99ers and the Long-term Unemployed Are the Elephants in the Economic Recovery Room

[Donnachaidh]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-thornton/99ers-unemployment_b_862179.html?ref=tw

The latest BLS employment report showed a gain of 244,000 jobs for April, which was trumpeted by the Obama administration and the media as a continuation of a rapidly improving jobs market. While job growth is important, it's also important to realize the jobs hole that needs to be filled. Over the past four months more than 800,000 jobs have been created, but in January 2009 alone, more than 800,000 jobs were lost. Since February 2010, 1.8 million jobs have been created, but 8.8 million jobs were lost prior to that period. That's a job shortage of 7 million and that doesn't include the 125,000 jobs each month that needed to be created to simply absorb new entrants into the workforce.

Additionally, the unemployment rate increased to 9%, since more people began looking for work. Returning job seekers is often considered an improved sign of job availability, but if they aren't hired, they will go back into hiding and the unemployment rate will decline. Because of returning job seekers, the number of officially unemployed increased 205,000 to 13.75 million, which is still historically high when compared to other jobs challenged times.

One of the few honest assessments of the current jobs market was offered by Heidi Shierholz of the Economic Policy Institute:

At this point, coming out of a recession this deep, we should be getting unambiguously huge growth, of 300,000 to 400,000 a month," said Heidi Shierholz, a labor economist at the Economic Policy Institute. "And it's just nowhere near that." She concluded: "We're still in a rocky place."

More at the link --

[damntexdem]

1. But those elephants may start voting with the donkeys.

Since the elephant party only wants to hurt them.

[Donnachaidh]

2. sure, when the donkeys show that they will actually DO SOMETHING for them

As it stands now, those 99ers are watching a lot of rearranging of the deck chairs on the Titanic. On both sides. And they aren't allowed to sit in any of those chairs.

:shrug:

[Horse with no Name]

3. Until the politicians quit using these numbers to make political hay

then it won't get better.

Until our politicians start worrying about the sad state of the country instead of the next election, things won't get better.

VERY FEW people that I know in real life are having it easy. They are hurting at the gas pumps. They are hurting at the grocery store. They are hurting every time they open their light bill.

We are hemorrhaging GOOD jobs and trying to stave the flow with crappy jobs. For awhile, some of the people who still have the GOOD jobs will rationalize that the numbers are good and the economy is ticking right along. Until it is their job involve. Then they will FINALLY be pissed.