5.4% unemployment is a loaded statistic... don't forget that it represents 8,000,000 people

And... they are only people actively collecting unemployment benefits... there are still 1.6 million in a fringe that the government doesn't like to include... they are, and I quote the United states department of labor here...

The number of persons who were marginally attached to the labor force was
1.6 million in August, about the same as a year earlier.  (Data are not sea-
sonally adjusted.)  These individuals wanted and were available to work and had looked for a job sometime in the prior 12 months.  They were not counted
as unemployed, however, because they did not actively search for work in the
4 weeks preceding the survey.  There were 534,000 discouraged workers in
August, also about the same as a year earlier.  Discouraged workers, a subset
of the marginally attached, were not currently looking for work specifically
because they believed no jobs were available for them.  The other 1.1 million
marginally attached had not searched for work for reasons such as school or
family responsibilities.

1.6 million don't count? Statistics are dangerous in an election year because they can be skewed and adjusted to fit the need of the group requesting or gathering the statistics.

They don't even have a statistic for those who went back to work after the Nafta-Shafta to a job that pays less or has limited or no health benefits?

People won't understand until it affects them... I guess that's the bottom line. It's easy to accept the ignorance of those who have not had to come home not once but twice (or more times) to their families and tell them they were laid off for no better reason than government blessed corporate greed...

THe republicans do not care about the poor or the middle class, the democrats do not care about the rich and the middle class, so regardless of who wins, it's not going to really make things better for the middle class, but an administration willing to stick it to corporate greed is better than the blatant arrogance of rich nafta abusers who are more than willing to sell out their own people for profit.... just go vote and show them we still care... The deadline to register is very early in october, so go do it now, and bring a norm of ID to the poll if you are a first time voter or voting in a new district, that will make the process easier for you. Regardless of which way you vote, just do it because not voting has apparently given them the green light to do whatever they want.

Take all statistics with a grain of salt, because they express what the poll takers want it to express, just like you can fool yourself into believing misleading lottery statistics... we as a group know better than that... just because it hasn't affected you yet doesn't mean it's not affecting millions of others...