Can a U.S. president "create" or "lose" jobs in the private sector? From the campaign rhetoric you'd think the leader of the free world has merely to focus his mighty brow upon the issue and jobs can be summoned from clay or a rib like Adam and Eve ("Watch yourself - another truck-load of ribs coming through").

But this is simply nonsense. The forces at play that promote or demote entire industries are historical, global and tectonic in nature. Roger Lowenstein tackles the subject in the NY Times Magazine:

Robert Barbera, chief economist at the brokerage firm of ITG/Hoenig, says that in his 30 years in the business, ''the notion that presidents create and lose jobs is the most grotesque mischaracterization of the economic backdrop'' that he has witnessed.

....Robert Reich, secretary of labor under Clinton, says bluntly, ''Job numbers are largely a function of population and the business cycle, and the business cycle has its own rhythm.''

....the president is only one of many influences over whether a manager decides to hire or fire. Some of the others that come to mind: Alan Greenspan, the stock market, the strength of international economies, technological change, oil prices and the weather (try legislating that).

....Jobs result from growth — from employers' desire to increase profits, not from their desire to increase payrolls. Countries that have tried to target jobs specifically — say in Europe, by restricting the freedom of businesses to lay off workers — have discovered an unpleasant paradox. Lessened flexibility in the labor market leads to more tentative hiring and fewer jobs.

Moreover, since the economy benefits when companies are able to produce more goods and services with fewer workers, maximizing the number of jobs is not always in society's interest. If it were, we would all have wonderful memories of the Carter administration, which recorded the fastest job growth of any president since the 1960's.

But we don't. Which means that job numbers are one, but only one, indicator of economic well-being. Productivity — how much each job accomplishes — matters, too.

....In total, since the start of Bush's term, payrolls have shrunk by 1.1 million. Kerry advisers are quick to point out that the economy normally adds about 150,000 jobs a month, which over four years would total 7 million. Bush has yet to get to the starting line.

This was Kerry's theme when I caught up with him early this summer. He was addressing a rally in a high-school gymnasium in Massillon, Ohio, a depressed region in a battleground state that Bush carried narrowly in 2000 and that has been pounded by layoff notices since. The big news in Massillon was that the Timken Company, a steel and bearings manufacturer founded by a German-born inventor in 1899, had announced it would close a trio of plants in nearby Canton. As a symbol, Kerry couldn't have done better. Timken's chairman, Timothy Timken, is a major contributor to the Bush campaign. In 2003, while campaigning for his third tax cut, Bush came out to Timken and praised its workers and promised that his package would help ''create the conditions for job growth, so people can find work.''

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