Until one woman showed them the way....
Posted on 08/17/2009 8:44:43 PM PDT by ex-Texan
In Oregon, one in four people can’t find full-time jobs
Here’s the thing that worries unemployed Woodstock resident George Snipes: What if things are worse, much worse, than we are being told?
They are, says Andrew Sum, an economist who heads the Center for Labor Market Studies at Northeastern University in Boston. Sum has analyzed employment data for all 50 states, and he says that those charts provide statistical verification of what Snipes feels in his gut: Oregon’s 12.2 percent official unemployment rate is something of a red herring and far from a true indicator of the social hardship taking place in Oregon today.
If you really want to know how much people are suffering, Sum says, check out Oregon’s labor underutilization rate. That number combines the unemployed with two other categories of workers who don’t make it into the official unemployment rate – underemployed workers who want full-time work but can only find part-time jobs, and unemployed people who say they want work but have given up looking.
Combining those two categories with the state’s official unemployment rate brings Oregon’s rate up to 23.8 percent for the first six months of 2009, and over 24 percent for the past three months. That’s the worst in the nation, according to the center’s data, and it means nearly one in every four work-ready Oregonians is struggling to get by, an unprecedented number in post-depression America.
Sadly, a closer look at the data makes the numbers, and Oregon’s prospects, look even worse.
For instance, more than 53.5 percent of Oregon’s unemployed lost jobs that are never coming back, according to the Center for Labor Market Studies’ data. In just two years, that rate – what some economists call permanent job losses – has tripled in Oregon. That’s a growth rate that Sum also says is unprecedented.
Economists like to look at trends, and Oregon’s 24.1 percent underutilization rate represents an 11.3 percent increase over a year ago, the steepest increase in the nation. In no previous recession, Sum says, did the combined unemployed and underemployed worker rate shoot up as dramatically as it has in the past 18 months.
“I’ve never seen numbers like this in my entire life,” Sum says.
The numbers may help explain why, according to the latest figures from the Oregon Department of Human Services, one in six Oregonians is dependent on food stamps to get by.
One in four Oregonians jobless, or making ends meet with part-time work, is a little higher than George Snipes expected, but he says he’s figured for a while that the official 12 percent unemployment rate was lowballing the truth.
Snipes, 62, has held four jobs since returning from military service in Vietnam in 1968, with no more than two or three months unemployment in between jobs – until now. He worked cutting up plastic at a Portland plastic wholesaler for 13 years before getting laid off in November. In fact, he says, of the 12 plastic cutters who worked at the company, three have been laid off – one in four, he notes, just like the state average.
Snipes hasn’t been able to find work since November, and he’s been looking hard. Last Friday he interviewed for a 20-hour-a-week job that would pay him $12 an hour unloading trucks on a midnight shift. If he gets offered the job, he’ll accept it, even though he might only end up with about $800 a month in take home pay.
If Snipes takes that job, he will no longer be counted in Oregon’s official unemployment rate, despite the fact that he will be working at far less than the full-time job he needs.
University of Oregon economist Tim Duy says with talk of the recession’s end getting closer, it is possible that end will be a “jobless” one.
But Snipes wonders how that could be considered an end at all.
“The thing I hate to think of is that this might go on for 10 years,” Snipes says. “I think it’s a real possibility.”
A preview of what’s to come
Duy is not only concerned that whatever recovery follows the current recession doesn’t include jobs. He’s also worried that people who have become unemployed this time might be “permanently disadvantaged.”
“People who go part time never get their earnings back,” he says. “One in four is a big number.”
Heidi Shierholz, a labor economist at the Washington, D.C.-based Economic Policy Institute, says it makes little sense for states to continue to release traditional unemployment numbers each month.
“Unemployment is less and less relevant for a modern labor force,” Shierholz says. “We no longer have a world where it’s men working full-time jobs.
Shierholz says the high number of unemployed and part-time workers previews a host of problems further down the road. For starters, the state government is dependent on income tax revenues, which drop as unemployment and underemployment rise. Also, most of those half-time workers aren’t getting health insurance through their work. The same goes for pension and other retirement benefits.
The news gets worse when you consider Oregon men as a separate category. Usually, unemployment and underemployment figures for men and women don’t stray too far from each other.
In California, for instance, there is a 2 percent difference between the percentage of working men and women who are in jobs where they are underemployed. But in Oregon – and again, Sum says he’s never seen a place where it was this bad – the gap is 5 percent. Twenty-six percent of working men in Oregon are either unemployed or underemployed, vs. 21 percent of women.
Sum says gender gaps like that usually are found only in Rust Belt industrial towns, where large numbers of blue collar jobs have disappeared along with local factories. The gap might be a reflection of Oregon’s fading male-dominated industries such as timber and construction, experts says.
If that’s so, many of those men are going to need retraining for new careers, and that can take time. And time, Sum says, is something many of these men find working against them.
“What you find is when they stay out a long time, a lot of these people just vanish,” Sum says. “They develop bad social habits, they are not used to working on a schedule, getting up on time. People get mentally depressed.”
Oregon has a state government that is dominated by Democrats. Worse yet, the population and economy is centered mostly in three counties. These counties are made up to a large extent by extreme left wing liberals. Most people who live here are so 'weird' that even Democrats who visit from DC are shocked.
Portland is known for being 'weird.' It is a city that enjoys greenies, transvestites and vegans. Homeless camp out downtown and mess up the streets. They harass business owners. A demented left-wing judge lets them do whatever they want just so they are non-violent. He ordered the cops not to enforce the 'no begging rule.' Thousands of small cars have bumper stickers glued on windows that say, 'Keep Portland Weird.'
I heard on the news this morning that the city is about to lose 300 more jobs. Manufacturing jobs. Hard to come by jobs in a city that is bleeding jobs like crazy. High local taxes may have had something to do with it -- but the local media are playing it mum. A manufacturer of wind machines to generate electric power is moving to Washington State. In case you did not know our neighbor to the north has a very low corporate tax rate. It also does not have a personal income tax. More and more people are moving across the river to Washington. And are much happier for doing so.
Oregon has one of the highest state income tax rates in the U.S. County taxes are high and still rising. Everything is going up but wages and employment. This city is totally clueless. The people in charge are as dumb as the shoes they wear.
*Ping* !
Portland is known for being ‘weird.’ It is a city that enjoys greenies, transvestites and vegans. Homeless camp out downtown and mess up the streets. They harass business owners. A demented left-wing judge lets them do whatever they want just so they are non-violent. He ordered the cops not to enforce the ‘no begging rule.’ Thousands of small cars have bumper stickers glued on windows that say, ‘Keep Portland Weird.’
This is getting close to describing Austin... we have panhandlers at every intersection.... and really WELCOME the homos crowd..even having special parades for them....
Austin still has jobs... for now... but it is an amoral city in its urban area and can’t last the way it has become.
Earlier this year Oregon was planning a 1,900% tax increase on breweries. Yes, you saw that right - one thousand, nine hundred percent. Did it pass? If so, I imagine by now the breweries are shutting down left and right or relocating to other more business friendly states.
Seven jobs for Seven brothers
Obama and Congress must go.
Too bad and sad too what’s become of Oregon—a beautiful state mucked up by liberals and their politics. Termites really!
The Discovery channel was filming a documentary on Dr. Erich Ritter, "Shark Behavioral Scientist," at Bull Shark Beach. Its original plot was to enlighten the public on the undeserved reputation of these so called man eaters. Dr. Erich Ritter was to enter the water as he had done many times before to study these amazing animals. His numerous theories on what made a shark attack, particularly the Bull Shark, read like the Book of Tao on swimming with sharks. His intentions seemed right for a "Shark Behavioral Scientist." Teach the public to understand and appreciate its creatures and you will rightfully help conserve their existence on this planet.
Unfortunately this story's plot took a different course. For in the midst of their filming in the waist high waters of Bull Shark beach, a Bull Shark clenched its teeth around the leg of Dr. Erich Ritter. The Bull Shark then dragged Dr. Erich Ritter a short distance before cleanly severing off most of his calf muscle.
Of course the incredulous Dr. Ritter returned to the water still clinging to his theory that sharks are just misunderstood.
No matter how many times liberal economists are shown to be incorrect, they NEVER learn. If getting your calf ripped of your leg doesn't cause you to rethink your theory, you're probably a liberal.
“The thing I hate to think of is that this might go on for 10 years,”
Unfortunately for Oregon and the other 49 states, the obammie presidency is going to ruin the economy for much longer than that, IMO.
Excellent article Tex...thanks for posting!
Your take on Portland, and the entire state is accurate. I've lived here for most of the last 18 years. The eco-nazis ruined our logging industry back in the '90's, and are now intent on wrecking havoc on the blue part of the state, which includes everything EXCEPT the greater Portland Metro area. But there are enough liberals there to ourvote the rest of the state.
When the Oregon state legislature needs money, they just come up with a new tax -- problem solved! Soak the rich, spoil the young punks who are voluntarily homeless, along with every other component of the leftist voting block. I would move anywhere to find a real job, but can't afford to move. At least rents are reasonable, where I live.
Well, we've seen what four decades of not working has done for Black males and their familes, why not White males too?
People will do just fine. They will work underground. Typical of liberal areas. They expect everyone else to pay the freight but won’t do it themselves. Neighbor who worked for my local government bragged to me about his 62 classic cars hidden not far from my store in the Mojave desert. I paid six grand in property taxes. He paid almost nothing.
Nope
Seven jobs for Nine brothers
The neo-Marxist clowns running the White House will continue making the economic situation far worse, but making a profit in the process, as always.
Thinking same thing.
I heard things were so bad, that there were seven pimps for one horror:
DNC, DLC, DCCC, AARP, AMA, AFofL-CIO, SEIU all pimping Obamacare.
On-topic: those taxes; the "green" laws and regulations; the threatened metering of my well water; the declining economy; and the ever greater influx of (mainly) Californicating liberals were the major reasons we put our home on the market, and left Oregon. Home prices were just starting to decline, and we managed to get out before the big drops. Don't regret it one bit. And that waas rural southern Oregon, not even the really screwed up portion.
I hear Washington state is about as bad as Oregon.
Washington, Oregon, California and to some extent Colorado and New Mexico is where the hippies settled in their communes. They leave ruin in their footsteps.
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