Record Number of U.S. Jobless Seen Losing Benefits

[limitdown]

Quote from Mecro:

Oh come on now.

But stop blaming the White House and blame the CEOs that are making these decisions because they want an even bigger bonus. And if you want to blame the government, blame Bill Clinton and his promotion of globalization and the strong dollar.

The unemployment benefits programs have been very generous in the last few years. I would bet that 80% of the claimants just collect and chill out or work for cash. Anyone that I knew on unemployment did just that. The excuse was that jobs were not just coming their way, which is true. But if those benefits did not exist, they would have found a job long time ago.

There is no difference in who is to blame, whether it is the present or previous WH or it is the CEO's. They are all in the wealthy category, for whom these concerns never really touch their daily lives, hence they make these decisions without concern for those whom are displaced and really hurt by it.

Blame the Bush's and the present WH. The previous WH is long gone!

The TV stations across America have banned reporting on the growing displaced white families all throughout the country, and especially in the Midwest. Where is their fault, and all these alternative jobs? I'm sure they have been beaten down enough to take a street sweeper's job, yet even those aren't availalbe.

The policies and the consciences of these wealthy, who invariably support Republican tickets really care nothing and justify their offshoring and no concern for their fellow citizens by simply avoiding responsibility for their actions:

1) Jobless recovery - that's the answer
2) just wait, don'y worry there are no benefits of any kind, just wait, we'll have thousands of jobs coming soon -- and its 3 years later
3) off shoring will increase profits and reduce expenses -- go buy our new product series

Get a grip and look at things for what they are.

The 1929 Depression wasn't nearly as bad and detremental as what we've been through in the last 3 years under this administration.

 

[limitdown]

Quote from jstanton:

New York Daily News - http://www.nydailynews.com
The U.S. job machine's broken

Wednesday, February 4th, 2004

The Bush administration has a big problem. Last year, the President and his aides promised that their tax cut would give America what it needed most: jobs. Never happened.

The jobless recovery we're now in is unlike anything the American economy has ever seen. Typically, the Great American Job Machine energizes our economy. New jobs beget more income, which begets more spending, which begets more hiring, incomes and spending. What we're seeing now, however, suggests that there may be something fundamentally wrong in the engine room of the American economy.

This time, we have seen not a deceleration in job creation, but a net loss - the sharpest in any period since the Great Depression, especially in manufacturing. No work and not much in the way of wage increases either. Ouch!

"offshoring" is moving up the food chain of services to include professions like engineering, design, accounting, legal work, actuarial and insurance work, medical services and financial analysis.

That's why virtually all the jobs created in the latter part of 2003 were concentrated in the most sheltered segments of the workforce. It also explains why some 80% of the 2.5 million manufacturing jobs lost are gone for good. The result is that too many of America's jobs today cannot support a full household, at least at the level that most people feel appropriate to a middle-class lifestyle.

Productivity has at least succeeded in lifting profits and stock prices. This has produced a boom on the capital side of the economy, but not on the labor side, for it has not yet increased either jobs or workers' pay. This has been masked in part by tax cuts, by a huge buildup of personal debt and by the extraction of money from the increased value of assets, especially homes, made possible by record- low interest rates.

But look closer and you'll see they really want someone to challenge the President on the gut issues they really care about: jobs and health care. As New Hampshire goes, so goes the nation.

Outstanding article. Accurate and hard to put the normal political spin that so many are doing.

1) Now they're trying to count the so called Home Based Businesses as part of the job growth.

That is desperation in the worst way and cynical in the least. Those so called home based businesses are really deficit financed endeavour to prevent one's mind from going insane. Most of these businesses offer services on the premise that someone out there is still spending money, and they will service those needs. Declining spiral is what economists call that.

2) the sharpest in any period since the Great Depression, especially in manufacturing. No work

The recession has not ended and neither has the Depression that they never wanted to admit we had as a direct result of this administration's determination to undo the fundamental supports to the American Middle Class.

3) "offshoring" is moving up the food chain of services to include professions like engineering, design, accounting, legal work, actuarial and insurance work, medical services and financial analysis.

These skills required almost lifetime dedication to their degrees, certifications, skillsets, experiences and job focus. Transplanting mid-stream with no safety net and no preparation time has produced what Depression Scenarios we are living today in so many households. Hundreds of thousands of single and single parent families are simply not able to both retrain, get rehired, earn anywheres equivalent to previous job and handle their obligations. Hence you have the tremendous ground swell of discontent with this administration and their rich person policies. Clinton is no where to be found on these issues.

4) This has been masked in part by tax cuts, by a huge buildup of personal debt and by the extraction of money from the increased value of assets, especially homes, made possible by record- low interest rates.

This is classic bubble economy development trends that produce broken pieces all across the economic board. When interest rates are no longer capable of remaining low; when the US Dollar is no longer artificially depressed against other currencies; when these debts come back to haunt the State Houses and Regional Economies of each of the states, then all these cliche's will not offer any help.

So, there you have your Jobless Recovery unmasked.

 

[CalTrader]

Quote from limitdown:

.... These skills required almost lifetime dedication to their degrees, certifications, skillsets, experiences and job focus.

This is the fact that is changing: Labor markets are changing much faster than the length of time it takes to train an individual.

Thus, the idea of lifetime dedication to any single profession, no matter how complicated the niche, is over.

Is this good or bad ? I'm not sure. Its just different.

Perhaps we need a labor market futures instrument at this point that allows individuals and large corporations and academic institutions to hedge their investments in schooling and educational and training infrastructures.

If labor markets continue to evolve I believe that this type of instrument will become a necessity.

 

[omcate]

Quote from CalTrader:

This is the fact that is changing: Labor markets are changing much faster than the length of time it takes to train an individual.

Thus, the idea of lifetime dedication to any single profession, no matter how complicated the niche, is over.

IMHO:

Another problem is that competition has becoming keener and keener, and employers can afford to be more demanding, and less forgiving. Thirteen years ago, if you had a Maths. Ph. D. degree from a good school, major investment banks would hire you, even though you know nothing about programming. Now, if you just get a Maths. Ph. D. degree, and know nothing about computing, they may not even give you an interview.

Twenty years ago, one might find a decent job after graduating from higher school at age 18. Now, a Bachelor degree is the minimum for most jobs. If you are over 40 and unemployed, it is very difficult to land another good job. One of my friends, who worked at Brookhaven National Lab., tried to switch career few years ago. He talked to a group of headhunters in 1999. They told him that he had to do that before age 40.

In other words, there is no job security. Yet for safety sake, the current generation need to have everything set (including retirement) within 20 years(eg. from age 20 to 40). Not an easy task...............

 

[CalTrader]

Quote from omcate:

.... One of my friends, who worked at Brookhaven National Lab., tried to switch career few years ago. He talked to a group of headhunters in 1999. They told him that he had to do that before age 40.
...

Earlier in my career ... Before all the talk of globalization .... I watched Brookhaven, Argonne, and other DOE and DOD facilities sack world experts in important strategic science areas simply because they had no grant attributable to their specialty for a period of six months. These were people that had dedicated their lives, at low pay, to develop pioneering technologies critical to many strategic research areas.

I got the message way back then - loud and clear - that even the US government went for the cheapest labor source and exhibited no loyalty in its employees.

As for your friend .... Probably the best course is to start comercializing all that knowledge directly and bypassing the recruiters .....

 

[ges]

A final note on the employment report, which showed a disappointing 112,000 non-farm jobs created in January. The Department of Labor had this interesting line in the report (italics added):

“Retail trade employment increased by over 76,000 over the month, after seasonal adjustment. The industry lost a total of 67,000 jobs in November and December. Weak holiday hiring in general merchandise, sporting goods and miscellaneous stores meant that there were fewer workers to lay off in January, resulting in seasonally adjusted employment gains for the month.”

That's almost Orwellian. Essentially, the seasonal adjustment adds jobs to the January figures to correct for normally heavy losses of temporary jobs after the holidays. But since there were so few of these jobs actually created during the holidays, those January layoffs didn't occur either. As a result, the seasonal adjustment results in a gain of 76,000 fictional jobs for January. These aren't real jobs because they aren't real people. Let's call them “Seasonally Adjusted People.”

 

[limitdown]

Quote from CalTrader:

Earlier in my career ... Before all the talk of globalization .... I watched Brookhaven, Argonne, and other DOE and DOD facilities sack world experts in important strategic science areas simply because they had no grant attributable to their specialty for a period of six months. These were people that had dedicated their lives, at low pay, to develop pioneering technologies critical to many strategic research areas.

I got the message way back then - loud and clear - that even the US government went for the cheapest labor source and exhibited no loyalty in its employees.

As for your friend .... Probably the best course is to start comercializing all that knowledge directly and bypassing the recruiters .....

OUTSTANDING Advice

I publically praise you for this comment.

It won't be cheap, easy or fast, however, vehicles such as Ebay and other auction sites allow for sale and dissemmination of specialized packages (of skills, low use products and start-ups).

That, and comments like those are why I take the time to actively participate on these discussion boards, sometimes to the distraction from my trading career.

Another solution is to get funding (legally) and associate with one of the trading programs that these proprietary brokers offer, on these discussion boards.

 

[limitdown]

Quote from CalTrader:

This is the fact that is changing: Labor markets are changing much faster than the length of time it takes to train an individual.

Thus, the idea of lifetime dedication to any single profession, no matter how complicated the niche, is over.

Is this good or bad ? I'm not sure. Its just different.

Perhaps we need a labor market futures instrument at this point that allows individuals and large corporations and academic institutions to hedge their investments in schooling and educational and training infrastructures.

If labor markets continue to evolve I believe that this type of instrument will become a necessity.

EXCELLENT comment

This indeed is the problem, and the solution will have to be two fold:

1) employers recognizing their social and national responsibility to cut tremendous slack to those who have left their previous careers and have documented degrees/training/experience and use / hire these displaced persons

2) in general, start valuing these degreed persons with respect, both politically, socially, secularly and otherwise.

Veterans and Entertainers (sports, music, movie, stage, etc.) receive this respect and are treasured as potential hires. Why aren't these displaced degreed persons too.

Imagine sending in a resume with a popular family name for a salesmans job, and skipping past the 200+ competitive resumes and not only getting the interview but also getting an offer. Imagine you are:
Justin Timberlake...
Pancho Villa....
Theodore Kenedy... or any other famous named person.

Something has to be done to turn these things around proactively....

 

[PuffyGums]

Quote from limitdown:



The 1929 Depression wasn't nearly as bad and detremental as what we've been through in the last 3 years under this administration.

Puleeze, where do you get this stuff from? Krugman? The DNC daily talking points fax?

You saw Seabiscuit which pretty much described the labor situation during the depression. Is there anything remotely resembling that situation here? No!

The depression had back to back waves of multi-year, double digit unemployement. There is nothing even close to that now.

 

[cwjcntr]

Quote from PuffyGums:

Puleeze, where do you get this stuff from? Krugman? The DNC daily talking points fax?

You saw Seabiscuit which pretty much described the labor situation during the depression. Is there anything remotely resembling that situation here? No!

The depression had back to back waves of multi-year, double digit unemployement. There is nothing even close to that now.

Careful, cause we might just be headed towards that if things don't improve