12.5%

12.5%

That number reflects the minimum percentage of Americans who are unemployed.

9.1%, the party line number, is pure fiction.

Why? Because it doesn’t include Americans who have left the workforce temporarily, mostly due to being "discouraged," a cruel euphemism used by government to remove the chronically unemployed off the books.

While Federal Reserve economists pretend that the unemployment picture has improved since their last intervention, the facade is disingenuous at best.

If we look back to 2007, we can see where the missing got lost. Then, the labor participation rate was 66.4%. In July 2011, it hit a new recessionary low of 63.9%. That 2.5% might not seem like a lot, but it would have meant nearly 6 million more people in the labor force. If you add those people into the workforce, then the unemployment rate last month would have hit a new high of 12.5%, much higher than the official 9.1% reported.