The  US economy and markets continue to sway, dip and rise, with each new  piece of news from Europe and Asia. Compounding the volatility in the  markets are the political bickering in Washington DC.

The US  economy continues to sputter on. The markets have good days and bad  days, reacting to news both internally and from events occurring around  the globe. There is no "great" news on the horizon.

The Markets: Bad news coming out of China sent US stocks sliding down 52 points after closing up this past Friday, says The Christian Science Monitor.  Investors are remaining tepidly optimistic, however, in hopes that the  Federal Reserve Bank System will provide more stimulus relief also known  as QE3.

The  Dow Jones industrial average fell 52.35 points to close at 13,254.29 on  Monday. The Standard & Poor's 500 slipped 8.84 points to 1,429.08  and the Nasdaq composite fell 32.40 points to 3,104.02.

At the same time, according to CNN Money, eyes will be watching what happens in Europe this week as well:

Meanwhile, investors will be keeping tabs on Europe, as the German  Constitutional Court is expected to hand down a ruling Wednesday that  could impact the European Central Bank's plans to preserve the euro.

The European Central Bank announced its own bond-buying program last week, aimed at keeping the continent's debt crisis at bay.

Investors are also awaiting details on the European Union's proposal to  create a new banking authority, general elections in The Netherlands  and a meeting of euro area finance ministers later this week.

"The market is digesting last week's gains with a multitude of events  ahead of us," said Art Hogan, a managing director at Lazard Capital  Markets.

The Jobs Numbers:  As has been widely reported, the US of A only added 96,000 private  sector jobs in August and numbers for July and June were cut back by  41,000. Even though the jobs numbers were anemic at best, the  unemployment rate dropped from 8.3% to 8.1%. However, the drop is not  really good news when over 360,000 people simply dropped off the rolls  of those still considered to be in the workforce.

Yahoo News reported:

The  unemployment rate fell to 8.1 percent from 8.3 percent in July. But  that was only because more people gave up looking for jobs. People out  of work are counted as unemployed only if they're looking for a job.

The sluggish job growth could slow the momentum President Barack Obama  hoped to gain from his speech Thursday night to the Democratic National  Convention.

They could also make the Federal Reserve more  likely to unveil a new bond-buying program at its meeting next week. The  goal would be to lower long-term interest rates to encourage borrowing  and spending.

Hourly pay fell in August, manufacturers cut the  most jobs in two years and the number of people in the work force  dropped to its lowest level in 31 years.

The unemployment rate  declined in August, but for a bad reason: The government doesn't count  people as unemployed if they've stopped looking for a job.

The  number of people working or looking for work shrank in August by  368,000, the government said. The reasons vary, economists say.

Many people, after months of looking for a job without success, give  up. But this group of "discouraged" workers doesn't fully capture the  phenomenon.

"Record 88,921,000 Americans ‘Not in Labor Force’—119,000 Fewer Employed in August Than July" was the headline on CNSNews.com.

CNSNews.com explained:

The  Labor Department counts a person as not in the civilian labor force if  they are at least 16 years old, are not in the military or an  institution such as a prison, mental hospital or nursing home, and have  not actively looked for a job in the last four weeks. The department  counts a person as in “the civilian labor force” if they are at least  16, are not in the military or an institution such as a prison, mental  hospital or nursing home, and either do have a job or have actively  looked for one in the last four weeks.

In July, there were 155,013,000 in the U.S. civilian labor force. In  August that dropped to 154,645,000—meaning that on net 368,000 people  simply dropped out of the labor force last month and did not even look  for a job.

There were also  119,000 fewer Americans employed in August than there were in July. In  July, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, there were  142,220,000 Americans working. But, in August, there were only  142,101,000 Americans working.

Despite the fact that fewer Americans were employed in August than  July, the unemployment rate ticked down from 8.3 in July to 8.1. That is  because so many people dropped out of the labor force and stopped  looking for work. The unemployment rate is the percentage of people in  the labor force (meaning they had a job or were actively looking for  one) who did not have a job.

The Bureau of Labor Statistic also reported that in August the labor  force participation rate (the percentage of the people in the civilian  non-institutionalized population who either had a job or were actively  looking for one) dropped to a 30-year low of 63.5 percent, down from  63.7 percent in July. The last time the labor force participation rate  was as low as 63.5 percent was in September 1981.

The Chevy Volt:  Sales are up, but return on investment hasn't even made a dent yet on  the hybrid electric car that General Motors and President Barack Obama  are banking will the model that puts and keeps the American automaker on  top.

Reuters tells the tale of the good, the bad and the ugly of the much touted Chevy Volt:

General  Motors Co sold a record number of Chevrolet Volt sedans in August — but  that probably isn't a good thing for the automaker's bottom line.

Nearly two years after the introduction of the path-breaking plug-in  hybrid, GM is still losing as much as $49,000 on each Volt it builds,  according to estimates provided to Reuters by industry analysts and  manufacturing experts. GM on Monday issued a statement disputing the  estimates.

Cheap Volt lease offers meant to drive more  customers to Chevy showrooms this summer may have pushed that loss even  higher. There are some Americans paying just $5,050 to drive around for  two years in a vehicle that cost as much as $89,000 to produce.

And while the loss per vehicle will shrink as more are built and sold,  GM is still years away from making money on the Volt, which will soon  face new competitors from Ford, Honda and others.

GM's basic  problem is that "the Volt is over-engineered and over-priced," said  Dennis Virag, president of the Michigan-based Automotive Consulting  Group.

And in a sign that there may be a wider market problem,  Nissan, Honda and Mitsubishi have been struggling to sell their electric  and hybrid vehicles, though Toyota's Prius models have been in  increasing demand.

GM's quandary is how to increase sales  volume so that it can spread its estimated $1.2-billion investment in  the Volt over more vehicles while reducing manufacturing and component  costs - which will be difficult to bring down until sales increase.

But the Volt's steep $39,995 base price and its complex technology —  the car uses expensive lithium-polymer batteries, sophisticated  electronics and an electric motor combined with a gasoline engine — have  kept many prospective buyers away from Chevy showrooms.

Some  are put off by the technical challenges of ownership, mainly related to  charging the battery. Plug-in hybrids such as the Volt still take hours  to fully charge the batteries - a process that can be speeded up a bit  with the installation of a $2,000 commercial-grade charger in the  garage.

From the Cornfield, this election will be centered dead square on the economy, jobs and the unsustainable national debt.