By NBC’s David Murphy
An election year reminder: Watch the jobless rate trends, not just the number.
In October of 1980, Ronald Reagan asked Americans: “Are you better off than you were four years ago?” When it came to unemployment, the numbers showed that they weren’t – but it was close. The September jobless rate, released in the first week of October, was 7.5%, just a tick below the 7.6% rate from September of 1976. Nevertheless, it was enough for voters to deny Jimmy Carter’s bid for a second term and put Reagan in office. Ironically, the unemployment rate was almost exactly the same when Reagan ran for re-election four years later. The report from September of 1984 showed a rate of 7.3%. However, that was far off the high of 10.8% at the end of 1982. For Americans that re-elected Reagan overwhelmingly, apparently the trend was more important than the final number and it helped put Reagan back in the White House.









