Sunday Roundup

This week brought news that the U.S. economy had unexpectedly shrunk during the last quarter of 2012 -- the first time that's happened since the recession ended. Though this contraction was largely attributed to government cuts, the policy conversation in Washington centered on... more cuts. On Friday, labor department numbers showed that the economy added 157,000 jobs last month, while the numbers for the two previous months were revised upward. Even so, unemployment climbed to 7.9 percent -- among millennials it is 13.1 percent, having gone up each month since the election. That this kind of jobs report is seen as good news is a measure of how far we've downwardly revised our expectations -- along with the prospects of the young people that Washington loves to extol in speeches. If our leaders cared about "the next generation" as much as they claim, youth unemployment would be a national emergency. Revised numbers are great; revised thinking would be much better.