Posted on 08/02/2010 3:18:07 PM PDT by reaganaut1
...
Ms. Jarrin is part of a hard-luck tribe of jobless whose members have taken to calling themselves “99ers,” because they have exhausted the maximum 99 weeks of unemployment insurance benefits that they can claim.
For them, the resolution recently of the lengthy Senate scrum over extending jobless benefits was no balm. The measure renewed two federal programs that extended jobless benefits in this recession beyond the traditional 26 weeks to anywhere from 60 to 99 weeks, depending on the state’s unemployment rate. But many jobless have now exceeded those limits. They are adjusting to a new, harsh reality with no income.
With long-term unemployment at record levels, about 1.4 million people were out of work for 99 weeks or more in June, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Not all of them received unemployment benefits, but for many of those who did, the modest payments were a lifeline that enabled them to maintain at least a veneer of normalcy, keeping a roof over their heads, putting gas in their cars, paying electric and phone bills.
Without the checks, many like Ms. Jarrin, who lost her job as director of client services at a small technology company in March 2008, are beginning to tumble over the economic cliff. For them, the last vestiges of their former working class or middle-class lives are gone; it is inescapable now that they are indigent.
Ms. Jarrin said she wept as she drove away from her old life last month, wondering if she would ever be able to reclaim it.
...
Nevertheless, the political appetite to help people like Ms. Jarrin appears limited.
...
She says none of her three adult sons are in a position to help her.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
So the Summer of Recovery is missing some spots?
How about the last 18 weeks of “unemployment” can only be the difference between their initial unemployment check and the hourly wage of any job they enter.
For example, If my unemploment check is 100, and a new job is 75, then my “extension” benefits would cost the government only 25.
This would both lower the cost to the government and would encourage people to quit waiting for the perfect job and take an available job....even if it is less than what they had. Better than having them end up on welfare.
the Government has sent all your jobs over seas to china
‘Our Own Government Has Become Our Enemy’
I am in Utah, as well. St. George.
Our Washington County unemployment rate in May 2010 was 9.00%. Businesses are closing left and right. We continue to suffer an influx of people from Vegas, looking for work. The AZ immigration law is causing a migration of amigos fleeing as well.
Unemployment is an insurance policy paid by the employee through payroll deduction and contribution by his employer. That policy has traditionally had a low payout.
Now when extraordinary circumstances arise, catastrophe for many, the policy is paying at rates it would if employees could have contributed to a private plan on their own.
The system is now taking an influx of tax money only because it has been such an inefficiently run government managed benefit.
There is not work out there folks. Nobody is getting rich on their unemployment checks. Cut off the checks and ramp up the soup lines.
The only legitimate complaint is that costs in other parts of the government were not reduced to cover the added cost of continuing unemployment benefits.
Your numbers are significantly low for some parts of the country where the official number is 20% - you pick the number of the underemployed.
Can he find two $10 an hour jobs? Have you sat down with him to show him how to manage his finances? How much did your brother pay in unemployment insurance coverage? Has he collected more in unemployment insurance benefits than he paid in over his life time?
This new economy is a lost middle class. I suppose you are right, she just needs to get used to living in poverty in what is quickly becoming a third world country.
One of our steady customers has been in that business for a long time. Used to make very good money at it. She is very good at house cleaning. Her business is way down. Half her customers can't afford the luxury. More people are trying move into house cleaning. She saved her money in good times, was responsible.
In other words, get real. You must be very insulated from the market out there. Tell her to go clean houses. Ridiculous.
For products that require automation for assembly and for quality, the low labor rates are not an incentive to move to China or India.
The reality is that we have chased business out. For companies that require automation for assembly, it is not true that China and India have lured them with cheap labor.
The government does not “send jobs” overseas”.
Politicians do not vote to “send jobs overseas”.
The tax policies that every level government sets for an area determine where a manufacturer decides where to have it’s manufacturing located there or move it to an area where it would be more profitable.
Strange union workers overwhelmingly vote for the big taxers. Talk about shooting yourself in the foot.
I have a cousin staying in my house, taking care of it. I live elsewhere. He has been off of work almost 2 years as my brother has.
Numerous times I have informed of manufacturing hiring.
A building products manufacturer was putting on a third shift, starting $10.00 an hour. he did not check on it.
A refridgerator manufacturer last winter was putting on
a third shift, $10.00 an hour. he did not check on it.
Here’s the equation, while collecting unemployment a person can pick up work doing jobs under table.
Unemployment benefits + tax free money from odd jobs
vs
going to work starting $10.00 an hour.
As for my brother, he doesbn’t even work for cash.
It’s all about what he “can’t” do.
And he knows what is non-essential and what isn’t. He’s 56 years old!
>> Maybe you will be out of a job soon. Then it will be our turn to ridicule.
I’m not ridiculing. I’m pointing out a truth. If you’re too stupid to realize it, that’s your problem.
By the way, I don’t HAVE a job.
However, I DO have a lot of work to do, and I’m doing it, and I’m earning a living at it.
Figure that riddle out... “bonehead”.
Showing compassion as individuals towards another individual is a good thing. It is another thing for a government to do so.
As said in Star Trek, sometimes the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the one.
Governments should not be in the charity business because government should not discriminate (and I don’t mean this in a racial way). Not everyone in need deserves to be helped. Governments are too large and too inefficient to separate the “greedy from the needy”.
Individuals and small charities are better able to do so.
We are where we are today because the government got into the social welfare business starting with the New Deal on through the Great Society. How many generations have grown up on welfare? While there have been many individuals that have managed to fight their way out, on the whole it is easier to just accept what is.
As long as there were more “producers” than “takers” the system sort of worked. But the burden on the producers has grown each year, not just on individual also on businesses.
Like the final straw on the camel’s back, we are reaching the point that the producers in this nation can not sustains supporting those that do not produce.
Am I less compassionate then you for pointing this out? Misplaced compassion is what got us here.
Extend unemployment don’t extend unemployment, it does not matter (except to those individual receiving it). The problem goes way beyond the current debate.
Those currently on unemployment are like a drowning person. If our society attempts to “save them” may very well end up drowning itself.
It is a vicious circle, the more we try to help the deeper in debt we get, the less sustainable the burden gets. We are on a sinking ship in a storm. We have enough fuel to make it to a port or we could go back out and try to save the one that is drowning. If we do that we may not survive ourselves.
I don't want to work for some feather-bedded domestic industry, making uncompetitive products for as long as the Gov'mnt sends me a cheque.
And I don't want my family to be forced to buy expensive crud from some feather-bedded domestic industry, just so that socialists like you can claim you're 'bringing jobs back to America'.
In a free trade society, we get to buy the best and cheapest of everything. In your version of America, we'd all be forced to buy Volts.
The American manufacturing base has been eroded by excessive taxes, unionisation, excessive regulations and the minimum wage.
If we want America to become the default manufacturer for the stuff we buy, then America must reduce its internal barriers to wealth production. It must compete.
But that's not easy. Competing is hard. It's far easier politically to forget about wealth-production, and to impose tariffs and subsidies.
Tariffs and subsidies practically force Americans to buy expensive crud from feather-bedded domestic suppliers rather than cheap stuff that works from e.g. Asia. The result is that everybody gets poorer - but at least no voters had to compete in the real world.
The solution to outsourcing is either to compete, or to recognize that you can't compete and so move into another field of endeavor.
But using governmental fiat and protectionism to stop outsourcing is not a solution: it is sheer wealth-destruction: the transformation of American industry into a welfare state. It would be disastrous.
Hope this was helpful.
California would love to have 9% unemployment rate again - I’ll wager their U6 number is well above 20%.
In regards to Utah and other “low” unemployment rate states, brace yourself for an even larger army of economic refugees pouring in from high unemployment states and seeing signs like, “Move on! We don’t have enough work here for our own people.”
I’m living in Salt Lake City and I’ve noticed an increase of bums begging for money this summer. The business situation seems to be fair, however...
Good rant.
Pretty much sums it up.
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