Mysteries of Employment Numbers in the USA

Employment Status, Household Data (000s)
	Jan	Feb	Change
Population	244,663	244,828	165
Civilian Labor Force	155,654	155,524	-130
Participation Rate	63.62%	63.52%	-0.10%
Employed	143,322	143,492	170
Unemployed	12,332	12,032	-300
Unemployment Rate	7.92%	7.74%	-0.19%

The chart above comes from this Calculated Risk post. If you like, click thru and real the CR blog’s commentary; it’s always worth a read.

For the EleBlog’s purposes here: The number of employed went up 170,000; the number of unemployed declined 300,000. How the F did that happen? If there were 300,000 more unemployed in January, then the presumption is that all 300,000 of them got jobs in February (temporary or full-time — whatever). The presumption has to be:

130,000 people who had jobs in January retired in February. Or died. Or left the country suddenly. Or won the lottery and walked away from work.

All things numerical should have an explanation. I’m not sure I understand what’s in the table.

Source: http://electricalcontractor.com/?p=8668

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