No one will check, so why try to be accurate?

Steven “Captain Stratego” Den Beste writes:

Europe’s labor laws, which were intended to increase employment by preserving existing jobs, have instead yielded chronic high unemployment because they have discouraged creation of new jobs. [Emphasis added]

Unemployment Rate, April 2004:

United States: 5.6%
Luxembourg: 4.2%
Cyprus: 4.4%
Ireland: 4.5%
Austria: 4.5%
Netherlands: 4.5% (March)
United Kingdom: 4.7% (February)
Denmark: 5.9% (March)
Hungary: 5.9%
Sweden: 6.3%
Slovenia: 6.4%
Portugal: 6.8%

This is not to deny, naturally, the fact that the unemployment rate in several EU members is significantly higher than in the US. Yet all Den Beste provides are trite (and partly inaccurate) platitudes that only manage to reinforce his preconceived opinions (Europe sucks.)

 

Comments: 13

 
 
 

Not to mention the fact that the US cooks the books on unemployment by not counting “discouraged workers”, a euphemism for people whose benefits have run out but still haven’t found work. What, do they think these folks just park themselves in Borg-style regeneration chambers until “the economy” improves and they can resume human form and activity?

And let’s just completely ignore the fact that Europeans, while paying high taxes, receive in return a social contract respecting the right to health care, paid maternity leave, long vacations, etc.

US commentators just hate Europe because they are moving beyond the obsession with “growth” as the be-all of life. Note the constant “worry” about the fact that populations are stable or even falling slightly…isn’t that what we should ALL be aiming for?

 
 

Captain Clueless also doesn’t seem to notice that the bulk of Europe’s unemployed are under 25.

 
 

ugh, it’s bad enough when Americans resort to this, but even worse when eurotrash like den beste and Ferguson go this route.

speaking of cooking the books, dont we start, as it were, at the cover? I seem to remember Gore Vidal always saying that Europe includes their incarcerated as unemployed while America excludes the incarcerated from the count, wholly. I’m not sure if it’s true, but if it is, this is 10 percent of the population of America that, if counted in the Euro way, would be “unemployed”.

Is this true or was it ever true?

 
 

I could be wrong, but I think it’s something closer to 1% of working age Americans who are incarcerated. I have seen in numerous places that, if the US were to calculate its unemployment rate the way the Europeans do, it would be over 10%.

Steven is Clueless, as usual.

 
 

…but you left off Germany, France and Italy…

 
 

Around the OSP Blogs

All Facts and Opinions quotes God as mysteriously saying, thou shalt not kill. Whatever could have been meant by that? Also, a review of the decision by the Southern Baptist Convention to secede from the rest of the denomination. Blunted…

 
 

Around the OSP Blogs

All Facts and Opinions quotes God as mysteriously saying, thou shalt not kill. Whatever could have been meant by that? Also, a review of the decision by the Southern Baptist Convention to secede from the rest of the denomination. Blunted…

 
 

Around the OSP Blogs

All Facts and Opinions quotes God as mysteriously saying, thou shalt not kill. Whatever could have been meant by that? Also, a review of the decision by the Southern Baptist Convention to secede from the rest of the denomination. Blunted…

 
 

A point that Dean Baker makes continuously is that Germany’s unemployment rate contains East Germany, where unemployment is close to 20%, and West Germany, where unemployment is around 8%. Germany also measures unemployment differently. If the U.S. used the German measure of unemployment, our unemployment rate would also be around 8%.

http://www.tompaine.com/feature.cfm/ID/6470

 
 

Of course you sort of accidently prove the point since the 6 with better than US numbers are generally not the ones with the labour laws being discussed.

Anyhow, using Luxembourg and Cyprus to argue about the EU v. the US is like focusing on one suburb of New York to prove some point about the US. In fact, you are lying with statistics more that those you accuse.

Those who say “we count differently” obviously have no clue since they are simply wrong about the implications. They assume facts needed to support their views, rather than having any real understanding of what they are talking about. The fact is that most of the EU (certainly the larger, more centralized economies) have been and still are seriously underperforming the US economy – YAY for personal liberty, folks !!!

 
 

Shorter Den Beste: my revulsion of Europe is totally independent of all the facts in the world.

(I’m guessing that Den Beste, being a ‘retired’ shut-in engineer with more money than sense — i.e. $3.50 — doesn’t feature on the US unemployment figures.)

 
 

kim: Yes — but the point here isn’t that Den Beste is entirely wrong, but that simple (and sweeping) generalizations about “Europe” are pretty meaningless and bound to be only partly accurate. Even in those countries with high unemployment, labor laws on hiring/firing are only part of the problem.

Have Faith:

Of course you sort of accidently prove the point since the 6 with better than US numbers are generally not the ones with the labour laws being discussed.

You think Den Beste could tell you anything that isn’t found on google about the respective EU members’ labor laws? We think not.

In fact, you are lying with statistics more that those you accuse.

Where’s the lie? The issue is with simplistic and “under-informed” generalizations about Europe/EU.

Those who say “we count differently” obviously have no clue since they are simply wrong about the implications.

It’s time to go look for your credibility, because it just went out the window. The unemployment rate as calculated by and Germany and Belgium (to take 2 examples we know apply) is significantly higher than that counted per ILO-standards and the method employed in the US and the UK. You almost had a point there and then ended up pissing it away. Teddy Salad’s observations about Germany are entirely accurate.

 
 

well you all miss the point that europe sucks because people do nto take daily showers

 
 

(comments are closed)