This article was originally published by Michael Snyder at The Economic Collapse Blog. 

I can’t take it anymore.  Fake numbers that are released by the government get turned into fake news by the corporate media, and many Americans don’t even realize that they are being conned.  Major news outlets all over the country are breathlessly trumpeting the “blockbuster jobs report” as if it is a sign from heaven that good economic times are ahead.

We are being told that the U.S. economy added 517,000 jobs last month, but that isn’t true.  Sadly, the truth is that the U.S. economy actually lost 2.5 million jobs in January.  Yes, you read that correctly.  So how in the world does a loss of 2.5 million jobs become a “gain” of 517,000 jobs?  Every month, government bureaucrats apply “adjustments” to the numbers that they believe are appropriate, and at this point, their “adjustments” have become so absurd that they have turned the monthly employment report into a total farce.

As I have been documenting on my website for weeks, there has been a tremendous wave of layoffs over the last several months.

Google, Microsoft, Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Lyft, Twitter, Walmart, McDonald’s, FedEx, and countless other large corporations have decided to conduct mass layoffs.

But now the government expects us to believe that the U.S. economy is actually adding jobs at a very brisk pace.

That doesn’t make any sense at all.

Unfortunately, the corporate media is totally buying it.  For example, CNBC just posted an article that described the jobs report as “stunningly strong”…

The employment picture started off 2023 on a stunningly strong note, with nonfarm payrolls posting their biggest gain since July 2022.

Nonfarm payrolls increased by 517,000 for January, above the Dow Jones estimate of 187,000 and December’s gain of 260,000, according to a Labor Department report Friday.

And a CNN article has quoted one expert as saying that “the labor market is more like a bullet train”…

“With 517,000 new jobs added in January 2023 and the unemployment rate at 3.4%, this is a blockbuster report demonstrating that the labor market is more like a bullet train,” Becky Frankiewicz, president and chief commercial officer of ManpowerGroup, said Friday.

Really?

After all of the layoffs that we have witnessed in recent months, does she really believe that?

Not to be outdone, Moody’s Chief Economist Mark Zandi boldly declared that any concerns about a coming recession “should be completely dashed by these numbers”…

The January jobs report should “dash” concerns of recession, Moody’s chief economist said Friday, but warned that the numbers may overstate job growth.

“Any concern the economy is in recession or close to a recession should be completely dashed by these numbers,” Moody’s Chief Economist Mark Zandi told CNN’s Matt Egan on Friday, adding that it would take “an awful lot” to send the US economy into a downturn.

Come on man.

You are smarter than that.

The U.S. economy did not add 517,000 jobs last month.

That is the “adjusted” number.

The “unadjusted” number actually shows that the U.S. economy lost 2.5 million jobs last month.  The following comes from Bloomberg…

For the establishment survey, the government’s updated seasonal factors may have impacted the headline payrolls figure. On an unadjusted basis, payrolls actually fell by 2.5 million last month.

That is actually what was measured.

But if you brazenly add more than 3 million jobs to the report that simply does not exist, it makes it look like the U.S. economy is doing just great.

Needless to say, Joe Biden was quite eager to take credit for the “spectacular” jobs report, and he also told reporters that he takes no responsibility for the raging inflation crisis that we are currently experiencing…

He replied with an emphatic ‘no’ when asked if he took any accountability for the price rises under his presidency. ‘It was already there when I got here, man.’

‘Remember what the economy was like when I got here? Jobs were hemorrhaging. Inflation was rising. We weren’t manufacturing the damn thing here. We were in real economic difficulty.’

Inflation in January 2021 when Biden took office was 1.4 percent. The latest December figures were 6.5 percent, down from a June 2022 peak of 9 percent.

For the next month, the Biden administration is going to endlessly boast that 517,000 jobs were added to the economy in January, and most Americans will never even know that it is a number that is entirely fictional.

The cold, hard reality of the matter is that economic activity is slowing down all around us, and many people are starting to become quite desperate…

Video out of Austin, Texas, shows desperate people climbing into supermarket dumpsters to retrieve food that may have been discarded due to a widespread power outage.

The shocking footage Thursday from behind an H-E-B grocery store in Southeast Austin featured people having a free-for-all from dumpsters, in what one commenter on Instagram described as a “dystopian hellscape.”

From now on, I really wish that the government would only release the raw, unadjusted employment numbers to the corporate media.

Because there is way too much guesswork that goes into the “adjustments” that the government bureaucrats are coming up with.

But that is never going to happen.

Every month they are just going to continue to tell us that things are better than they really are.

At least that will give me something to write about.

If anyone tries to shove the “517,000 jobs” number in your face, please share this article with them.

That figure does not reflect reality in any way.

The raw numbers show that 2.5 million jobs were actually lost last month, and that is absolutely horrible.

And as I continue to warn my readers, incredibly challenging economic times are on the horizon.

More layoffs are coming, the housing market is going to continue to crash, and global food shortages are going to continue to intensify.

So don’t let anyone fool you.  We really are plunging into a very serious economic downturn, and the months ahead are not going to be pleasant.

***It is finally here! Michael’s new book entitled “End Times” is now available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.***

About the Author: My name is Michael and my brand new book entitled “End Times” is now available on Amazon.com.  In addition to the new book I have written six other books that are available on Amazon.com including “7 Year Apocalypse”, “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America”, “The Beginning Of The End”, and “Living A Life That Really Matters”. (#CommissionsEarned)  When you purchase any of these books you help to support the work that I am doing, and one way that you can really help is by sending copies as gifts to family and friends.  Time is short, and I need help getting these warnings into the hands of as many people as possible.  I have published thousands of articles on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream, and The Most Important News, and the articles that I publish on those sites are republished on dozens of other prominent websites all over the globe.  I always freely and happily allow others to republish my articles on their own websites, but I also ask that they include this “About the Author” section with each article.  The material contained in this article is for general information purposes only, and readers should consult licensed professionals before making any legal, business, financial, or health decisions.  I encourage you to follow me on social media on Facebook and Twitter, and anyway that you can share these articles with others is definitely a great help.  These are such troubled times, and people need hope.  John 3:16 tells us about the hope that God has given us through Jesus Christ: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”  If you have not already done so, I strongly urge you to invite Jesus Christ to be your Lord and Savior today.