Many people reading a NYT article on a series of Greek court decisions rejecting government austerity measures were probably surprised to see the comment that:
“According to analysts, the decisions could upend Mr. Samaras’s progress in putting the economy back on track.”
It’s not clear what progress these analysts have in mind. The Greek economy shrank at a 1.1 percent annual rate in the most recent quarter. While it is projected to show modest (0.6 percent) growth for the year as a whole, the most recent projections from the I.M.F. show the economy will still be 10 percent smaller than its pre-recession level in 2019, the last year covered. These projections don’t show the unemployment rate falling below 20 percent until 2017. It is worth noting that I.M.F. projections for Greece have consistently proven to be overly optimistic.
Many people reading a NYT article on a series of Greek court decisions rejecting government austerity measures were probably surprised to see the comment that:
“According to analysts, the decisions could upend Mr. Samaras’s progress in putting the economy back on track.”
It’s not clear what progress these analysts have in mind. The Greek economy shrank at a 1.1 percent annual rate in the most recent quarter. While it is projected to show modest (0.6 percent) growth for the year as a whole, the most recent projections from the I.M.F. show the economy will still be 10 percent smaller than its pre-recession level in 2019, the last year covered. These projections don’t show the unemployment rate falling below 20 percent until 2017. It is worth noting that I.M.F. projections for Greece have consistently proven to be overly optimistic.
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The Washington Post had a pitch for allowing more high-skilled immigrants into the country, arguing that by allowing more foreign software engineers into the country we would create more jobs. While there may be some possible gains here, it is worth noting that the wages of stem workers have been flat since the late 1990s. (Also, it would be easier to be sympathetic to the demands of the tech industry if they had not conspired to hold down their workers’ wages.)
However it is striking that with all the efforts to bring in more immigrants to work in tech jobs no one ever talks about bringing in more immigrant doctors. The potential gains to the economy are enormous since our doctors receive far higher compensation than their counterparts in other wealthy countries. (The linked comparison understates the actual difference in physician compensation since more than 70 percent of our doctors are specialists, whereas the share in other countries is closer to 30 percent. The greater use of specialists has little obvious benefit in outcomes, it more likely indicates rent-seeking as specialists can enforce rules requiring their services for procedures for which primary care physicians are fully qualified.)
The fact that we see so much discussion of easing immigration to bring in more software engineers as immigrants and none on doctors presumably reflects the power of the tech sector in getting items on the national agenda and the power of the physicians’ lobbies in keeping items off the national agenda.
The Washington Post had a pitch for allowing more high-skilled immigrants into the country, arguing that by allowing more foreign software engineers into the country we would create more jobs. While there may be some possible gains here, it is worth noting that the wages of stem workers have been flat since the late 1990s. (Also, it would be easier to be sympathetic to the demands of the tech industry if they had not conspired to hold down their workers’ wages.)
However it is striking that with all the efforts to bring in more immigrants to work in tech jobs no one ever talks about bringing in more immigrant doctors. The potential gains to the economy are enormous since our doctors receive far higher compensation than their counterparts in other wealthy countries. (The linked comparison understates the actual difference in physician compensation since more than 70 percent of our doctors are specialists, whereas the share in other countries is closer to 30 percent. The greater use of specialists has little obvious benefit in outcomes, it more likely indicates rent-seeking as specialists can enforce rules requiring their services for procedures for which primary care physicians are fully qualified.)
The fact that we see so much discussion of easing immigration to bring in more software engineers as immigrants and none on doctors presumably reflects the power of the tech sector in getting items on the national agenda and the power of the physicians’ lobbies in keeping items off the national agenda.
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Thomas Edsall had a piece noting the deterioration of job quality since 2000 that many of us have been writing about in recent years. He discusses various possibilities going forward, but ignores an obvious one.
For most of the period since the 2001 recession the economy has been below full employment by almost anyone’s definition. In such situations, it should not be surprising that there would be a deterioration in job quality as workers have to slide down the skills ladder in order to find employment. This is the sort of story that Jared Bernstein and I highlight in our book, Getting Back to Full Employment (free download available).
If Jared and I are correct then the problem is simply the government’s high unemployment policy. This could be reversed by either larger government deficits (i.e. increased spending and/or tax cuts to people who will spend them), a lower trade deficit from a lower valued dollar, or a reduction in the length of the average work year through policies like work sharing. This would suggest that the deterioration of job quality is a problem that we know how to solve, even if there may not be the political will to do it.
Thomas Edsall had a piece noting the deterioration of job quality since 2000 that many of us have been writing about in recent years. He discusses various possibilities going forward, but ignores an obvious one.
For most of the period since the 2001 recession the economy has been below full employment by almost anyone’s definition. In such situations, it should not be surprising that there would be a deterioration in job quality as workers have to slide down the skills ladder in order to find employment. This is the sort of story that Jared Bernstein and I highlight in our book, Getting Back to Full Employment (free download available).
If Jared and I are correct then the problem is simply the government’s high unemployment policy. This could be reversed by either larger government deficits (i.e. increased spending and/or tax cuts to people who will spend them), a lower trade deficit from a lower valued dollar, or a reduction in the length of the average work year through policies like work sharing. This would suggest that the deterioration of job quality is a problem that we know how to solve, even if there may not be the political will to do it.
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The media have spent a great deal of time in the last few years highlighting the money paid out to people on Social Security disability. Associated Press was on the job again yesterday with an article that highlighted four administrative judges employed by the Social Security Administration who approve almost all the cases that are brought to them. There are many important facts that are left out of this piece.
First, these judges were deliberately selected by the House Oversight Committee because they were outliers who approve a high percentage of the cases brought to them. The Social Security Administration has almost 1400 administrative judges. Undoubtedly many are also outliers on the other side, denying most of the cases brought to them. A serious news story would have pointed out that these judges are atypical.
The piece was also misleading in telling readers:
“Lifetime benefits average about $300,000, according to the report, so Krafsur’s [one of the four judges] cases will lead to nearly $1.8 billion in benefits.“
The average disability benefit is roughly $1,150 a month. If the average period for collecting benefits is 15 years (almost certainly an overstatement, since most beneficiaries first become eligible in their 50s), this would imply benefits of $207,000. It is possible that the $300,000 includes Medicare payments. (Disability beneficiaries are eligible for Medicare after two years.)
If so, counting these benefits is seriously misleading for several reasons. First, Medicare is paid out of a separate fund so its does not affect the solvency of the Disability program. Also, most of these people would have low incomes and therefore be eligible for Medicaid, even if they were turned down for disability. This means there is little or no net cost to taxpayers from having them receive Medicare. Finally, most people would likely see this number and think beneficiaries are seeing $300,000 in cash.
It would have been worth pointing out that just over one-third of applicants for disability get approved. The people who appeal their initial denial to a disability judge likely exclude most of the marginal cases, (it takes time and generally lawyers’ fees to file an appeal), so it would not be surprising that a high percentage will be approved. A recent study by the University of Michigan examined the work experience of marginal applicants who were denied disability by administrative judges. Of this group, which comprised 25 percent of all applicants, it found that only 28 percent of these people were employed two years after being turned down. Even among this group (7 percent of all applicants)average earnings was only half of what it had been before they had applied for disability. That suggests that the vast majority of this marginal group really are experiencing difficulty in working.
While the piece notes the sharp rise in the share of the workforce on disability it would have been useful to point out that the main reason is the aging of the baby boom cohort into the prime years for receiving disability and the increase in the age for receiving full Social Security benefits from 65 to 66. It would also have been worth noting that the United States ranks near the bottom of wealthy countries in the share of GDP going to disability benefits. Disability benefits comes to 0.9 percent of GDP in the United States, by comparison Germany pays out 1.7 percent of GDP ($290 billion a year in the U.S.) for disability benefits.
The media have spent a great deal of time in the last few years highlighting the money paid out to people on Social Security disability. Associated Press was on the job again yesterday with an article that highlighted four administrative judges employed by the Social Security Administration who approve almost all the cases that are brought to them. There are many important facts that are left out of this piece.
First, these judges were deliberately selected by the House Oversight Committee because they were outliers who approve a high percentage of the cases brought to them. The Social Security Administration has almost 1400 administrative judges. Undoubtedly many are also outliers on the other side, denying most of the cases brought to them. A serious news story would have pointed out that these judges are atypical.
The piece was also misleading in telling readers:
“Lifetime benefits average about $300,000, according to the report, so Krafsur’s [one of the four judges] cases will lead to nearly $1.8 billion in benefits.“
The average disability benefit is roughly $1,150 a month. If the average period for collecting benefits is 15 years (almost certainly an overstatement, since most beneficiaries first become eligible in their 50s), this would imply benefits of $207,000. It is possible that the $300,000 includes Medicare payments. (Disability beneficiaries are eligible for Medicare after two years.)
If so, counting these benefits is seriously misleading for several reasons. First, Medicare is paid out of a separate fund so its does not affect the solvency of the Disability program. Also, most of these people would have low incomes and therefore be eligible for Medicaid, even if they were turned down for disability. This means there is little or no net cost to taxpayers from having them receive Medicare. Finally, most people would likely see this number and think beneficiaries are seeing $300,000 in cash.
It would have been worth pointing out that just over one-third of applicants for disability get approved. The people who appeal their initial denial to a disability judge likely exclude most of the marginal cases, (it takes time and generally lawyers’ fees to file an appeal), so it would not be surprising that a high percentage will be approved. A recent study by the University of Michigan examined the work experience of marginal applicants who were denied disability by administrative judges. Of this group, which comprised 25 percent of all applicants, it found that only 28 percent of these people were employed two years after being turned down. Even among this group (7 percent of all applicants)average earnings was only half of what it had been before they had applied for disability. That suggests that the vast majority of this marginal group really are experiencing difficulty in working.
While the piece notes the sharp rise in the share of the workforce on disability it would have been useful to point out that the main reason is the aging of the baby boom cohort into the prime years for receiving disability and the increase in the age for receiving full Social Security benefits from 65 to 66. It would also have been worth noting that the United States ranks near the bottom of wealthy countries in the share of GDP going to disability benefits. Disability benefits comes to 0.9 percent of GDP in the United States, by comparison Germany pays out 1.7 percent of GDP ($290 billion a year in the U.S.) for disability benefits.
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For some reason the NYT continues to have problems distinguishing between the concept of a counterfeit item and an unauthorized copy. The confusion appears in a column by Yu Hua which uses the term “counterfeit” and “pirated” interchangeably.
The distinction between the two terms is simple and important. A counterfeit item is one where the seller misrepresented its origins to the consumer. In this case the consumer has been ripped off by the seller. By contrast, an unauthorized copy may violate a company’s trademark or other intellectual property claim, but it doesn’t involve a rip-off of the consumer.
This matters because consumers will presumably assist in cracking down on counterfeits, they are the victims in such cases. On the other hand they benefit from getting unauthorized copies. They are able to buy products at prices that are substantially less than the ones produced by the company’s whose intellectual property claims are being violated.
Since this column does not distinguish clearly between the two, it’s not possible to understand its complaint. It’s not clear whether its common for people in China to order goods on the Internet and not receive the product they are expecting (if this is the case, presumably they would stop buying products on the Internet) or whether goods are being sold that violate intellectual property claims of various companies.
Note: Correction made, thanks Andrew and Robert.
For some reason the NYT continues to have problems distinguishing between the concept of a counterfeit item and an unauthorized copy. The confusion appears in a column by Yu Hua which uses the term “counterfeit” and “pirated” interchangeably.
The distinction between the two terms is simple and important. A counterfeit item is one where the seller misrepresented its origins to the consumer. In this case the consumer has been ripped off by the seller. By contrast, an unauthorized copy may violate a company’s trademark or other intellectual property claim, but it doesn’t involve a rip-off of the consumer.
This matters because consumers will presumably assist in cracking down on counterfeits, they are the victims in such cases. On the other hand they benefit from getting unauthorized copies. They are able to buy products at prices that are substantially less than the ones produced by the company’s whose intellectual property claims are being violated.
Since this column does not distinguish clearly between the two, it’s not possible to understand its complaint. It’s not clear whether its common for people in China to order goods on the Internet and not receive the product they are expecting (if this is the case, presumably they would stop buying products on the Internet) or whether goods are being sold that violate intellectual property claims of various companies.
Note: Correction made, thanks Andrew and Robert.
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Matt Yglesias has a piece in Vox explaining the politics of cramdown in which it tells readers that there was no way the Obama administration could have gotten cramdown through Congress. While Yglesias correctly points out that the Obama administration never really tried, he misrepresented the nature of the problem.
One of the great things about cramdown was that the proposal could have been sliced and diced in almost an infinite number of ways. While Yglesias is undoubtedly correct in saying that a wholesale revision to the bankruptcy code, that would have allowed all mortgages to be rewritten in bankruptcy, never would have gotten through Congress, that doesn’t mean Obama could not have gotten a more limited version passed.
For example, the dates at which mortgages were issued could have been narrowly restricted (e.g. 2004-2008). The size of the mortgages could have also been restricted. Does Yglesias know that Evan Bayh never would have agreed to cramdown for mortgages of less than $300,000 issued in a narrow time window, coupled with some huge government contract for a firm he could subsequently work for as a lobbyist in his post-Senate career?
That is the way presidents get bills passed that they actually want passed. (Look at what Obama will do to get fast-track authority when he wants to get the Trans-Pacific Partnership approved by Congress.) Anyhow, cramdown was almost certainly passable in some form if President Obama wanted to go that route. He didn’t, end of story.
Matt Yglesias has a piece in Vox explaining the politics of cramdown in which it tells readers that there was no way the Obama administration could have gotten cramdown through Congress. While Yglesias correctly points out that the Obama administration never really tried, he misrepresented the nature of the problem.
One of the great things about cramdown was that the proposal could have been sliced and diced in almost an infinite number of ways. While Yglesias is undoubtedly correct in saying that a wholesale revision to the bankruptcy code, that would have allowed all mortgages to be rewritten in bankruptcy, never would have gotten through Congress, that doesn’t mean Obama could not have gotten a more limited version passed.
For example, the dates at which mortgages were issued could have been narrowly restricted (e.g. 2004-2008). The size of the mortgages could have also been restricted. Does Yglesias know that Evan Bayh never would have agreed to cramdown for mortgages of less than $300,000 issued in a narrow time window, coupled with some huge government contract for a firm he could subsequently work for as a lobbyist in his post-Senate career?
That is the way presidents get bills passed that they actually want passed. (Look at what Obama will do to get fast-track authority when he wants to get the Trans-Pacific Partnership approved by Congress.) Anyhow, cramdown was almost certainly passable in some form if President Obama wanted to go that route. He didn’t, end of story.
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Actually he is not angry about how much money the government pays to Peter Peterson but if he were consistent in his logic he would be. Bruni wrote an apology from older generations to millennials, and one of the central themes is that we are supposed to feel bad about all the money that we get for Social Security and Medicare:
“The Urban Institute released a report in 2012 that looked at figures from 2008 for the combined local, state and federal spending that directly benefited Americans 65 and older versus spending that went to Americans under 19; the per capita discrepancy was $26,355 versus $11,822.”
The vast majority of the money going seniors in the Urban Institute’s calculation refers to payments for Social Security and Medicare. These are benefits that seniors paid for during their working lifetimes with designated taxes. Ignoring the fact that people paid for these benefits would be as dishonest as ignoring that the fact that a rich person like Peter Peterson could get millions of dollars a year in interest payments on government bonds because he happened to pay to buy hundreds of millions of dollars of government bonds.
Neither Bruni nor economists at the Urban Institute would ever make the mistake of talking about the interest payments to wealthy people on government bonds without noting that these people had paid to buy the bonds. Why do they forget this connection when it comes to talking about Social Security and Medicare benefits?
And these are benefits that are largely paid for. According to an analysis from the Urban Institute, the typical retiree will get slightly less back in Social Security benefits than what they paid into the program in taxes. The cost of their Medicare benefits will substantially exceed what they paid in taxes, however this is due to the fact that health care costs more than twice as much per person in the United States as the average for other wealthy countries.
This is not due to getting better care in the United States. It is due to the fact that our doctors get paid twice as much, our drug companies and medical equipment suppliers charge close to twice as much, and administrators and top management in hospitals and other health care providers get paychecks that are many times larger than their counterparts in other countries.
We may owe an apology to millennials for handing them an enormously unequal economic system, but that is not Bruni’s complaint. He wants middle class seniors to apologize for getting benefits that cost lots of money because the wealthy charge so much to provide them. As a practical matter the impact of inequality will swamp any costs that might be associated with Social Security and Medicare.
If young people get their share of the economy’s productivity growth their real wages will be close to 50 percent higher in 30 years according to the Social Security trustees projections. On the other hand, if the trend in inequality we have seen over the last three decades continues, their wages will be little changed from what they are today.
Of course Bruni does have a point when it comes to global warming, but here also the class dimension should not be ignored. The media highlighted economic hardships that could come from measures to slow global warming in ways that they never did in other contexts, such as increases in military spending. This has helped bolster the case of those who did not want to take action. So the people who own and control major news outlets like NPR and the NYT should perhaps be signing Bruni’s letter, but the bulk of the public who had little say in the matter have less cause.
(I would have Al Gore sign the letter also since the guy could not even be bothered to pay a couple of grad students to maintain a website on his movie/book.)
Note: Correction made, thanks folks.
Actually he is not angry about how much money the government pays to Peter Peterson but if he were consistent in his logic he would be. Bruni wrote an apology from older generations to millennials, and one of the central themes is that we are supposed to feel bad about all the money that we get for Social Security and Medicare:
“The Urban Institute released a report in 2012 that looked at figures from 2008 for the combined local, state and federal spending that directly benefited Americans 65 and older versus spending that went to Americans under 19; the per capita discrepancy was $26,355 versus $11,822.”
The vast majority of the money going seniors in the Urban Institute’s calculation refers to payments for Social Security and Medicare. These are benefits that seniors paid for during their working lifetimes with designated taxes. Ignoring the fact that people paid for these benefits would be as dishonest as ignoring that the fact that a rich person like Peter Peterson could get millions of dollars a year in interest payments on government bonds because he happened to pay to buy hundreds of millions of dollars of government bonds.
Neither Bruni nor economists at the Urban Institute would ever make the mistake of talking about the interest payments to wealthy people on government bonds without noting that these people had paid to buy the bonds. Why do they forget this connection when it comes to talking about Social Security and Medicare benefits?
And these are benefits that are largely paid for. According to an analysis from the Urban Institute, the typical retiree will get slightly less back in Social Security benefits than what they paid into the program in taxes. The cost of their Medicare benefits will substantially exceed what they paid in taxes, however this is due to the fact that health care costs more than twice as much per person in the United States as the average for other wealthy countries.
This is not due to getting better care in the United States. It is due to the fact that our doctors get paid twice as much, our drug companies and medical equipment suppliers charge close to twice as much, and administrators and top management in hospitals and other health care providers get paychecks that are many times larger than their counterparts in other countries.
We may owe an apology to millennials for handing them an enormously unequal economic system, but that is not Bruni’s complaint. He wants middle class seniors to apologize for getting benefits that cost lots of money because the wealthy charge so much to provide them. As a practical matter the impact of inequality will swamp any costs that might be associated with Social Security and Medicare.
If young people get their share of the economy’s productivity growth their real wages will be close to 50 percent higher in 30 years according to the Social Security trustees projections. On the other hand, if the trend in inequality we have seen over the last three decades continues, their wages will be little changed from what they are today.
Of course Bruni does have a point when it comes to global warming, but here also the class dimension should not be ignored. The media highlighted economic hardships that could come from measures to slow global warming in ways that they never did in other contexts, such as increases in military spending. This has helped bolster the case of those who did not want to take action. So the people who own and control major news outlets like NPR and the NYT should perhaps be signing Bruni’s letter, but the bulk of the public who had little say in the matter have less cause.
(I would have Al Gore sign the letter also since the guy could not even be bothered to pay a couple of grad students to maintain a website on his movie/book.)
Note: Correction made, thanks folks.
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That is the impression that readers of a piece on low birth rates in Iran might be led to believe. The piece told readers that Iran’s government wants to raise the country’s birth rate from its current 1.3 per couple. According to the piece, the government wants a higher birth rate to increase the power of Iran in the world and the power of its Shiite population in the Islamic world.
Towards the end the piece tells readers:
“Experts say that while birthrates in Iran are very low, there is no real crisis just yet.”
It’s not clear what the crisis would be in the future if Iran’s low fertility rates continue. For those who think it is important that Iran’s power in the world grow, or that Shiites become more important in the Islamic world, the continuation of a low birth rate among Iran’s Shiites would indeed be bad news. However it is difficult to see why anyone else would be troubled by this prospect.
Iran has had high unemployment for many years and is likely to face continued high unemployment long into the future. In this context, a lower birth rate is likely to be good news since fewer labor market entrants will mean less competition for jobs. This should help to push up wages and living standards for those at the middle and bottom of the income distribution. It would be bad news for those looking for cheap household labor to mow their loans, clean their toilets, and serve as nannies for their kids.
That is the impression that readers of a piece on low birth rates in Iran might be led to believe. The piece told readers that Iran’s government wants to raise the country’s birth rate from its current 1.3 per couple. According to the piece, the government wants a higher birth rate to increase the power of Iran in the world and the power of its Shiite population in the Islamic world.
Towards the end the piece tells readers:
“Experts say that while birthrates in Iran are very low, there is no real crisis just yet.”
It’s not clear what the crisis would be in the future if Iran’s low fertility rates continue. For those who think it is important that Iran’s power in the world grow, or that Shiites become more important in the Islamic world, the continuation of a low birth rate among Iran’s Shiites would indeed be bad news. However it is difficult to see why anyone else would be troubled by this prospect.
Iran has had high unemployment for many years and is likely to face continued high unemployment long into the future. In this context, a lower birth rate is likely to be good news since fewer labor market entrants will mean less competition for jobs. This should help to push up wages and living standards for those at the middle and bottom of the income distribution. It would be bad news for those looking for cheap household labor to mow their loans, clean their toilets, and serve as nannies for their kids.
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That’s what the Washington Post told readers.
“Unemployment fell from 3.3 to 3.2 percent for people with a bachelor’s degree or more, and from 5.7 to 5.5 percent for those with some college. But it actually rose from 6.3 to 6.5 percent for people with only a high school diploma, and from 8.9 to 9.1 percent for those without one.
“In other words, our polarized labor market isn’t getting any less so. The Cleveland Fed points out that routine jobs disappeared during the Great Recession, and haven’t come back during the not-so-great-recovery — which partly explains why our economic upswing, such as it is, has been much less dramatic for the least educated.”
The data doesn’t necessarily agree with this story. If we ignore monthly changes, since these are extremely erratic, and instead look at the changes over the last two years we see that the unemployment rate for college grads in the first five months of 2014 averaged 3.3 percent, down 0.8 percentage points from its 4.1 percent average in the first five months of 2012. By comparison, the unemployment rate for those with just a high school degree averaged 6.4 percent, down by 1.8 percentage points from two years ago. Those with less than high school degrees saw a drop in their unemployment rate of 2.5 percentage points from 12.9 percent in 2012 to 9.4 percent in the first five months of this year.
If we go back to 2010 we see a comparable pattern. The drop in the unemployment rate from the 2010 peaks was 1.5 percentage points for college grads, 4.3 percentage points for high school grads, and 5.6 percentage points for those without a high school degree. The declines in unemployment rates in percentage terms were actually larger for less-educated workers than for college grads. But hey, why let the data get in the way of a good story?
That’s what the Washington Post told readers.
“Unemployment fell from 3.3 to 3.2 percent for people with a bachelor’s degree or more, and from 5.7 to 5.5 percent for those with some college. But it actually rose from 6.3 to 6.5 percent for people with only a high school diploma, and from 8.9 to 9.1 percent for those without one.
“In other words, our polarized labor market isn’t getting any less so. The Cleveland Fed points out that routine jobs disappeared during the Great Recession, and haven’t come back during the not-so-great-recovery — which partly explains why our economic upswing, such as it is, has been much less dramatic for the least educated.”
The data doesn’t necessarily agree with this story. If we ignore monthly changes, since these are extremely erratic, and instead look at the changes over the last two years we see that the unemployment rate for college grads in the first five months of 2014 averaged 3.3 percent, down 0.8 percentage points from its 4.1 percent average in the first five months of 2012. By comparison, the unemployment rate for those with just a high school degree averaged 6.4 percent, down by 1.8 percentage points from two years ago. Those with less than high school degrees saw a drop in their unemployment rate of 2.5 percentage points from 12.9 percent in 2012 to 9.4 percent in the first five months of this year.
If we go back to 2010 we see a comparable pattern. The drop in the unemployment rate from the 2010 peaks was 1.5 percentage points for college grads, 4.3 percentage points for high school grads, and 5.6 percentage points for those without a high school degree. The declines in unemployment rates in percentage terms were actually larger for less-educated workers than for college grads. But hey, why let the data get in the way of a good story?
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