Economics question of the day: When does a drop in the unemployment rate mean bad news?

When the drop is caused by people giving up on their search for jobs.

So it is that the Labor Department today reported that the jobless rate fell to 6.7 percent, the lowest rate since 2008, but the economy added only 74,000 jobs in December, which is far below economists’ prediction.

Is it time to push the panic button? Time to throw in the towel? Time to storm the White House with torches and pitchforks?

No to all of the above.

As my financial adviser keeps telling my wife and me: Take the long view.

The nation added 2.2 million jobs in 2013, which is about what it added in each of the previous two years. The labor market isn’t great. As one economist said on NPR this morning, it’s gone from being “terrible to just plain bad.”

I’m not going to join the amen chorus of critics who keep insisting the economy is in the tank.

We’ve recovered all the jobs lost during the great recession of late 2008 and early 2009; manufacturing is up; the budget deficit is down, as is the trade deficit; domestic energy exploration is way up, as evidenced by all those pump jacks working furiously along the Texas and Oklahoma panhandles.

Let’s just wait for next month’s job figures … and maybe the month after that.