Thank you! "Once in awhile we get shown the light, in the strangest of places, if we look at it right" - Hunter/Garcia
Why is it so difficult to use the same system in all countries - is it on purpose? This way everyone can pretend they look better or worse off because of the system used to collect the data. Or is it just not possible to use just one system in all countries?
High German Unemployment: Reporting is half the problem
Quote: "The problem with this reporting is that it refers to the official German government definition of unemployment. This definition of unemployment treats anyone who is working less than 15 hours a week, and desires full-time employment, as being unemployed. By contrast, the U.S. definition treats anyone who worked even a single hour in the reference period as being employed. It would really be incredible if a fulltime reporter stationed in Germany did not know the distinction between these two definitions."
I leave it to the Germans in this discussion to correct Sawicky if he's wrong, but it's good to see an American economist looking with some scepsis at these "official" statistics flying around.
