Posted on 01/10/2014 12:54:38 PM PST by Jim Robinson
Friday's December jobs report was a major disappointment, showing the economy gained just 74k jobs last month. Economists had expected the economy to gain around 200k jobs. The unemployment rate, however, dropped to 6.7% as 347k frustrated job-seekers gave up and left the labor force. We are in an upside-down world where a drop in the unemployment rate is a bad sign for the economy.
The overall labor force shrunk dramatically last year. In December 2012, 155.4 million workers had a job or were actively looking for one. Last month, though, 154.9 million were in the labor force, a drop of over 500k Americans.
It is important to remember that the population grew last year. The US adult population grew by around 2.5 million people. If the labor force were the same percentage of the adult population as last year, 2 million more adults would have jobs or be actively looking for employment. Their disappearance is a drag on the economy.
(Excerpt) Read more at breitbart.com ...
Yeah well, if you look up the classes to learn a trade and earn a certificate, it is the main reason, that is the prices, that made me decide to put off university. For fifty thousand I can get a dozen certificates and credentials and learn a lot more than one semester in university.
Thank You! Lets be lovers!
Too bad the people we pay to fight these battles are not doing their jobs.
Jeepers, read the thread before spouting nonsense.
A Brilliant Prophecy From 93 Years Ago
H. L. Mencken (born 1880 - died 1956) was a journalist, satirist, critic, and Democrat . He wrote this editorial while working for the Baltimore Evening Sun, which appeared in the July 26, 1920 edition.
As democracy is perfected, the office of the President represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. On some great and glorious day, the plain folks of the land will reach their hearts desire at last and the White House will be occupied by a downright fool and complete narcissistic moron.
- - - H. L. Mencken, The Baltimore Evening Sun, July 26, 1920
So it was written and so it has come to pass.
Yes; I have to believe that sooner or later the native born Americans are going to start breaking things whether the government likes it or not.
"More than a half million long-term unemployed people are losing their federal extended unemployment benefits. And when the checks stop coming, one of two things are likely to occur: They'll take any job they can get to stay afloat financially or they'll drop out of the labor force completely.
Either way, they won't be counted as unemployed anymore."
Why the unemployment rate will fall
FWIW
I've read elsewhere that in Europe most hiring is temporary or contract, which is why the world's largest temp agency, Ranstad, is based there.
Employment agencies are probably a good investment.
And the above is not in conflict with your link.
OK. I guess I don't understand what you're trying to say.
We didn’t lose 2 million workers, we lost 2 million jobs. This is just Obama/Democrap communist propaganda.
The Founders were wise to forbid internal tariffs.
But the truth is, external tariffs are unwise as well, as they distort the operation of the market. Consumption taxes should be solely for raising revenue, not for rewarding narrow constituencies at the expense of the consumer.
“The stores are full of Chinese made stuff while Americans sit unemployed.”
Until you address the reasons why that is, all tariffs do is lower the standard of living.
And that is the kicker, isn’t it? NO ONE wants to address the reasons why, and to do so is likely racist, and homophobic, since it makes Democrats, (and some spineless Republicans) look bad.
The reason why is the wage differential. You can’t address that without the tariff unless you want to lower the American wage down to the Chinese level.
You can eliminated all tariffs and regulations and still not compete with China because of the wage differential.
The tariffs will prevent the U.S. from descending to the Chinese level.
Tariffs will not lower the standard of living, because 23% of our workforce is unemployed. Putting them back to work will raise our standard of livings, help balance the gov’t budget and reduce our future tax burdens.
As the CEO’s of Intel, Emerson Electric, and many others have publicly stated, wages in the automation age make little difference.
It’s taxes, UNLIMITED CIVIL LIABILITY, insane government regulations, and inane enviro regs that have made manufacturing in America uncompetitive, even with transportation costs at $100 oil. Just look at what government has done to coal, as but one example.
Wages and unionism are frankly at the bottom of the list.
High tariffs and low (or no) income tax is a Conservative position.
Conversely, Free Trade(no tariffs) and high income taxes are a progressive liberal position. No other way to look at it.
Actually, high tariffs, and high income taxes are the positions held by the most LIBERAL Western countries, such as France.
The Conservative position should be low tariffs, free trade, and a COMPETITIVE manufacturing environment, supported by penalty for forgien gov-subsidized product.
Look at product costs. The wage differential dwarfs the costs of regulation.
The CEO’s complain about regulation because it’s a corporate headache and they still maintain some headquarters and operations here.
Not everything can be easily automated. That’s why they use Chinese labor. If all the processes were automated, then raw material costs and transportation costs would rule the day. But they aren’t. And that’s where most of our jobs have gone.
The manufacturing that has remained in the U.S. is highly automated. But their is an opportunity to bring back jobs that aren’t highly automated.
France is part of the EU which has high tariffs. But Germany is cleaning the other countries clocks with the EU because of the low tariffs within the EU.
Americans are not known for heeding warnings.
Americans are very good at overcoming a bad situation once the bad situation has visited its cruel wrath on America, AND in a manner that is convincing to most Americans that the situation truly is bad.
Since the Socialist (FDR called it “Liberal”) FDR Era began 80 years ago, American leaders in all fields have clung to the “primed pump,” or “Keyensian Economic Philosophy (KEP)” which states in more elegant economic jargon than this simplified version: “ all ya gotta is keep throwing money at the problem until it goes away!” [Works well in divorce cases, but not in Government.]
After the FHA went bankrupt in 9-2008, nobody blamed the FHA, it was merely a lack of money.
Since then KEP has been used but evidence is lacking that KEP worked from 2008 to now.
IOW, Keyensian Economics was tested, and failed.
We are in a bad situation, but our leaders are not convinced that it is so, because they refuse to believe the results of the above mentioned test.
Thus, the situation will get a lot worse, or we will change leaders.
I suspect that the former will occur before the latter.
Now just a cotton pickin’ minit here. Let’s be fair. The MSM may be a circus, and so is Washington, but what about the bread?
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