September Jobs Report Won’t Save Obama

Let’s dispense with conspiracy theories right away: September’s jobs and unemployment reports were good. Driven primarily by upward revisions of past months’ anemic job creation numbers, the official unemployment rate ticked down from 8.1 percent to 7.8 – a significant decline. That’s still a unsatisfactorily high rate of unemployment, but the trend is moving in the right direction. It should and will be touted by the Obama administration, but the president’s supporters who think that this report alone will be enough to reverse the impression that the economy is, at best, struggling, will be disappointed to learn in the coming days that the electorate does not turn on monthly jobs reports.

That said, progressives are crowing this morning. After Mitt Romney delivered what can only be described as a drubbing in his first faceoff against President Barack Obama on Wednesday night, Democrats set about despondently conceding that the election might not be over after all. They needed a pick-me-up, and Friday morning’s jobs numbers have served that purpose.

However, many liberals have oversold the implications of today’s report by several parsecs. Eurasia Group President Ian Bremmer declared succinctly, “7.8% unemployment > US Presidential Debate.” MSNBC journalist and anchor Thomas Roberts asked his audience, “Is 7.8 percent unemployment the real October surprise?”

Even seasoned journalists like the Associate Press’ Ron Fournier have over bought into the hype. “Obama won the week,” he declared on his twitter account on Friday morning.

Not quite.

There is evidence that the sluggish economic recovery is – after four years of stagnation – baked into the electoral cake. A strong July jobs report which saw gains in new jobs better than any month since March, which has yet to be matched, made virtually no impact on the state of the race. While the unemployment rate ticked up to 8.3 percent due to the increased participation of previously discouraged workers in the labor market, that newfound confidence in the economy did not translate into confidence in Obama. The polls remained static.

Likewise, August’s jobs report, which showed the unemployment rate ticking down two tenths of a point, due almost entirely to a mass exodus of eligible laborers leaving the workforce, was touted by conservatives as a game-changing development. It was not. In fact, it had nearly no impact on the election. That report came the day after Democrats wrapped up their nominating convention and the unemployment numbers did nothing to mute Obama’s post-convention bounce, as some Republicans had predicted.

Furthermore, the Obama administration could overplay its hand. They would be smart not to oversell these numbers – with 23 million unemployed or underemployed, there are still millions of Americans for whom these unemployment figures will not match their own reality. The Obama campaign can say things are getting better, but they should tread carefully and stress that there is a long way to go. If they do not, they risk alienating voters who do not see an improving economy or jobs market.

The president seems to know this. Speaking before a campaign rally in Virginia this morning, Obama touted that the unemployment rate is now the lowest it has been since he took office, but he made it clear that there is work yet to be done. That is the right tactic, but it will frustrate his supporters who want this jobs report to become Obama’s “Mission Accomplished” banner.

Finally, the first presidential debate is more likely to have an impact on the electorate than this jobs report. 67 million people watched the debate – perhaps more, given the impossibility of measuring the number of people who watched online or listened to it on the radio. This decidedly one-sided event was taken in by more than half the number of people who turned out to vote in 2008. Those who suggest that the last month’s positive jobs numbers will have a broader impact than that widely-watched event are kidding themselves.

Mitt Romney presented himself as a credible alternative to Obama on Wednesday. He was polite, displayed a solid command of the facts and looked like a president while dressing down the underprepared Obama. That impression will stick.

The reality is that this is still a horserace. The economy is baked into the cake – it has been for some time. It will take several months of solid job growth and at least a handful of quarters that show sustained economic activity to reverse that impression.

Mitt Romney and Barack Obama have a lot of campaigning left in the coming month. This jobs report is strong and it may negate some of the good that Romney did himself during the debate. But it is nothing more than wishful thinking to suggest that this jobs report alone will save Obama.

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This is an opinion piece. The views expressed in this article are those of just the author.