Do politicians like GDP too much

Not just GDP, unemployment figures, average earnings, these stats can hide so much that sometimes politicians hide behind these stats to get praise.

Politicians are under a lot of pressure to decrease unemployment but not under enough pressure when it is low to get people into better work 

If living standards are falling politicians are under pressure to increase average earnings but not under enough pressure to try and increase earnings for all. 

When the stats are in the politicians favour they don't work as hard to improve working conditions as it's harder to show that in stats or even increase the average persons wage as it's not a popular statistic like GDP, unemployment or average earnings when total wages are divide between the population. 

A higher minimum wage may lead to higher unemployment an important stat for politicians unlike the higher skills gap shortage what is harder to define, but if people are unemployed because they can't earn a high enough wage there is a higher skills gap shortage and now it's been redefined in terms of unemployment, a pressure stat for politicians.
It maybe possible that politicians would work harder to bridge the higher skills gap when they can see it's leader to higher unemployment than when unemployment is low and workers have low pay.