Eight years ago, the hacks at the @WSJopinion editorial page published a breathtakingly dishonest piece. Even for them, which is saying something. It had to do with the labor market. Here is the headline. 1/ 
They compared the first pass of Sept 2011 jobs (103,000) to a supposed 1.1 million under Reagan 28 years earlier. Sadly, however, their narrative could not have been more of a lie and is quite easily disproven. 2/
Here is the money shot from the editorial, paying homage to St. Ronnie in the most fawning of ways: 3/
If only any of it were true. The story behind the 1.1 million jobs that were "created" in Sept 1983 is a remarkably simple and straightforward one. Ignoring it speaks to the rank dishonesty of the WSJ's editorial board. 4/
The story is so simple, I can fit it all in one tweet: In Aug 1983, ~700,000 telecom workers went on strike (and dinged NFP for that month). In Sept 1983, they came back (and goosed NFP for that month). Here you go: 5/
Here's what a look-back at NFP (via ALFRED, vintage Dec 1983) tells us: 6/
The Journal's misinformation was of course picked up far and wide, and I eventually wrote a piece about it for Business Insider, correcting as many instances as I could find: 7/
businessinsider.com/ronald-reagans…
businessinsider.com/ronald-reagans…
Sadly, nothing has changed on the @WSJopinion pages, as I have found them manipulating, massaging, misrepresenting, and torturing data many times since. That said, they do have some fine reporters. It's a shame the Editorial page is such a clown show. 🤡 FIN/
