Wisconsin Jobs: New Numbers

It's unfortunate when good news for the people of Wisconsin is denied for political purposes.

Numbers that reveal the state experienced gains rather than losses in the job market is something that should please everyone.

Tom Barrett and the Democrats and their media mouthpieces are fighting the figures and whining about their release.

Good economic news for Wisconsin is bad news for Tom Barrett's political prospects. So, they're not happy.

From the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel:

In an unusual effort to rebut bad news on the jobs front, the Walker administration is speeding up release of new numbers showing job gains rather than job losses in Wisconsin last year.

The numbers come from a source familiar to many economists but one that hasn't figured until now in the state's highly politicized jobs debate heading into the June 5 recall election: the Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages.

The new figures, provided to the Journal Sentinel on Tuesday, cover the final three months of 2011.

State officials said they show a gain of 23,321 jobs (public and private) between December 2010 and December 2011, which represents Gov. Scott Walker's first full year in office.

That stands in sharp contrast to a commonly used and widely reported monthly jobs measure, the Current Employment Survey, which earlier this year showed an estimated loss of 33,900 jobs in Wisconsin for the same 12-month period.

Job numbers are reported in different ways, based on different sources, and it's been common throughout the current recovery for different data to tell different stories.

But in this case, one set of well-publicized numbers (from the Current Employment Survey of businesses) put Wisconsin at the very bottom of 50 states in job creation during Walker's first year. These figures were based on a sample of 3.5% of the state's employers and are subject to significant revisions.

The other numbers, from the Quarterly Census, tell a more positive story, one the Walker administration is in a hurry to get out. They are based on a jobs count, not a survey. Each state gathers the quarterly census data from virtually all employers in both the public and private sectors, which are mandated to share staff and wage data as part of their tax and unemployment insurance reports. That makes it a more reliable source of employment data, state officials and many economists say.

At the same time, it's highly unusual for a state to release this kind of data on its own before it is reviewed and officially released by the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics.

It's "highly unusual" to release the figures, according to the Journal Sentinel.

So what?

The new figures paint a far more accurate picture of Wisconsin's economic reality.

It's too bad that Barrett and the Democrats don't like reality, and that it messes up their "Wisconsin is dead last in job creation" mantra.

Is it a political move on the part of the Walker administration?

There's no question there may be political benefits for Scott Walker. But there's also no question that the sooner the truth about Wisconsin's economic situation gets out the better it is for the state's future by encouraging others to have confidence in growing their businesses in Wisconsin, too.

...Secretary of Workforce Development Reggie Newson denied in an interview Tuesday that the early release of the data was an effort to shape public opinion before the June 5 election.

"We have a responsibility to the job creators, the employers and the job-seekers . . . to make sure they have an accurate depiction of the true economic situation in the state of Wisconsin. They need this information to be accurate so they can make informed decisions. That's why we are correcting the record," said Newson. He called the previously released data showing job losses in Wisconsin "volatile, imprecise" and "unreliable" even though the Walker campaign is using the monthly data in TV ads because it shows job growth in early 2012.

It's far better to rely on "data from virtually all employers in both the public and private sectors" than figures "based on a sample of 3.5% of the state's employers."

Even the Tom Barrett mouthpiece Journal Sentinel admits the figures from the sample are "subject to significant revisions."

Consider them revised.

Scott Walker did nothing wrong by releasing the figures.

...Economists generally laud the validity of the quarterly census figures, which are time-consuming to compile. One reason they don't figure as prominently in the political debate over jobs is the six-month reporting time lag.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics uses the quarterly census data to make revisions to the monthly survey data in order to retroactively clean up the inaccuracies that stem from extrapolation.

"The quarterly (census) data is much more reliable," said Brian Jacobsen, an economist in Menomonee Falls with Wells Fargo Funds Management. "If that one's showing job gains, that's going to be tough to argue with. It's a census as opposed to just a sample. That's a reason why that survey is used for benchmarking purposes."

Unlike most employment data, which is the property of the federal government, each state's quarterly census data belongs to the states, according to the bureau.

That gave the Walker administration leeway with the quarterly data, which the governor seized. The early release amounts to a rare action that breaches tradition but doesn't violate any agreements between the bureau and the state, officials at the U.S. agency said Tuesday.

By convention, states nearly always wait for the national release - or at least until the federal authorities review and revise the state data, a process meant to weed out mistakes that usually involve small changes.

Asked if Wisconsin broke any rules, bureau officials responded via email: "No, BLS does not have any concerns. Wisconsin is free to publish its data when it wishes."

No problem.

There's no wrongdoing, other than the fact the Journal Sentinel didn't tell the reader that until paragraph 23 of the article.

The only thing to see here is that Barrett and his allies are whining that the job situation in Wisconsin is brighter than the 3.5% sample revealed.

The Democrats' complaining about the early release of the data makes them appear very small and very selfish.

"Wisconsin has gained jobs since Scott Walker took office and he's telling people about it. No fair! Waaaaaaaah!"

Pathetic.