Jobs
This is the agency that collects jobs data.
What is the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS)?
These are the two groups of people that go into the numerator of the Labor Force Participation Rate.
What are those who are employed and those who are unemployed?
Name one of the requirements for someone to be considered unemployed.
What is actively looking for work, unemployed through no fault of your own, meeting work and wage requirements?
(answers may vary)
This agency collects data on inflation.
What is the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS)?
This banking system controls the changing of the interest rates.
What is the Federal Reserve?
This is how often the jobs report comes out.
What is once a month (the first Friday of every month)?
Name a potential universe for which the denominator of the Labor Force Participation Rate could be.
What is Age 16+, Ages 25-54, Gender, Education, Race?
(answers may vary)
Under this president, the unemployment rate allegedly fell from 8.2% to 7.9% (there was controversy with these numbers).
Who is Barack Obama?
Inflation does this to your purchasing power.
What is it decreases your purchasing power (value of dollar effectively goes down)?
This is the relationship between inflation and interest rates (direct, inverse, uncorrelated, etc.).
What is a direct relationship (as inflation increases, the Federal Reserve increases interest rates to slow economic growth)?
There are two surveys that collect data for the jobs report. What are those two surveys?
What are the Household Survey and the Establishment Survey?
Among educated white men and educated black men, one of these two groups has had a higher Labor Force Participation Rate for the past 20 years. Which group is it?
What is educated black men?
He said this phrase when discussing unemployment: "The unemployment rate is one of the biggest hoaxes in politics."
Who is Donald Trump?
Match this definition with its term: the average change over time in the prices paid by consumers for a market basket of goods and services (this is the main tool used to calculate inflation).
What is the Consumer Price Index (CPI)?
Name a reason why an increase in interest rates lead to a decrease in economic activity.
What is people want to save more and spend less? (increases in rates for credit cards, adjustable mortgages, etc. lead to a disincentive to spend. There are negative effects on the housing market and almost every other market, making people want to spend less and save more, which leads to a decrease in economic activity)
This president created the most jobs during his tenure.
Who is Bill Clinton?
Name a potential reason why the Labor Force Participation Rate has declined over the past 20 years.
What is the aging of the population, the COVID-19 pandemic, more people staying home, etc.?
(answers may vary)
The unemployment rate is the most reported figure from this survey.
What is the Household Survey?
Name a potential reason for the high inflation that has occurred over the past year.
What is the COVID-19 pandemic, the $900 billion stimulus bill, supply chain bottlenecks, high demand?
(answers may vary)
This is the current chairman of the Federal Reserve.
Who is Jerome Powell?
This person is the current commissioner of the BLS. Who is it, and what year did he/she become the commissioner?
Who is William W. Beach, became commissioner in 2019?
This race had the highest Labor Force Participation Rate as of February 2020 (pre-pandemic).
What is Hispanic or Latino?
This rule is defined as the measure of a recession, using the observation that when the 3-month average unemployment rate rises a half percentage point above the low of the prior 12 months.
What is the Sahm Rule?
This is the most widely accepted ideal inflation rate according to the Federal Reserve.
What is 2% (or slightly lower)?
Name a potential winner and a potential loser when interest rates are increased.
Winner: Who are those with money in savings accounts, CDs, bonds?
Loser: Who are those looking to purchase a home, those with loans, those invested in stocks and cryptocurrency?
(answers may vary)