When You Fiddle Data Series, Fiddle All The Correlated Data Series
Remember the startling unemployment announcement from the Michigan Department of Management, Technology, and Budget (DTMB) last month?
- That Michigan’s February 2015 seasonally adjusted (SA) U-3 unemployment rate had dropped to 5.9% from January’s 6.3%?
- That the 5.9% February 2015 SA U-3 unemployment rate was down 1.9% from Michigan’s 7.8% February 2014 SA rate?
- That 88,000 more ‘seasonally adjusted’ Michiganders were working in February 2015 than one year earlier?
- That the not seasonally adjusted (NSA) 12 month increase in Michigan employment was even better at 101,000?
Well, there is a little problem with these goal-seeked, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) X-13ARIMA-SEAT massaged unemployment statistics. They simply are not true.
You Betcha! (13)Nuh Uh.(0)