September 2012 Jobs Numbers Summary

September Jobs Reports & Summaries--  Also quick comments on media buzz:

• If the administration had the ability to manipulate the jobs data, why would they have waited until now to do so?  Every time the jobs numbers look good, some people speculate that someone is "cooking the books".  
• "The Labor Force is the smallest it has ever been."  No.. The Labor Force is the largest it has ever been, with over 155,000,000 people either working or looking for work over the last few months.
• "The Labor Force Participation Rate is the lowest it has ever been".  Not true either.  It is the lowest it has been since the early 80's, but there's a reason for most of that lack of participation:  Baby Boomers are retiring in droves.  And the number of people 55+ is the fastest growing segment of this population.  We also have many more young people in school than we did 20 or 30 years ago.  Of course, the economy is still recovering but, even at full employment, we'd still have a low labor participation rate.   

• September 2012 Jobs Numbers Summary
• Private, government jobs gained, lost under Obama (September 2012 update)
• Jobs Lost/Created Year by Year Since 1999 (September 2012 Update)
• Private/government Jobs by Month for 2011 & 2012 (Updated for September)
• Debate Fact Check on Jobs HERE!
• ADP Report for September: 162,000 more jobs

• September Summary: Report shows increases in both total jobs, private-sector jobs, and government jobs.  Unemployment is down  as almost a million more people reported themselves as employed.  (This report shows a smaller increase than was reported by  the ADP private jobs report which was released Wednesday.  The ADP report showed an increase of  162,000 private sector jobs.)   
• Economy adds 114,000 jobs; almost exactly the number of new jobs that were predicted.  Private sector jobs increase by 104,000; government jobs actually increased this month by 10,000.  (The new total number of jobs does NOT include the benchmark revisions that were released last week by the BLS.)
• 200,000 more jobs reported this month than last when including upward revisions from the last two months.  When adding the 386,000 jobs that were not previously counted and were discovered in the benchmark revisions, we have 586,000 more jobs than we thought we had a month ago.
• Unemployment decreases significantly to 7.8% as fewer people report themselves as unemployed.  This is equivalent to the unemployment rate when Obama took office.   Over 873,000 more people report themselves as employed.    456,000 fewer people reported themselves as unemployed and 418,000 people entered the work force.  
• Manufacturing jobs decrease by 16,000; private service-producing jobs increase by 114,000.   
• Unemployment rates for all ethnic and age groups declined significantly.  Unemployment rates for young people 16-19 declined 0.9%; unemployment among young people 20-24 declined 1.5%. Unemployment among white young people declined 1.6%, unemployment among young black people 16-19 declined 1.2%.  Unemployment among black women 20+ declined 1.1%.  Unemployment among Asians declined 0.9%, and unemployment among Hispanic young people 16-19 declined 1.2%.  Unemployment among young people 20-24 declined 1.5%.  
• Employment increased the most among people 20-24 and 25-34 years of age.  In particular, employment increased the most among women 20-24 and 25-34 years of age.
• 838,000 more full-time workers this month; 26,000 fewer part-time workers.  We have 2,747,000 more full-time workers than we had a year ago.
• Number of self-employed workers bounced back up this month; and we now have 500,000 more self-employed workers than we did a year ago. 
• 1,800,000 fewer people unemployed than a year ago;  2,000,000 more jobs than we had a year ago.
• 4.6 million more jobs than at the "trough" of the recession (including benchmark revisions); 5.2 million more private sector jobs than at the "trough" of the recession (including benchmark revisions).