As Donald Trump surrendered America’s leadership in the fight to protect the planet (and human rights) from climate change, he repeated the same boostery bushwah that he gave in Saudi Arabia about the great economic boost he’s achieved in four months of chaotic nongovernance:
Trump was talking up his jobs record as he withdrew from the Paris climate agreement — a deal he described as a jobs-killer. Here’s the president’s exact quote on jobs:
“Before we discuss the Paris Accord, I’d like to begin with an update on our tremendous, absolutely tremendous economic progress since Election Day on November 8th. The economy has started to come back and very, very rapidly. We’ve added $3.3 trillion in stock market value to our economy and more than a million private sector jobs” [Heather Long, “Trump Takes Credit for 1 Million Jobs. Not True,” CNN: Money, 2017.06.02].
The Bureau of Labor Statistics issued the latest jobs figures this morning. The May 2017 show that, “Since January, the unemployment rate has declined by 0.5 percentage point, and the number of unemployed has decreased by 774,000.”
According to BLS, May job growth was below the average for the past year: “Total nonfarm payroll employment increased by 138,000 in May, compared with an average monthly gain of 181,000 over the prior 12 months.” That includes January jobs, two thirds of which, if we are going to buy into the dubious notion of crediting Presidents with jobs, we must apportion to President Barack Obama.
The labor force participation rate in May was 62.7%. 37.3% of Americans are choosing not to look for work, about the same as throughout the past year.
BLS has revised down the job creation numbers for April and March. So whatever exaggerations Trump made about his magical job-creating abilities following the March and April reports are even more exaggerated now.
Monthly job creation so far this year is below the average number of jobs created each month in the previous three years.
And as for that fantasy about bringing America back by sending us all back down to work in the coal mines, Donald Trump’s caveman thinking doesn’t make economic sense. Mining jobs continue to increase, but the 6,000 additional mining jobs appearing in May, mostly in support services, is a meager fraction of the meager 138,000 new jobs for the month…
…and they aren’t enough to make up for the 9,000 jobs lost in government services, job losses more directly attributable to Donald Trump’s actions than any private-sector hiring this year.
Donald Trump’s claim to create a million jobs is like my telling my mom that I’ve cleaned my room when all that has happened is that the wind cleaned all the papers off my desk while I dumped more dirty laundry in my closet.
CH,
You know better than this. The closer we get to full employment both the absolute and percentage gains decrease. Obama started with high unemployment numbers so both absolute and percentage gains were easier to attain. Promote your guy using legitimate arguments and not presenting numbers not in context.
Drumpf has done zero to help the numbers out at all. He pats himself on the back for the efforts of those who came before.
Carrier of Indiana-Drumpf took credit for saving jobs there, are sending those jobs to Mexico. Haven’t heard a word out of Drumpf for the millions of incentive bucks down the drain.
Or is this Obama’s fault, Troy?
Face it, Troy. You of the wingnut persuasion cannot govern, you have zero clues as to how the economy works and basically all wingnuts can do is obstruct Dems when they straighten out wingnut messes.
Why it takes Dems to point out wingnut failures is beyond me, but someone needs to.
Good thing whatever you have MFI isn’t contagious over the internet. Must be a hard life you are living.
truth. not contagious
The rift in the Larsen C ice shelf has grown by 10.6 miles in just six days, Antarctica.
The news comes on the same day that Trump announced he would pull his country out of the Paris Agreement to limit climate change… it is widely accepted that warming ocean and atmospheric temperatures were a factor in the disintegration of Larsen A and Larsen B.
I have empirical evidence on my side, Troy. You got fancy words to obfuscate.
There are decades of fiscal facts proving Dems can raise taxes on the wealthy, grow the economy, put people to work and not jack up debt and deficits because Dems are fiscally responsible and raise revenues to pay for new programs.
Wingnuts cut taxes for the wealthiest, screw the poor and pretend like debt and deficits don’t matter when they have the keys to the treasury and trillions in unaccounted spending to luxuriate in.
MFI,
CH is a math major and his use of these numbers are misleading, when used properly it doesn’t support the thesis of this post, and he knows better. He probably could have gotten where he wanted without these numbers or maybe other numbers. I’m just calling him out for bad math.
Of the 138000 new jobs, 90000 needed to keep up with population growth.
http://jobsanger.blogspot.com/2017/06/unemployment-rate-for-may-falls-by-01.html
Interesting charts and very pretty, too.
Troy: “The closer we get to full employment both the absolute and percentage gains decrease.”
So, who brought the US economy back from a near depression to nearly full employment, so that the Trump apologists could have this excuse for their poor performance on job creation? Oh, let’s see if we can recall who that was. Wasn’t that the guy who killed all those jobs with Dodd-Frank regulations, tighter regulations on coal, voluntary carbon reduction goals? Wasn’t that the guy who bailed out the failing US auto industry?
Funny how you Republicans forget about all those millions of people laying on their beds in assisted living and not participating in the job market. Obama’s job accomplishments were continually disparaged because he didn’t get the Alzheimer’s patients to work. Now your guy is saddled with the task to improve these figures, which he said would be “easy,” just like 4 percent growth. Stop making excuses. Math and things like “facts” aren’t supposed to be excuses for your Dear Leader not counting those folks in his job figures. Come on, Troy, act like a real Spicy and tell us things are great, because Trump says they are.
Don,
I have no intention of debating the issues you raise. We are not going to agree on this matter. However, it doesn’t excuse Cory mis-presenting numbers in a manner which is deceptive. And, Cory as a math major knows better.
Well, there is no debating these points, as Troy admits. For eight years Obama did the heavy lifting with very little Republican help. Republicans drove the economy into the ditch, then stood around and bitched when Obama pushed it out.
No Republican help to save the US auto industry. No Republican help with stimulus. Without those policies, we would have been in a depression. But that’s what the Republicans wanted. They wanted good paying union jobs to go away. They wanted people so desperate that they would go to work for half what they were making before so that the fat cat Republican blowhard CEOs could make even more money. The jobs that count for them don’t involve actual work. The jobs they value involve those who sit in an air conditioned office around a nice maple table firing people. There could have been a quicker recovery and faster job growth, but the Republican Party actively tried to sabotage Obama’s economic success at almost every turn.
Trump doesn’t know squat about how to create jobs. He creates chaos, and chaos is not a great formula for job growth. Ask Syria.
Clever troy. Howz it feel to loose credibility. Not a math major I can see your fallicy But Iam NOT debating it :)