There was an article in the UK Guardian (Australian) edition last week (September 27, 2013) which carried the title – Can Labor be blamed for rising unemployment?. The Labor government, which was tossed out of office in Australia on September 14, had been in power since late 2007. They inherited an unemployment rate of 4.4 per cent (which dropped 3 months later to 4 per cent on the tail end of the growth phase), an underemployment rate of 6.2 per cent (total labour underutilisation rate of 10.7 per cent), a participation rate of 65.6 per cent and an employment-population rate of 62.7 per cent. By the time we got sick of them, the unemployment rate was 5.8 per cent and rising, the underemployment rate was 7.8 per cent and rising (total wastage was 13.7 per cent and rising), the participation rate had dropped to 65 per cent (some 114 thousand workers exiting the labour force because of the lack of jobs), and the employment-population ratio had dropped to 61.2 per cent (a loss of 285 thousand relative jobs). The labour force increased by 1147 thousand over this time but employment only rose by 934 thousand, which meant that unemployment rose by 161 thousand more than if the relative scales had been maintained from November 2007. So is Labor to blame for this? Of-course it is – it was the currency-issuing government for 6 years or so. Any rise in the unemployment rate is the fault of the national government because it alone as the complete capacity to offset any reductions in employment arising from other sources such as global financial crisis, the slowdown in the Chinese economy, an appreciated Australian dollar and whatever else. The author of the Guardian article, while mounting a reasonable fight against the conservative view of the changing labour market, feels unable to admit that basic truth. So the Labor Party is obviously to blame because it was in government and could have prevented the rise in the unemployment rate.