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[quote=Anonymous]https://www.nytimes.com/2025/08/13/opinion/trump-bls-nominee-antoni.html

When Mr. Trump abruptly fired the B.L.S. commissioner after negative jobs number revisions this month, he wrote on social media that he would find someone “much more competent and qualified” for the post. He is proposing replacing Erika McEntarfer, a highly respected economist with decades of experience working at the U.S. Census Bureau and elsewhere, with a partisan favored for the job by Steve Bannon.

Dr. Antoni’s posts that have shown apparent misunderstandings of import prices and the baby boom retirement have gotten the most attention and criticism, along with his statement before the nomination that the monthly jobs report should be suspended.

But even more egregious, as Alan Cole, an economist at the right-leaning Tax Foundation, has pointed out, is that in October 2024 Dr. Antoni took the time to publish a report that purported to find that “the American economy has actually been in recession since 2022.” This claim was based on a concept of “adjusted real” disposable income, which was down about 2 percent from 2019 to 2024 — in contrast to the official data, which showed real disposable income up 12 percent over this period. The problem was his measure effectively double-counted housing inflation, making the inflation rate artificially higher and growth artificially lower.

Dr. Antoni’s selection has done something I have rarely seen, which is to unite a number of economists and policy wonks from across the political spectrum. The American Enterprise Institute’s Stan Veuger told The Washington Post that “he is utterly unqualified and as partisan as it gets.” Similar sentiments were echoed by people affiliated with conservative and libertarian think tanks, in a Wall Street Journal editorial and a National Review article.[/quote]

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