Naive Question: Job Growth in America
 

(and elsewhere if you have something to say :) )

When we hear of Job Growth ...does it relate to the number of jobs that are in existence, the number of jobs that have people doing them, or the number of people doing jobs? And is there any cut off point about how many hours are involved in each job?

The press articles I have seen (maybe fake maybe real....) seem to imply it's the number of jobs being done. But so many companies are saving money by only employing two part-timers rather than one full-timer for each position so they don't have to offer benefits, and so many people are working 2 or 3 "part-time" jobs to make ends meet..... I'm kind of wondering if "Job Growth" has any meaning at all?

This is the article that nudged my question. Generally I like the BBC's reporting and find it fair, but this seemed to be an article with an agenda. But that said, my experience at the job I had for 5 years until recently was that almost everyone but us full-time back office folks (and even one of them) had other jobs just to get by

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-51578045

http://www.businessdictionary.com/de...bs-growth.html

Hmm... only new payroll jobs, self employment isn't counted. You get what you measure...

Years ago I was surprised to read the headcount of unemployed is only people on the unemployment rolls. Once your benefits run out you drop out of sight and join the ranks of homeless, ghosts to the government. I wonder if that has changed?

No it hasn't

Works both ways: if you work at a cash job -- like you might at, say, a pawn shop -- and it is never reported to any government, that is also out of sight and does not count as employment.

It's one of the U-measures of employment/unemployment; there are others in that same system. I gather it doesn't take too much skull sweat to assess one measurement of unemployment numbers against another, and arrive at a satisfactory estimate. I seem to recall officially-cited unemployment stats were changed to this measure in Obama's second term.

Another of the U-measures adds the unemployed-benefits people together with the ones that for one reason or another have dropped out of even looking for work, for an aggregate total of non-employed right now.

For the last year in the Oxnard area there seems to be a Help Wanted Now Hiring sign in every shop window. This is in California, mind -- not a wildly business friendly place if it's not Silicon Valley or Hollywood -- to a lesser extent, oil. Four years ago it wasn't that way. Sacramento is the one-party abode of dumbshits.

The Dairy Queen by my house has a banner up offering $12/hour starting wage.

Nothing starts under $12 here. Everyone is hiring. But no-one is offering more than 20 hours/week or bennies

Yep.

Monster, research into how many technical type job openings are going unfilled.

There is one party out there that would rather you didn't do that.

(I've refused to vote for them for many years.)

why?

41% of recent, and 33.8% of all, college grads have jobs that don’t require a degree.