ass.

So let's keep an eye out for the spin. Let's keep an eye out for the sleight of hand, for the shell game. Let's keep an eye out for statements being issued that simply have nothing to do with the facts, but sure do sound real good. And if the tinfoil hat brigade are right (and they've been right with unsettling frequency), let's keep an eye out for Tom Ridge.

I'll report back with what I find.

Here's a disturbing graph (posted by user "jfern" on this thread at Daily Kos) that really tells the story of the Administration simply saying whatever the f*** they think people want to hear. The gray bars are Administration Projections, the black bars are reality. You can almost hear them saying "This time, jobs will pick up! Okay... THIS time jobs will pick up! Okay... um... THIS TIME..." (click for full size):

UPDATE: So far, Bush is choosing the "what are you bitching about? We added jobs, right?" approach. From CNN:

Bush had a different view. "I say we have a strong economy, and it's getting stronger," he told supporters in Stratham, New Hampshire.

And then there are statements that defy parody:

"We've seen nine months of growth," Labor Secretary Elaine Chao told CNNfn on Friday.

"Not consecutive, but nine months in employment growth in the manufacturing sector in the last 12 months."

Points in the rhetorical sparring go to the Kerry camp for this impressively snarky dig:

"This year may be President Bush's best year; it would have been President Clinton's worst year," Kerry economic adviser Aida Alvarez told CNNfn.

Posted by rjt at August 6, 2004 10:55 AM