Networks Miss the Revision: 810,000 Added Jobs

October 9th, 2006 1:07 PM

     It takes a lot of effort to miss 810,000 new jobs. The Labor Department managed it, but at least they corrected the problem. The networks have over-reported job losses and now this huge piece of good news got lost in the shuffle.

     The October 8 Washington Post highlighted the incredible revision. “Unemployment is down to 4.6 percent, the lowest in five years, the Labor Department reported, adding with some embarrassment that it had suddenly discovered an estimated 810,000 net new jobs that it had somehow overlooked in the year ended in March,” wrote Steven Pearlstein.

     The networks made no mention of the change, which increased the Bush job record to 6.6 million new jobs since August 2003. In all, that's 37 straight months of positive job growth -- averaging nearly 180,000 jobs per month.

     So much for the jobless recovery.

     This report shows just another example of how the media downplay good news to make the economy look bad when it isn’t. To read more go to: http://www.businessandmedia.org/articles/2006/20061009123227.aspx