JOB LOSSES….A headline at CNN blares:
Worst year for jobs since ’45
The LA Times follows suit. But come on, folks. This is completely bogus. I’m all for dramatizing just how grim our economic situation is, but you can’t use raw numbers like this in an era of rising population. The civilian labor force today is 40% larger than it was in 1982 and more than twice as large as it was in 1945. Job losses last year amounted to about 1.7% of the labor force, but in 1945 the equivalent number was nearly 5% and in 1982 it was nearly 2%.
Job losses last year were brutal, and if you count broader measures than the headline unemployment rate they were even grimmer. But there’s no need to use moron math to make it seem even worse than it is. “Worst since 1982” would have been fine.
