Very selective on what desired to be believed. Either the number is trusted or not. If not then unemployment total wasn't 11.1 million in Dec 2008. Can't just pick and choose when you want to believe the numbers. Well I guess some can.
In December, the number of unemployed persons increased by 632,000 to 11.1 million and the unemployment rate rose to 7.2 percent. Since the start of the recession in December 2007, the number of unemployed persons has grown by 3.6 million, and the unemployment rate has risen by 2.3 percentage points.
The unemployment rate, at 5.7 percent, changed little in January and has shown no net change since October. The number of unemployed persons, at 9.0 million, was little changed in January. (See table A-1. See the note at the end of this news release and tables B and C for information about annual population adjustments to the household survey estimates.)