As per the latest quarterly jobs report Wisconsin tied Iowa for last place in private sector growth among midwestern states.
Among its peer states in the Midwest, Wisconsin tied with Iowa for last place. Both states created private-sector jobs at 1.16%. Michigan and Indiana led that group of states with 2.02% and 1.64% growth, respectively
The report further stated that the increase of private sector jobs over the past year from 9/13 - 9/14 was only 27,000 jobs. The Walker Administration immediately declared
"But-but-but- look at the most recent month totals:".
Separately, the administration of Gov. Scott Walker on Thursday morning released the state's latest monthly data, which showed that Wisconsin's unemployment rate continued to decline — falling to a preliminary 4.8% in February from 5% in January. In the worst months of the last recession, the state jobless rate peaked at 9.2% in 2009 and 2010.
The state's unemployment rate has tracked a parallel decline in the national unemployment rate, which fell to 5.5% in February from 5.7% in January and a peak of 10% at the worst point in the last downturn.
The Wisconsin Department of Workforce Development on Thursday also said the state added "a statistically significant" 13,600 private sector jobs from January to February.
"Wow, Walker's right.", said the news media. A number of the readers said
"Yeah but look at what else this reporter wrote about monthly totals."
Economists consider Thursday's job creation figures, known as the Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages, to be the most credible and comprehensive available. The census report breaks out data for the nation as a whole as well as each of the 50 states. It tracks the economy in rolling 12-month increments, measured every three months.
The quarterly data are based on a census of 96% of the nation's employers in the public and private sectors. That makes the figures far more reliable than monthly jobs data, which are based on a sample of only about 3% of employers, leaving monthly estimates prone to large margins of error.
The accuracy of quarterly reports is so superior to the monthly figures that the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics uses the quarterly data retroactively to clean up all the inherent inaccuracies of the monthly data — a massive overhaul of all state and national data that the Bureau of Labor Statistics can afford to undertake only once a year.
"Remember last time Walker said that he and his economic plan would be vindicated as the monthly totals indicated? That was after the bad jobs report that came out before the election." said the readers.
"Oh yeah..." said the media. "But that was last election. Who cares what the job numbers are in Wisconsin. There are bigger fish to fry in New Hampshires."
So the news media couldn't be bothered to put 2 and 2 together and nobody in the rest of the country was aware that Walker's economic policies were a failure. But they did know that he posed with a Reagan bible.