Jobs report gives Obama a last-minute lift
But like the presidential race itself, the strength of the recovery remains too close to call.
The last jobs report before the 2012 elections has given President Barack Obama a modest tailwind. Our Obamanometer reading is close to the highest level it's been at since we started tracking the economy's impact on the race in mid-September.
The Obamanometer seesawed between Obama and Romney for much of late September and early October. But since then, it has increasingly favored Obama, with the latest jobs report likely to anchor the needle on Obama's side during the last few days of the campaign. The report showed that the economy added 171,000 jobs in October, for a total of about 1.9 million so far in 2012.
Like mostly everything else in the economy, that's subpar but going in the right direction. Meanwhile, the unemployment rate for October drifted upward a notch, to 7.9 percent. But that's largely because more people are starting to look for work and are getting counted as unemployed before they actually find a job -- a typical trend during a recovery.
Most of the inputs that determine our Obamanometer reading have been following the same trend: They're not good enough, but at least they're getting better. Gas prices, now around $3.50 per gallon on average, have fallen nearly 30 cents over the past month, according to AAA. The stock market has yoyoed lately, but it's still up nearly 14% for the year. Most indicators show housing finally improving. Consumers are growing more confident, and some economists are beginning to predict buoyant holidays. The only consistently negative metric this fall has been inflation, and that is likely to moderate as gas prices come down and the spike in food prices caused by the summer drought abates.
The bottom line is that Obama can plausibly claim the economy is improving. And Republican challenger Mitt Romney can plausibly claim that it's happening too slowly. If those few key undecided voters have been looking for a strong swing one way or the other to help them sort out whom to vote for, they're not going to get it by Election Day. Like the election itself, the strength of the recovery remains too close to call.
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Unfortunately you may be right on this premise. The tragedy is that the electorate is grossly ignorant of the economic realities that determine the longer term economic health of our nation. The short term indicators you are using to spin for Obama plausibly claiming improvements in the economy are laughable to any reasonably informed person. I do however accept the fact that most of our populace are uninformed about the consequences of our debt, excessive regulations, projected layoffs, 14% real unemployment and corporations projections for reduced capital spending under another Obama presidency.
When nearly half of current college graduates are unable to balance a checkbook correctly, cant define the source of capital formation or accurately descibe how the market works, it is no wonder people on a large scale buy into the superficial indicators you reference.
Everyone would be much better served by listening to Steve Wynn, Mort Zucker, Ken Lagone, the presidents of Caterpillar, John Deere etc, etc. than opinion writers and talk show hosts in the tank for Obama. These are the peope with the most factual and credible insights on where weare and where we are headed.
RECOVERY-WHAT RECOVERY?
And all the people who lost jobs? Lots of companys laying people off like crazy.Also lots of people falling off the unemployment rolls due to them running out of benefits.
Theres so many articles trying to paint the president in a good light.People look around them and see the reality.And people see what your doing.Its disgusting.I guess there is no unbiased reporting anymore.
3 1/2 years later , just about anything is an improvement....13 million more on food stamps, UE at 7.9% only because another 5% ran out of benefits, $6 trillion more in debt. 5 jobs for every million of taxpayer money spent. Grow dependency , grow the democrat party. Obumbles sure is doing that.
If anyone cares to do some simple math, go to BLS website and subtract the revisions to their reports since Obama took office and you wil discover that there is a net loss of 160,000 jobs during his tenure.
THERE ARE NO NEW JOBS UNDER OBAMA. MSNBC, OBAMA CAMPAIGN, AND HIS SUPPORTERS NEED TO QUIT LYING AND THE AMERCAN WISE UP.
I CHALLENGE YOU ALL TO DEAL WITH REALITY AND DROP THE FANTASY.
DO THE MATH FOR YOURSELF.
LIes, lies and more lies, especially the latest attack on the embassy.
He wouldn't know the truth if it bit him, but he wouldn't care either. Mr transparency won't release any of his own records. That tells you everything you need to know, he has so much to hide. i HATE THE LAME STREAM MEDIA and their liberal nonsense reporting. BO says don't trust
Romney? He should watch videos of his 2008 lies **** hope and change (I hope I am elected and I will change this country into third world).
If you are in a dumpster buried in trash, you get used to the smell. If you make it to the top of the pile the view is allot better, but you are still in a dumpster. It's a horrible place to be,...... and that is our economy! Your optimism on how good things are puts great reliance on micromovements of largely weak positive indicators.
This article & MSN fail to see the big picture..............Your Obamanator and our economy are still in the Dumpster!
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