Peter Homitz – 7/23/06

This page was last updated on July 23, 2006.

Figures don’t lie; liars figure; Peter Homitz; Beaver County Times; July 23, 2006.

Below is a detailed critique of the subject letter.

“I thought I understood facts and figures, then I read Nikola (Nick) Drobac’s letter (‘What about the unemployed?’ July 12).

“He pointed out that Bush reported American companies created 150,000 new jobs in June, but that the U.S. Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics stated that the United States created 121,000 jobs in June. Combined that equals 271,000 new jobs.

“Those figures are tremendous, but misleading. Drobac further pointed out that the BLS also reported that there were 7 million unemployed Americans in June - and there were - but Mr. Drobac left out some pertinent facts.

“He did not show the BLS breakdown of those unemployment figures. He failed to acknowledge that millions are always on unemployment roles, because they are the lame, the halt, the blind and otherwise physically incapacitated or mentally challenged, and then some people who absolutely refuse to work.

“Would you believe that Nick?

“Paragraph four is the real reason for this letter: ‘Anyone who has taken an entry-level college economics class knows that full employment is achieved when the unemployment rate falls below 4 percent.’

“I would like to have a copy of that textbook.

“I was taught (in Economics 101) that even during the height of World War II, when all able bodied men, women and children on farms were asked to work for the war effort, that the unemployment rate never got below 4.8 percent. Today it is 4.6. Bush is doing something correctly.”

[RWC] Instead of relying on what he was allegedly taught in Economics 101, Mr. Homitz should have checked the BLS historical unemployment statistics. While the stats only go back as far as 1948, they clearly show periods when the unemployment rate was below 4.0%. With the exception of five months in 2000, these periods were during the post-World War II through Korean War era and during the late 1960s at the height of the Vietnam War and our space exploration activity.

“The rest of his letter is all nonsense about the economy, inflation, etc. Several of his statements contradicted each other, which goes to prove, figures don’t lie, but liars figure.”

[RWC] As I covered in my critique of Mr. Drobac’s letter, I agree it was a lot of nonsense. That said, I’ll never trust anything I read from Mr. Homitz either because it appears he doesn’t do his research.