Jobapalooza

20K jobs lost in January, but the unemployment rate down to 9.7%.  617,000 additional jobs lost in 2009 from downward revision in figures.  The reality is a bunch of Americans fell out of the labor force calculations as they've simply stopped looking for work, and BLS redid their benchmark stats.  2.5 million Americans have fallen out of the labor pool since this time last year.  This of course means the unemployment rate has gone down since these 2.5 million people out of work are no longer counting against the rate.

Hence the fall in the unemployment rates is ledger domain legerdemain.  The big clue?  U-6 down from 17.3% to 16.5% at the new scale "seasonally adjusted".  Unadjusted?  Shot up to 18.0%.  (Unadjusted U-3?  10.6%.  Scary as hell.)

There's your alarm bells, kids.  We took it in the pants last month.  There's your real unemployment rate. Eighteen percent and rising.

And 2010 will continue to get worse.

[UPDATE 9:15 AM] The Kroog reminds us that economics is not an exact science, especially with unemployment numbers being really just nifty statistical guesses.  Also, Tyler Durden flags those same unadjusted U3 and U6 figures and notes they are record highs.

Not good at all.