Obama's top intelligent official a complete idiotFollow

While Gbaji is a tad off, he's much closer than you are. Most economists agree that 4/4.5% is ideal unemployment.



Edited, Dec 23rd 2010 5:10pm by Kastigir

Nearly every economist in the world disagrees with you. And while we can ****** over the exact number that is considered "ideal", it absolutely is above 0% (I'm not aware of anyone who places it below 4% in fact).

If unemployment is too low it starts producing negative economic effects. I know that your simplistic view of economics appears to be restricted to whether people have jobs or not, but there really are other factors and those factors do start to matter more under certain conditions (like not enough labor available for any new ventures to work).



Setting the language butchery aside, the reported unemployment rate *does* account for people who are 18 and still on college, or who are retired, etc. If it didn't, the real unemployment rate would be much much higher. Unemployment (in this context) is the number of people who are actively looking for a job but who do not currently have one. I'm not sure if you just wrote it wrong, or honestly don't understand what we're measuring here.



Ideal is exactly the correct term. Just because you don't know this doesn't make it any less true.




Yes. But that also means that if you want to open up a new business, there might not be enough people with the correct skills you need for you to do it. This stifles economic growth.


I get what you are trying to say. However, the basic unemployment rate doesn't really tell us what you think it does. Ideally, we want unemployment around 5% (some argue lower, but that's a matter of opinion), and we want the period of unemployment to be short on average (3 months is pretty good). Low unemployment with long periods is worse than higher unemployment with shorter periods. The reason for this is because there's nothing wrong with someone quitting or being fired if they can get another job within a few months. In fact, that is an indicator of a healthy economy since people are able to shift their employment around and potentially improve their lot in life.

We're much better off if 6% of the people are unemployed, but it takes that 6% an average of 2-3 months to get a new jobs than if only 3% are unemployed, but it takes a year on average to get a replacement. It's not as simple as just looking at the unemployment rate itself.



Also a broader point which you seem to be utterly unaware of, is that this is a range. Unemployment will naturally shift and change within a few percent range all the time, often for reasons that are hard to predict and even harder to control. That range tends to historically be between 4% and 7%. Within that range, we generally view the employment situation to be relatively normal. It's when we get too far outside that range that we should start to worry. That's why a 7.7%, while not "great", isn't something to panic about all by itself (there were other far more troubling indicators at that time). 9.8% is much more problematic. At that point, unemployment rate isn't just an indicator of other economic factors, but now starts to become a causative factor itself. We start to see negative economic effects because of the high unemployment rate itself.

That's why the increase in unemployment since Obama took office is more of a problem than the rate increase prior to that time. It's also why all of the shifts during the Bush/Clinton/Bush presidencies that you have been screaming about are completely pointless. Those are normal shifts and all within a normal range. Your lack of understanding of what employment rates mean drive you to place great weight on things that don't matter, while ignoring the real problems.


You really need to educate yourself.

Edited, Dec 23rd 2010 3:43pm by gbaji

But 4%/5% doesn't represent room to grow. It as was said represent people moving between jobs, people fresh to the workforce, people still in school but not working, people waiting for retirement but not working. It is a number based on uncontrolled variables. Essentially it represents the lowest realistic number, but it is not Ideal.

For example Clinton had several months under 4%, majority of the time under 5% the economy was much better off during his presidency than it was under Bush who had near 5% on AVG during his presidency, only to have it implode.

I am not arguing that 4/5% is a great representation. I am arguing your opinion that 6%,7% is better than 4%,3% When the evidence of history clearly supports the opposite.

You sir need to learn how nationwide economics work, not personal wealth or economic power. Christ.

I'm going to take a stab and assume you missed this part.

These would be some of the negative economic factors that Gbaji was talking about.

Because Varus is projecting again.