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“America’s workforce is the envy of the world!” according to U.S. Secretary of Labor Elaine Chao. In the 2007 Labor Day report, Chao points out that despite a recent economic downturn, unemployment remains relatively low and 8.3 million new jobs have been created since August 2003.

In the report issued by the U.S. Department of Labor, Chao points out, however, that the nation faces a skills gap. “In a worldwide economy, the competitive strength of America’s workforce lies in its productivity, innovation, creativity and knowledge base. The majority of new jobs created over the next decade will require more skills, and higher education.” Chao adds that those jobs will pay higher wages, as well. “It’s important to ensure that workers are able to get the education and training they need to access these growing opportunities.”

The 55-page report, entitled “America’s Dynamic Workforce 2007”, outlines a number of trends in the workplace today. The report tries to put a positive spin on an employment picture that is less than rosy by carefully selecting the reported data.

The report’s contention that “the majority of employment growth over the past 6 years was in occupations with above-average compensation” invites comparisons to Garrison Keillor’s Lake Wobegon, where “all of the children are above average.”

In another example of sunny rhetoric on a partly-cloudy topic, the report presents a positive picture of rising unemployment rates. While the overall unemployment rate is about 1% higher than last year, the report points out only that the rate is still about 1% lower than throughout most of the 1990s.

While job growth in the first half of 2007 is disappointing, the report focuses on the good job growth rates in 2006  of 2.3 million jobs. It also mentions the total of 8.3 million jobs gained since August 2003, without point out that 5.5 million of those jobs were necessary just to recover from the recession of 2001. This is a clear case of picking and choosing your statistics to reflect the most positive information. What the report doesn’t mention is that job growth has slowed by 20% in the first half of 2007, to just 871,000 compared to 1.2 million in the same period of 2006. Instead,  the report cheerily proclaims that by 2050, the workforce will increase by 43 million jobs, to 195 million.

The report points out that job growth has increased for 46 consecutive months through June 2007, although it fails to note that the job growth rate has slowed considerably in recent months. Instead, the report characterizes this as a “steady and sustainable economic path.”

The annual Labor Day report in past years has focused on performance in the preceding 12 months. However, with disappointing labor sector numbers, this report uses a different strategy. The report conceals disappointing trends in a number of areas by focusing on the period from 2001 to 2006, in several key areas. These include productivity and real compensation, which is up 7.2% over 5 years.

The U.S. leads the world in manufacturing, with 21% of goods world-wide produced. This compares favorably to other leading manufacturing countries, such as Japan with 13% of the world’s products, China with 12% and Germany with 8%.

The report focuses on the gross domestic product per hour in 2005, reporting that it is $48.30.

American workers are more highly trained than every before, with twice as many people aged 25 to 64 holding at least a bachelor’s degree as in 1970. Employment in positions associated with higher education of a bachelor’s degree or more increased 18.8% between 2001 and 2006.

Instead of focusing on rosy economic news, which is in short supply a the moment, the report stresses that the American workforce is aging, and is increasingly diverse. In an interesting sidelight, the report blames the slowing of job growth on the aging population, perhaps forgetting that most baby boomers are resigned to working until they die.

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1. Posted by: American Workers World’s Most Productive - Labor Law Center Blog

   [...] U.S. Labor Secretary Elaine Chao recently cited American workers as the envy of the world. [...]