At first sight, it might seem as if there’s nothing wrong with this Fox News graph on US unemployment. But take another look and you’ll notice that the figure for November (8.6 per cent) appears to be no lower than that for October (9 per cent) and significantly higher than that for March (8.8 per cent). The US labour market is improving but you wouldn’t know it from Fox’s chart. The message is that it’s stagnation all the way.
Were it not for Fox’s history of distortion, one could write this off as an honest mistake. But as Media Matters notes, “A few weeks ago, when the Bureau of Labor Statistics first reported that the unemployment rate had dropped to 8.6 percent in November — the lowest rate in more than 2 years — a Fox News graphic rounded up to 9 per cent.”
For the record, here’s what an accurate representation of the figures looks like:
But don’t expect to see that graph on Fox anytime soon.
Hat-tip: Media Matters.
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