Wednesday, May 16, 2012

Scott Walker: The Kathy Nickolaus Of Job Creators

Walker ciphering those new job numbers
Scott Walker is pulling all the stops on the extent he will lie to the voters in order to keep his job, at least until he is indicted.

The latest gimmick is that Walker is now claiming to have calculated the jobs numbers in a "more accurate" manner.  What Walker wants us to believe is that during the first year of his abbreviated term as governor, he didn't really lose 34,000 jobs, but had actually created 23,000.  And how convenient it is that he just so happened to do this three weeks before the recall election.

Whoo, boy! Where to start?

Did he pull a Kathy Nickolaus and find those jobs in an unsealed bag in the back of his closet?  Or did he really help create those jobs and forgot to hit the save button?

But seriously now, Walker's got some problematic issues regarding this claim.

First of all, even if one were to give Walker the benefit of the doubt on this, and ignore the fact that it doesn't allow a comparison to other states which have been shown to be doing much better than Wisconsin, it doesn't help him much:
Even using the more positive numbers from the quarterly census of businesses, the governor finished his first year just a fraction of the way toward meeting his target of 250,000 private-sector jobs in four years.

"It would certainly be nice if the particular year saw a 1% increase rather than a 1% decrease, but this remains a slow jobs recovery using anyone's numbers," said John Heywood, an economics professor at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.
But one would have to overlook a lot of things to go as far as giving him the benefit of the doubt.

For example, Walker has a notoriously bad time whenever it comes to numbers and math. Not only that, he's tried to do a similar stunt before and got busted out on it.

In 2009, when Walker was Milwaukee County Executive and prepping for his run for governor, he wanted to show that he had some real fiscal acuity, he started the year claiming a huge deficit and ended it with a huge surplus. But this miraculous $24 million turnaround was easily proven to be a lie:
In 2009, Scott Walker declared a fiscal emergency, stating that Milwaukee County faced a $15 million deficit. In order to address this, he ordered all county workers to start on a reduced work week schedule. This meant that all workers would only be putting in 35 hours per week instead of the standard 40 hours.

The arbitrator also found that Walker failed to prove that there was even a fiscal emergency, when an analysis by the county's auditor, Jerome Heer, found that there was only a minimal deficit, if even that. This was later reinforced when Walker claimed a $24 million turnaround resulting in a supposed $9 million surplus.
It should be noted that the supposed surplus from that year is coincidentally just about the same amount that the county "saved" by Walker's illegal furloughs, so that surplus has been basically wiped out.

Another problem with Walker's claim, if you really, really want to believe him is how those jobs came about.  This is something we have discussed before and is clearly illustrated in this chart:


As you can clearly see, the job growth phase of 2011 came when Governor Jim Doyle's budget and policies were still in effect.  It was only when Walker's policies like Act 10 took effect that the job losses started happening.  And as you can see in the chart, once the effects of Walker's budget started kicking in, the job loss accelerated.

So when Walker is saying that there was a job growth in 2011, what he is really saying is that he didn't lose as many jobs as what the Bureau of Labor Statistics numbers show.

Wouldn't make that a great slogan for Walker's campaign in these final weeks?

"Yeah, I suck at creating jobs! But just not as much as you think I suck!"

23 comments:

  1. Scott Walker is shameless.

    Minor typo:jobs numbers in a "more accurate" >>manor<<. SB manner.

    Scott Walker tells the truth to those who live in manors.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Scott Walker tells the truth to those who live in manors.

      Well, if you think about it, that's a true statement.

      Delete
  2. If I made that same typo I would be called illiterate! Thanks for the laugh

    ReplyDelete
  3. Sorry, your typos are seldom meaningful puns. Palli

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    1. I thought the whole article was sattire. Kind of like reading the onion. But that was the only line meant to be funny?

      Delete
    2. IMBAR- I thought you were the cut rate comic sidekick...

      Delete
    3. Yes, but I am going to unionize. And when collective bargaining comes back I will have a say in the content here.

      Delete
    4. You already do. You just left a comment, didn't you? Have a good day.

      Delete
  4. It's hilarious watching liberal heads explode over this! Say what you want, but these new numbers are based on hard data from employers, not the tiny sampling from a survey. The employers are required by law to provide accurate information.

    Thank you, Governor Walker!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Actually-Walker's number came from him calling HOMES, the national numbers come from businesses. http://www.forbes.com/sites/rickungar/2012/05/15/scott-walker-magically-turns-dismal-wisconsin-job-numbers-into-a-pre-election-miracle/

      Thanks!

      Delete
    2. Too bad you didn't read the entire article. The numbers Walker used do not come from the Current Population Survey. They come from the Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages, which includes hard data from 95% of the state's businesses.

      Delete
    3. You mean, "Thank you, Governor Doyle!" It was his policy that created jobs in 2011, as the chart proves.

      Delete
  5. So you are not doubting the validity of the good news, you are whining about Walker releasing it now. That should tell us all we need to know.

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    Replies
    1. Next time, try reading the article before you go and prove yourself the fool.

      Delete
  6. IbelieveanythingtheytellmetoMay 16, 2012 at 9:43 AM

    I guess it must be true - Walker said it, and he never lies.

    ReplyDelete
  7. I would believe Scott Walker before I ever trust a WEAC or AFCSME member to tell the truth

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  8. "I would believe Scott Walker before I ever trust a WEAC or AFCSME member to tell the truth."

    Amen!

    ReplyDelete
  9. You are mentally unstable, or a compulsive liar. Which is to say, a typical Walker supporter.

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  10. I love how the right wing fanatics, out of a desire to defend Walker's terrible record, would impugn every teacher and public employee in the state. They are so firmly committed to the Walker administration they find it easier to call tens of thousands of people liars collectively rather than face the simple truth that Scott Walker, a career politician with a court record showing a long history of ethical lapses and public deception, might have misrepresented data even in the face of documentary evidence. What happened to basic respect and a little intellectual honesty?

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    1. You have to admit they did bring some of this mistrust upon themselves, how many years did we have to endure "its about the children". I'm sorry the unions lost some benefits, but other than the early retirements (which isn't an option for most real world employees) I haven't heard of any of them leaving for a better job in the private sector. An unbiased person could clearly see how collective bargaining made it impossible for government to get smaller when budget constraints required it to.
      And as usual, the truth about jobs lies somewhere in the middle of the gop and dem. claims. What I like is that the budget is balanced without raising taxes. The jobs will come.

      Delete
    2. Nope, all I have to admit is that this comment of yours ranks up their with some of your most illogical all-timers in your pantheon of post, imustberacist.

      But I'm not going to bother this time in trying to edjicatify you. You're just not worth it.

      Delete
    3. I know lots of private sector workers that retired early through severance packages, etc.

      I could give you the names of hundreds of Milwaukee County Workers who left for the private sector to make more money.

      And, the budget's not balanced, taxes went up as did the number of state workers.

      Sorry, this ain't an echo-chamber. You're lies don't stand.

      Delete
    4. Really? Hundreds in the past year? The point was that because of act 10 the government isn't having trouble hiring enough workers.
      If your trying to convince me that public workers are being under compensated you have a long way to go. And it seems the majority of the voters agree with me.
      I am hoping Barrett tries to use your message of taxes went up and the budget is not balanced.
      Anom.- I'm glad I am not as closed minded as you are, or too lazy to create a screen name to identify myself. Capper makes some good points from time to time, but he should be called out to explain his bias from time to time. And to his credit he does just that.
      But, apparently you have given up trying to justify your bias.

      Delete