Searching for the truth on the jobs issue

A very interesting article in the Boston Globe - “What the jobless statistics don’t reveal” – tries to reconcile the vast gap between the payroll survey and the household survey of employment.

When properly interpreted, the two surveys together reveal the real emerging story line: Unable to find regular payroll employment, many workers are accepting second choice self-employment, contract labor, or off-the-books work arrangements. In other words, the growth in nonformal payroll employment over the past two years has acted as a labor market safety valve. American workers are finding that for now, their best and maybe only alternative lies somewhere between a regular wage and salary job and unemployment.

I can speak from experience here. Last year, my wife “quit” her job at a nearby university to do the same work as a “consultant” (this was done voluntarily for personal reasons that I won’t detail here). So she no longer appears on the university’s payroll but collects a paycheck nonetheless. She is not unemployed, despite what the Democrats choose to believe.