Net Private Sector Job Gain for 2006's 3rd Quarter: 19,000
By Lee Russ
Tuesday, May 29, 2007 at 09:05 PM
According to the Monthly reports from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), the US economy gained a net of almost half a million jobs in the third quarter of 2006. Then BLS issued its aggregate quarterly report earlier this month, titled "BUSINESS EMPLOYMENT DYNAMICS: THIRD QUARTER 2006."
Like magic, most of the new jobs announced in the monthly reports disappeared. Instead of a net gain of almost half a million, BLS says the net gain was 19,000. That's not a type--nineteen thousand. Somewhere around 4% of the previously announced total.Possibly worse is that the total number of private sector firms dwindled by some 8,000 in the third quarter of 2006--8,000 more businesses dies than were born.
An excerpt of relevant material from the quarterly summary:
Private Sector Establishment-Level Gross Job Gains and Job LossesWhat in the world could cause such a discrepancy between the monthly and quarterly figures? The report in the NY Times notes:Opening and expanding private sector business establishments gained 7.4 million jobs in the third quarter of 2006, a decrease of 397,000 from the previous quarter. Over the third quarter, expanding establishments added 6.0 million jobs, while opening establishments added 1.4 million jobs.
Gross job losses totaled 7.3 million, an increase of 50,000 from the previous quarter. During the quarter, contracting establishments lost 6.0 million jobs, while closing establishments lost 1.3 million jobs. (See tables A, 1, and 3.)
The difference between the number of gross jobs gained and the number of gross jobs lost yielded a net change of 19,000 jobs in the private sector for third quarter 2006.
From June 2006 to September 2006, gross job gains represented 6.5 percent of private sector employment, while gross job losses represented 6.5 percent of private sector employment. (See tables A and 2.) These gross job gain and loss statistics demonstrate that a sizable number of jobs appear and disappear in the relatively short time frame of one quarter.
Number of Establishments Gaining and Losing Employment
Another way to look at the dynamics of business activities is to monitor the number and proportion of business units that are growing and declining. The third quarter of 2006 represented the first quarter where the number of contracting establishments exceeded the number of expanding establishments since the second quarter of 2003. Out of 6.9 million active private-sector establishments, a total of 1,865,000 establishments gained jobs from June 2006 to September 2006. (See table C.) Of these, 1,524,000 were expanding establishments and 341,000 were opening establishments. During the quarter, 1,542,000 establishments contracted and 349,000 establishments closed, resulting in 1,891,000 establishments losing jobs.
Overall, the number of active private sector establishments decreased by 8,000 during the quarter. This change is the difference between the number of opening establishments and the number of closing establishments.
The figures do not cover exactly the same things, as a small proportion of employers — notably railroads and religious organizations — are not covered by unemployment insurance. And Kirk Mueller, a branch chief in the section of the bureau that deals with current employment statistics, said differing seasonal adjustment factors could affect the results.Nonetheless, the Times piece also states that "Eventually, the monthly numbers will be revised to reflect the results of the quarterly survey." In other words, the quarterly figures will be treated as the final figures.
Nineteen thousand jobs over three months. Around 4% of the previously announced net gain.
Eight thousand more private sector employers going out of business than entering business.
Anyone want to reconsider the state of the economy?
Comments
Add to the dismal news that the economy's in worse shape than 2002.
Nice to know how screwed we are these days, eh? Meanwhile, in DC and in Wall Street, the rich smoke their doobies....and Rome burns...
Wait! We're in charge now! We control congress and the economy and you're criticizing us. Why? Are you some sort of Republican troll?
The rich are actually evil, aren't they? I'm surprised we allow any in our party, at all?
We need to clean house -- Feinstein has billions, Reid is rich, Edwards, Gore, why all of them are rich!
Soros is rich, not even an American but giving us money? What for? To help us discover just how bad they (the evil rich) just happen to be?
How can we accept these people as 'okay' when they are part of the problem? Are we just a party of hypocrites?
I'm not sure how you got "The rich are evil" out of that. They're obviously not. Some of the very rich people I know are people who worked their way up from nothing with only the most basic opportunities.
I think a large part of the problem with the "rich is evil" mentality is that it discounts the good the rich can and often do in our society.
It's when the rich become elite, and the elite forget anything but increasing their wealth, that a problem arises. There are a great many rich people (not percentage-wise, but in general), and very few of them are "evil". But you know what, some of them are, just like some of us middle class folks are evil, and just like some poor people are evil. That wouldn't change with economic status, but rich people who are evil, I guess we notice them a hell of a lot more.
~A!
"I'm not sure how you got 'the rich are evil' out of that."
I'm pretty sure that our Visitor didn't. It's just another opportunity to try to distract and shift the debate into name calling, etc.
The number of jobs created has nothing at all to do with rich people being evil. It has everything to do with:
1. The status of the very unrich in our society.
2. The unreliability of the initial government statistics on employment (& most other things).
On number two, just like with criminal accusations that prove to be untrue, the original monthly reports fulll of hope and good news got a lot of media play; the new quarterly report that has little hope and no good news will get next to no attention.
And Fox and the cheerleaders for the right will continue to foster the idea that everything is absolutely great out there in Middle America Land. Why you'd have to be crazy to think otherwise.
I don't remember who it was, but I remember reading somewhere that a society can be measured by how it treats the least among its subjects. Might have been Jesus, but I don't really recall, and am too lazy to look it up.
If we don't look out for each other, a day will come when we stand alone and there is no one to look out for us. If the government could cooperate with the people a little more and rule a little less, we might find ourselves moving toward a more robust economy and social order.
IMHO, of course.
~A!
Jesus hit on that topic a time or two. So did Ezekiel:
"Behold, this was the iniquity of thy sister Sodom, pride, fulness of bread, and abundance of idleness was in her and in her daughters, neither did she strengthen the hand of the poor and needy. And they were haughty, and committed abomination before me: therefore I took them away as I saw good." (Ezekiel 16:49, 50)
And, considering the lead off yarn this AM on CBS was all about poor, poor Paris Hilton, well, it's beginning to look a lot like Sodom.......