Declaring that 750,000 Americans are out of work because of intellectual property piracy, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce is urging President Bush to sign legislation creating a cabinet-level copyright czar to oversee expanded IP enforcement efforts.

Those are eye-popping numbers, equaling 8 percent of the official number of 9.4 million unemployed Americans.

But the origin of that 750,000 number – which was included Thursday in a Chamber of Commerce lobbying letter (.pdf) to the president – is a mystery.

A spokesman for the Chamber of Commerce said Friday that the nation's largest business lobbying group obtained the figure from "several federal government departments and agencies," including the U.S. Department of Commerce.

In an e-mail, chamber spokesman Alex Burgos provided a link to a Sept. 21, 2005 statement from then-Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez citing the 750,000 figure.

The U.S. Department of Commerce, however, said Friday that it obtained the number from the Chamber of Commerce. "That information was provided by the Chamber of Commerce," Emily Lawrimore, a U.S. Department of Commerce spokeswoman, said in a telephone interview. "That's where we received the information from."

The 750,000 figure is repeated on the Chamber of Commerce'swebsite section on intellectual property, but cites the office of U.S. Customs and Border Protection as the source.

And then there's the same number again appearing on a 2007 jointU.S. Department of Commerce-U.S. Chamber of Commerce press release. A link on the press release goes to the Commerce Department's trademark division dealing with small business. Atop the website is this flash message we captured with a screenshot: