The New York Times: Rooting against America's economy since November 2000

"Sharp Drop in Jobs Adds to Grim Picture of Economy" read the March 7 headline in The New York Times.

That "sharp drop" to which The Times refers was 63,000 for the month of February, which is undeniably unwelcome news, at least for those of us who want to see America moving from strength to strength.

But what was The New York Times reporting for the record 52 consecutive months of job growth that ended just this January? The four years and four months in which the U.S. economy created a net 8.3 million jobs?

The Times can take pride in having predicted this downturn. Indeed, The New York Times has anticipated hard economic times nearly every month since sometime around November, 2000.

When the Labor Department reported last November 3 that the U.S. economy had gained 166,000 jobs in October, The New York Times demurred. "Despite Gain in Jobs Data, Wall Street Is Skeptical". At The Times, "despite" is always a good sort of way to start a headline reporting good news.

128,000 jobs were added in August of 2006, but The Times had the cold water ready for that. The September 2 story was headlined "Jobs and Wages Increased Modestly Last Month", and began, "Job growth seems to be reaching its peak," just in case the poor reader was getting carried away with all the wet blanket-wrapped good news.

The Labor report for July of 2006 found an increase of 113,000 jobs. The August 5 New York Times headline? "Job Growth Slackened Last Month".

And what would The Times do if jobs grew at such a pace that it would be impossible to deny the improvement without losing all credibility? Like a quarter of a million jobs added in a single month?

The jobs report of March 10, 2006 was a blockbuster. In February, the U.S. economy had added 243,000 jobs. So, The New York Times avoided adjectives altogether. " U.S. Says Employers Added 243,000 Jobs in February". Note that "U.S. Says", as if the numbers might be in dispute, or are just one opinion on the subject.

It only got worse from there. The Times actually found a way to turn an explosion of 243,000 jobs in a month into a troubling development, within the first paragraph: "...igniting concerns among many Wall Street economists that higher wages could fuel inflation and increase expectations that the Federal Reserve will raise interest rates further."

In fact, only five of the article's 23 paragraphs were upbeat, and the piece was peppered with lines like, "But the increase in wages was greeted with some furrowed brows." Including at The New York Times, apparently.

The Times even managed to work in a little global warming-ism among the economic data. "January's average temperature of 39.5 degrees was the highest ever recorded." What that has to do with the price of tea in China is unclear, but The Times does have the world's temperature to worry about as well as the negative ramifications of a quarter million fewer jobless Americans.
Give credit where it's due. In 2005, when the United States was busy adding 2 million jobs and there were no national elections for The Times to worry about, the headline writers were good enough to toss the optimists a bone: "Creation of Jobs Surged in April, and Income Rose".

But on May 7, The Times editorial writers calmed their excitable scribes. "If April's numbers are the start of a new upward trend, great. But it's too soon to tell. Policy makers must be especially mindful that the economy has been at this juncture before, and then failed to deliver on its promise."

October 9, 2004: Labor Department reports 96,000 new jobs in September; New York Times reports "Growth of Jobs for Last Month Seen as Sluggish". You'll have to forgive The Times for that one -- you can't have good news getting through at election time.

And as the 52-month job expansion was beginning in August of 2003, The Times headlined "Not Much Job Growth, but Mediocre May Look Good in 2004".

So, at The New York Times, a loss of 63,000 is "sharp" and a gain of 128,000 is "modest"; 96,000 is "sluggish", 113,000 is "slack", and the less said about 243,000, the better.

Play down the good news, play up the bad. That's how The Times makes the news fit to print. Unless of course The Times supports the president of the day, in which case, reverse those rules exactly.

Now The New York Times has that slowdown they've been dreaming of since the last boom began in President Bush's first term, and just in time for a presidential election, too. Better hope the stimulus package doesn't work. But even if it does work, The Times can always say it's only made things worse. An election season would be no time to start acknowledging good news.

It's not for nothing that The Times' circulation and advertising taken the same direction as its writers and editors have been wishing on America 's economy. The bad news is that among those stragglers who still worship at The Times' Gothic nameplate are almost the entirety of the English-speaking world's journalist class, amplifying the axe-grinding of The New York Times in newsrooms from Houston to Halifax .