The federal Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) released their latest employment figures today, and they continue to be disturbing. According to the BLS, the economy only added 92.000 jobs last month, and the unemployment rate edged up from 4.5% to 4.6%. But those numbers don't tell the whole story.

Actually, the real clue comes from the job creation rate, which continues to lag behind the number needed merely to keep pace with population growth. So if not enough jobs are being created, why isn't the official unemployment rate higher? It's because fewer Americans are considered to be part of the workforce.

Specifically, 63% of Americans 16 and older are officially in the workforce. That's down from a 64.25% average during the last three years of the Clinton administration -- a figure Bush has never been able to reach. These percentages translate into just over three million Americans whom the BLS considers to be "unpersons." Add those three million unemployed Americans into the mix, and the rate jumps from 4.6% to 6.4% -- and rising.

What's worse ...

That 63% is reversing a generations-long trend. For decades that number rose, but ever since Bush took office it has declined. Between January and September of 2001 the number dropped from 64.4% to 63.5%, and it hasn't been that high since. If the percentage of Americans in the workforce were just 65%, the unemployment rate would be 7.5%.

And now you know why those idiots on CNBC and other places seem puzzled by what they call a "disconnect" between the job-creation numbers and the unemployment rate.

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