Well, yeah, I’m jaded when it comes to government employment data.  In the balance of things, though, I don’t think I’m as jaded as the mainstream media folks are not jaded enough when it comes to proclaiming the “lowest unemployment in five years” and 200,000+ job growth.

The bottom line is that the national employment figures for November are strange.  Employment and labor force (i.e., employed + unemployed) both decreased comparably from September to October (735,000 and 720,000, respectively).  From October to November, however, employment went up 818,000 while labor force went up only 455,000.

A big chunk of these results has to do with the government furlough, due to the shutdown, in October.  From October to November, people counted as unemployed because they were on temporary lay-offs dropped by 377,000.  At the same time, the number of people unemployed for less than five weeks went down by 300,000.

In other words, it looks like the number of people who were newly unemployed went up.  16,000 completed temporary jobs; 32,000 left their jobs.  Add to this the facts that 44,000 fewer people returned to the labor force than did the previous month and 58,000 fewer people entered the labor force for the first time.  Meanwhile, both the labor participation rate and the employment-to-population ratio remain down from a year ago. (All numbers seasonally adjusted to be comparable month to month.)

All told, it looks like once you account for the government shutdown, the story is the same-old same-old: Improvement in the unemployment rate is an indication of continuing decline, not of growth.  People are giving up.