So we didn't even create enough jobs to keep up with the growth in the labor force.

[MadHound]

It is estimated that we need to create between 125,000 and 150,000 jobs each month to simply keep up with the growth of the labor force in this country.

How many months, years, has this gone on? With the exception of a couple months in 2010, this has gone on for four years now. Since May of '07 our job growth has not kept up with the growth in the labor force. More people unemployed, more people dropping out of the work force. An entire generation having to put their lives on hold. An entire population stalked by poverty.

Sadly, little has been done to alleviate this problem. When Obama and the Democrats had the political capital in '09, they spent it on a stimulus plan that wasn't very stimulating. Made up of over forty percent tax cuts and tax credits, the least effective form of stimulus bar none, the stimulus bill soon petered out and once again we found ourselves back where we came from.

What is needed is a big, WPA style jobs creation program. Virtually every economist with any kind of sense realizes this, Krugman, Reich, you name it. It is the obvious solution. Yet the Obama administration isn't pushing this. In fact they have run away from that position as fast and as far as possible, leaving us to the tender mercies of the "job creators."

Worse yet, as we start sliding back into the economic abyss, Obama and the Dems have handcuffed themselves over spending with the totally non-sensical debt ceiling debacle. They have helped lock in the mantra of spending cuts, which is going to mean even higher unemployment. And the thing is, all of that could have been avoided if Obama had locked in a rise in the debt ceiling last December. Instead, he thought that the 'Pugs would "act responsibly".

Well, now that this hole has been dug, it is time for the Dems and this administration to start acting responsibly. They can't just pay lip service to job creation, they need to start aggressively addressing the situation and they need to start fighting back. Otherwise, not only we continue to lose jobs this year, and next year, a lot of those Dems currently in office will lose theirs as well. You know, the economy, stupid.

[TwilightGardener]

1. People voted Republican in 2010 because they were convinced that

spending was BAD. Stimulus = bad. Reading the comments on our local news, average readers still think government spending and too-high taxes are what's HURTING the economy. They are 100% steeped in Republican lore. If Obama and Dems propose any new spending thru legislation, there will be a media pushback of gargantuan proportions, there will be political damage, and it doesn't have a chance of passing. It's not going to happen now anyway, because cutting is the order of the day. Spending cuts, in theory, are politically popular.

[MadHound]

3. Then educate these people

Use that big bully pulpit, use the media, educate people.

[jeff47]

4. That's 'cause the only people talking to them was the Republicans.

The Democrats didn't want to seem 'partisan'. That would make the villagers tut-tut at them.

[Karmadillo]

2. 193000 workers dropped out of the labor force this month. Not great news.

nt