We are losing our economic statistics

[Walt]

A huge amount has changed in the labor market, and in society in general. I, like many Americans, no longer have a landline that I can be called at. Many Americans work gig jobs, from home, or other things different from our parents. Some of these jobs do not even pay Social Security up front, so there is no way for the government to even know they existed until taxes are filed. If taxes are not filed, it is an under-the-table job, and does not count in employment numbers, but that is a totally different thing.

In the last 30 years, the BLS' budget has been cut in half in terms of inflation adjusted dollars. Now trump has fired a third of their staff, so we are in even worse shape.

At a time the BLS should be figuring out new ways of doing things, they are so understaffed they cannot even do things the old way. This is a disaster.

 

[cawacko]

Gig work is definitely harder to measure in real time. Remote jobs are usually counted like any other payroll job, so they are not really the issue. And under the table work is not new. That has always been part of the economy.

A big part of the challenge is that fewer people answer government surveys at all. Since most people no longer have landlines and cell phones are harder to reach, BLS has a tougher time getting responses. People ignore surveys more than they used to, so response rates keep falling.

On top of that, budget and staffing limits have kept BLS from modernizing data collection the way it should. That is why we keep seeing later revisions. It is not just about the types of jobs. It is also about fewer people responding and slower data coming in.

I agree that we need to modernize how we gather the data. If that doesn’t happen, these revisions and questions about accuracy will just keep repeating.