Job Losses at Highest Level Since 1945
I wonder what Obama is going to do for laid-off workers who weren't employed long enough to be eligible for unemployment. That's a big - and rarely discussed - problem:
More than 11 million American workers -- roughly 1 out of 14 -- are unemployed and actively looking for new jobs, according to the Labor Department. An additional 8 million are working part time even though they want full-time work, and 1.9 million were out of work and either too discouraged to keep looking or had refocused on school or caring for family.
"Factoring in discouraged workers, unemployment is closer to 9.4%," said Peter Morici, an economist at the University of Maryland. "Add workers in part-time positions that cannot find full-time employment and the hidden unemployment rate is 14.5%."
The stock market had braced for bad news, so the reaction was relatively muted compared with the dramatic swings of last autumn. The Dow Jones industrial average closed down 143.28 points, or 1.6%, to 8,599.18.
The last time the unemployment rate topped 7% was in 1993. In nominal terms, the economy has lost more jobs this year than in any year since 1945, although the population has grown significantly.
Still, economists generally expect this recession, which began in December 2007, to be the longest since the Great Depression. The two longest recessions of the postwar era -- 1973-75 and 1982-83 -- each lasted 16 months. (The deepest quarterly contraction of the postwar era was a 10.4% decline in gross domestic product in the fourth quarter of 1958.)
The unemployment rate is still far from the levels of the Great Depression, when more than 20% of American workers lost their jobs, as well as of the shorter but deep recession of the early 1980s, when unemployment reached 10.8% in 1982.
The report was full of ill portents nonetheless. For one thing, the average number of weekly hours worked dropped to 33.3 per worker. That's the lowest number since the Labor Department began keeping track in 1964. Businesses tend to cut hours before cutting workers, suggesting that more layoffs are pending.
"We're seeing a complete unraveling of the labor market and are on track for getting beyond 10% unemployment," said Lawrence Mishel, president of the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute in Washington.
"FOUR MORE YEARS!" "FOUR MORE YEARS!"
who thought it was a swell idea to have a supposedly recovering alcoholic as their drinking partner.
the reported unemployment rate today would be between 17 and 20 percent.
Under-employment is equally high.
I read this today (or last night)on Daily Kos.
In a time of plenty all of the disabled can find some bit of work. Not now. For 4 years, due to a partially disabling illness, I've found NO work.
Between Bush and his enabling Democrats in Congress, led by the whining supplicants Steny Hoyer and Harry Reid, our foreign tourist economy -some of the biggest spenders -has been drastically cut back. Most of the smaller tourist towns here in the West now employ none of the seasonal work force and are all owner operated, with reduced hours to save money.
My only way out is to become self-employed. I've tried to retrain myself with the aid of small Pell Grants for undergrad classwork.
But with the banks hoarding student loans for only the most golden of customers and state budget cuts - I'm really screwed after this next semester.
I have no where else to go but BK, and the streets.
and i guess your f#cking buddies the gop had
absolutely nothing to do with the state of the country.
give me a break, like all gop, they never do anything wrong.
The rate given by MSM and govt actually is the number of first-time unemployment filers and only that number. Thus, the second week of unemployment check recipient is officially not included in the unemployment rate figures.
The actual number of unemployed people may be as high as 30%. We don't see the rural unemployed. They don't count middle-aged and nonpretty women who have given up on looking for work, in the face of ageism and looksism.
Like 1946, the bourgeois white boys are about to start stabbing women's backs while kissing our faces, to get our jobs plus our free household labor. Not a happy prospect.
Bushie Inc. made all those McDonald burger flippers classified as "MANUFACTURING" sector jobs...
Or our illusion would really be in the shitter.
Burn motherfucker.. Burn.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q95kX_EP2Nk
RIP.
"Parachutes are allowed in checked or carry-on baggage, but may not be worn in flight."
---Southwest Airlines
My hometown saw 20% unemployment numbers. It was main reason I wanted to use my US citizenship and move. That recession lasted for years, and the recovery took what seemed like forever. The recovery didn't come until Nokia took off big time (thanks to abundance of an engineering force that was sustainable thanks to free higher ed). US is too big to be saved by a single company and will likely need an entire industry. I don't see that coming from any other form than massive infrastructure revamping, which would allow for new energy as well as rethinking urban city planning to cut down on waste. I can only hope that the build up will keep people on the payrolls.
Thanks to that "Blood" Coltan from the war torn Congo...
Cell phone companies supply weapons to all sides down there, in trade for the Coltan...
Truth be known .. the parasitic, cancerous existence we know as capitalism is not sustainable over any real measure of time.
Moving to different countries will not stop the death spasms.
Only a new paradigm will.
Feel free to articulate.
Australia is the biggest producer... but it is so super awesome to pick up a cause, and run with it on the internets so you look like you care.
“If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their money, first by inflation and then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around them, will deprive the people of their property until their children will wake up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered.”
— Thomas Jefferson
"All of the perplexities, confusion, and distress in America arises, not from the defects of the Constitution or Confederation, not from want of honor or virtue, so much as from downright ignorance of the nature of coin, credit and circulation." -- John Adams
"It is well enough that people of the nation do not understand our banking and monetary system, for if they did, I believe there would be a revolution before tomorrow morning." -- Henry Ford
THE SOLUTION:
"The government should create, issue, and circulate all the currency and credit needed to satisfy the spending power of the government and the buying power of consumers. The privilege of creating and issuing money is not only the supreme prerogative of government, but it is the government’s greatest creative opportunity. The financing of all public enterprise, and the conduct of the treasury will become matters of practical administration. Money will cease to be master and will then become servant of humanity." ~ Abraham Lincoln
...since you know so much about money...!!
what is this little fucking owl doing on the dollar bill?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uSBP9aYwfhU
(insert smile)
audit-prosecute-incarcerate
This is waaaayyyy better than the little owl thingy:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D1SYfqH8J30&NR=1
"The US has an army of 90,000 soldiers in Afghanistan and is spending $100bn a year, but has still been unable to defeat 20,000-25,000 Taliban who receive no pay at all." - Patrick Cockburn
do you have an original thought?
or anything of your own to contribute?
this economy is destroyed.......quotes are
not effective......suggestions to a solution is.
what do you suggest that will help?
I suggest implementing once again JFK's Executive Order #11110
I suggest taking the power to print and issue our money away from the private Federal Reserve
I suggest dropping the whole empire thing with our foreign bases and military.
I suggest investing massively in independent energy initiatives here at home.
I suggest education and covering this topic without the corporate bias in our media, blogs, and schools.
I suggest legalizing hemp products such as paper, fiber, oil, fuel, etc and start growing that again as a cash crop.
What do you suggest?
A National Standardized "Medicare for everyone" health care system with the for-profit insurance companies being deep-sixed completely out of our health care equation.
"The US has an army of 90,000 soldiers in Afghanistan and is spending $100bn a year, but has still been unable to defeat 20,000-25,000 Taliban who receive no pay at all." - Patrick Cockburn
...never paid into, or recieved "unemployment" in my lifetime!
I guess its safe to say im not on the list of "laid off workers" period! (I'm statistically challenged?)
I choose not to purchase unemployment "insurance" from the govt. ...I think its been worth it so far.
...I still actually have work, but the company I "contract" for is almost kaput...
audit-prosecute-incarcerate
in this country if you work, you contribute to "unemployment",
some of your taxes paid are used to bolster unemployment throughout
this country.
statistically challenging.
I have always been a contract worker, they have had the curious habit of not using us for more than 13 weeks. If they did they would pay unemployment.
I have had regular un- and under employment throughout my life but never collected unemployment compensation.
It is swim or sink. I plan accordingly.
This time is proving challenging.
statusquObama, change you can only pretend in
The whole job thing after a three year hiatus.
I happen to be a Registered Nurse with about 30 years of experience.
My problem is that I refuse to work in any hospitals because they give you assignments that cannot be safely handled for the patients or your own license!
So I will be looking for a private duty assignment as in Independent Contractor in the next 4 weeks.
Wish me luck!!!!
"The US has an army of 90,000 soldiers in Afghanistan and is spending $100bn a year, but has still been unable to defeat 20,000-25,000 Taliban who receive no pay at all." - Patrick Cockburn
Best of luck.
"Parachutes are allowed in checked or carry-on baggage, but may not be worn in flight."
---Southwest Airlines
Huntington Beach, NY.
The population is about 200,000. It's on the sound where the water is fairly acceptable for summer swimming.
Lots of cosmetic surgeons and they have a nice post-op rehab place there where I can probably get a good job a few days a week. After 25 years of taking care of REALLY sick people (and some terminal), I decided to get into post-op nursing. They're just the walking wounded. They aren't "sick", they get better and move on with their lives. The stress is nothing compared to typical hospital assignments.
Huntington also has the LIRR running through it from Penn Station and lots of good shops and restaurants etc.
Might be an interesting place to hang my hat.
Plus, if there's a big demonstration at the U.N. or someplace I can just hop on the train and be there in about an hour.
"The US has an army of 90,000 soldiers in Afghanistan and is spending $100bn a year, but has still been unable to defeat 20,000-25,000 Taliban who receive no pay at all." - Patrick Cockburn
Probably better weather and beaches, but full of Rethugs. And no UN nearby.
Best of luck.
"Parachutes are allowed in checked or carry-on baggage, but may not be worn in flight."
---Southwest Airlines
to give us real unemployment numbers?
since reagan, these numbers have been played with to look lower than they truly are
i am sure that if we saw the real numbers they would be closer to the height of the depression
what is worse, is that real income has stagnated over the past 8 years
"Add workers in part-time positions that cannot find full-time employment and the hidden unemployment rate is 14.5%."
------------
I really think that this number is even higher. I'd been in it for the last six months or so, and now I think I'm fully enemployed unless I get a contract that may last a week or two come Mon.
The bugger for me has been trying to figure out which is worse, under- or unemployment.
"Parachutes are allowed in checked or carry-on baggage, but may not be worn in flight."
---Southwest Airlines
This is all HIS fault, you know...
if you don't incluge JFK, Carter and Clinton.
ALL Micheal Moores fault...
I was laid off in 2004. There was NO money for retraining available for me at that time. My benefits amounted to $247.00 a week for 26 weeks. When its gone, I got nothing. Luckily, the economy wasn't so bad then and I got a job, making 65% of what I did before.
My roommate, who worked at the same place, was laid off six months after I was. She enrolled in a worker retraining program that had just been implemented. She was in the program for a year and received money for living expenses as she studied horticulture. Now, she's a horticulturist making twice what she was before.
These programs shouldn't be hit or miss. They should be available all year long to anyone who is out or work. They should be training people in industries that pay well, not greeting the unwashed masses at Walmart.
living in the highest concentration of greenhouses and nurseries in the US--South Florida. And let me tell you, there ain't SHIT available now.
Even the undocumented workers (chiefly Guatemalans here) are being cut in droves.
I'm leaving this week to either go to WA state to shovel snow--BIG temp cash right now or turn myself in to jail on a court case where I'll get at least a roof and three (shitty) meals a day. Not sure which is the better situation yet.
"Parachutes are allowed in checked or carry-on baggage, but may not be worn in flight."
---Southwest Airlines
If we just look at the Obama plan there is going to have to be some money set aside for training if he hopes for it to succeed in creating those millions of jobs. Putting a lot of that money into infrastructure and the like is great but the people performing those jobs must have the ablility and training to do them.
So GHW was responsible for negative employment numbers during his term, and now it looks as if GW will now be on the hook for negative numbers.
This would be reason enough to never allow any Bush to take office or receive a political appointment.
'We, the People'............rimshot................hahahahahaha!
NEVER!
'We, the People'............rimshot................hahahahahaha!
here in las vegas unemployment has reached 8.0% and expected to increase. the surrounding areas of the
"strip" have been declining for a few years. its now hitting the strip. it would even be worse if it weren't for visitors from abroad. 50% of the mortgages in this city are underwater/upside down. it has become systemic. the neighborhood strip malls built within the last 5 yrs. or so are losing tenants. small businesses started right at the height of good times or maybe even on the (unknown) decline. commercial property is taking a hit right now. building projects have been delayed or stopped hurting small businesses that had expected symbioltic relationships. the local workforce/economy is NOT diverse and NOT sophisticated. this state and especially las vegas has the lowest high school graduation rates in the country. no education.....no/less jobs====crime.
Michigan is over 10% nominal, 15% with the 'discouraged'. Western Michigan is propping those numbers UP.
The state is broke.
statusquObama, change you can only pretend in
the states are broke. That's where the stimulus money will go. To pay for every state's own existing programs.
I seem to be having a deja vu over President Shit For Brains denying ANYTHING was wrong with US economy till he had to. Much like all his other massive lies.
What, me worry?
bush must be ecstatic and elated
that he has achieved 100% success in
destroying everything he has ever run,
only this time he has ruined the lives
of millions around the USA and the World.
fuck you bush-the next 10 days are too long to wait
for you to get your ass out of the our government.
History will certainly view Bush differently..
That is if we survive as a species and ever manage to re-invent and implement scientific inquiries, after the shit storm were heading into.
Finally, after years of waiting, someone had the guts to put the real numbers in print! Seriously.
John Boehner, Mitch McConnell, John Kerry, Diane Feinstein and Harry Reid say those polls are wrong Americans aren't doing bad right now, it's more important to save Wall Street, Big Business, CEO's, Israel and even the Porn Industry. Ohio and Kentucky representatives will fight Obama tooth and nail. John Kerry and his Bush supporting Democrats have no problem with Americans losing their jobs, homes and life savings. The Law Makers got their raise and really don't care about the voters until election time. Obama is no longer a Senator and he's not a President so he's working day and night without pay but the Senators/Congress/House of Reps need more vacation time to play golf. The Law Makers will do their best to block Obama/Biden from helping Americans live. Looks like McCain/Palin will get in office after all as the GOP with help from Democrats bring down Obama/Biden and the USA. Money is Power and the US has none.
[[The two longest recessions of the postwar era -- 1973-75 and 1982-83 -- each lasted 16 months. (The deepest quarterly contraction of the postwar era was a 10.4% decline in gross domestic product in the fourth quarter of 1958.)]]
Anyone notice a definite pattern here?
Like recessions? Put a Republican in the White House.
JFK/LBJ didn't see one month of recession during their presidencies (unless you count the first month of JFK's presidency, a hold-over from the Eisenhower years).
Clinton? Not one month of recession in eight years.
Even Jimmy Carter only had one short recession during his presidency that lasted all of 6 months, shorter than ANY of the serial recessions we typically see under Republican presidents.
The Wall Street gambling establishment isn't the only ones who cook the books.
The unemployment rate is still far from the levels of the Great Depression, when more than 20% of American workers lost their jobs,
I we still counted unemployed people the same way we did during the 1930s the current 16% would look very near the levels of the first great depression.
At what point do we stop calling it the Bush recession and start calling it the Bush depression?
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