Bad Data Means Bad Decisions
The Urgent Need for Reliable Economic Data: Reforming the BLS and Federal Reserve In September 2025, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) dropped a bombshell: a preliminary benchmark revision slashing nonfarm payroll growth by 911,000 jobs for the 12 months ending March 2025-the largest such adjustment on record. This follows a prior year’s revision of 818,000 fewer jobs, with cumulative overstatements over recent years exceeding 2 million according to conservative estimates. These revisions, reported across outlets like CNBC, RedState, HotAir, The Blaze, PowerLineBlog, and Breitbart, expose a critical flaw in the U.S. economic data ecosystem: policymakers and businesses cannot rely on…