Productivity Plunges [?]

Tyler Durden reports 366,000 new claims for unemployment benefits:

As is the case every Thursday, the BLS reported its weekly initial claims which unlike two weeks ago did not estimate the initial unemployment claims for America's most populous state when the number plunged, and has now missed expectations for two weeks in a row, printing at 366K, on expectations of a 360K number, while last week's 368K was as usual revised upward to 371K. As a result, the Mainspin Media already has its headline: Initial Claims decline by 5,000. Such is life under the US Department of Truth, even as unadjusted initial claims spiked by 16.7K to 386K in the week ended February 2.

 

The BIG News, however, is about productivity:

... it was widely expected that productivity would drop. It did, but it did so far more than most expected, plunging by a whopping 2% ...

 

Apparently, "output" and "hours worked" both went up, but they were offset by a rise in "unit labor costs." Some suggest this reveals ObamaCare kicking in, while others attribute the rise in labor costs to "bonus-type pay prior to the fiscal cliff."  

In other words, your guess is as good as mine? Moving on now to the comments section, which rarely disappoints. So Zap Powerz sez to GolfHatesMe:

Golf, Why work at all when the fed can just print all the money we need to run the government?  The fed should just send everyone a million bucks a year to "stimulate the economy".  No one has to show up for work, we can all just go spend money in stores where no one is working.  Oh, wait....

But seriously, if the fed can just print money and create wealth with ctrl + P why do we have to annoy ourselves with work?

 

Mike in GA writes:

The lying shills of the msm are sickening.  The lack of any journalistic search for objectivity is embarassing.  The press was once the pit bull at the ankles of the powerful...now they're the toy poodle in their pockets - fed treats and trotted out for propaganda purposes only.

Oh yeah, and coverups for the 'progressives' (Menendez, etc) and public damnation and vilification of their opponents.

 

The Gooch agrees and notes that   the MSM is now "SM," State Media.

 

Also this morning:

Obama Appears Sleepy, Chews Nicorette at Prayer Breakfast

Comments

[Mannie Sherberg]

Productivity is the measure of how much bang a company gets for its buck -- or, in the robotalk dear to economists, how much output it gets from its input. If, indeed, shrinking productivity becomes the norm, and if the reason for the shrinkage proves to be rising labor costs, we're going to see an increasing number of layoffs -- for the good and simple reason that the quickest and easiest way to reduce labor costs is to get rid of laborers. If all of this happens, then we'll obviously see those unemployment numbers rise once again above 400,000. Conclusion: those rosy economic scenarios we've been hearing of late are as phony as Bernie Madoff's promises. Our economy is sick. and Obama -- a quack doctor if there ever was one -- hasn't a clue as to how to cure it.