Job Searches in 2003 the Longest in 20 Years

Reuters ^ | Fri January 9, 2004 03:45 PM ET | By Jonathan Nicholson

[RaceBannon]

Job Searches in 2003 the Longest in 20 Years Fri January 9, 2004 03:45 PM ET

By Jonathan Nicholson WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The year 2003 was the most difficult for U.S. job hunters since 1983, as they faced the gloomiest job market in years, according to Labor Department figures released on Friday.

The unemployment rate was the highest since 1994, and the search for a new job was the longest in two decades.

According to Labor Department data, the average spell of unemployment lasted 19.2 weeks in 2003, or almost five months. That was the longest average duration since 1983, when the U.S. economy was emerging from the worst recession since the Depression. Then the average spell was 20.0 weeks.

As a percentage of all the unemployed, the long-term jobless -- those out of work for 27 weeks or more -- made up 22.1 percent in 2003, the highest annual number since 23.9 percent in 1983.

Democrats have called for renewing a federally-funded extension of unemployment benefits offered through states to deal with the problem. They revived their attacks on Friday after a weaker-than-expected jobs report showed only 1,000 new hires in December. Measures of long-term joblessness improved slightly in the month, though.

While Bush administration officials have continually repeated that they will not be satisfied "until every American who wants a job can get one," it has yet to support a renewal of extended benefits, a move many economists say would help blunt the economic damage of the rise in long-term unemployment.

In early December, Treasury Secretary John Snow told Reuters the administration had yet to decide if it would support extending the program for a third time.

According to the liberal-leaning Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, about 80,000 to 90,000 workers will be exhausting their state-funded benefits every week by late January, after the program's eligibility ended in December.

"Unemployment is the Achilles' heel of this administration and Congressional Republicans, and they cannot continue to ignore it," said House Democratic Whip Steny Hoyer, of Maryland.

Lee Price, an economist with the Economic Policy Institute and a former Clinton-era Commerce Department official, said the long-term jobless numbers show how difficult the labor market remains.

Extending jobless benefits again would stimulate the economy by putting money in the pockets of people not getting paychecks, Price said. "Almost 100 percent of that is going to be spent," he said.

© Reuters 2004. All Rights Reserved.

[clamper1797]

What's that matter with you ... you should just start-up your own fortune 500 company. Don't have the capital ... well just have a positive attitude and the money it would take will fall from the sky. Don't have the experience to start your own business because you've devoted your life to high tech ... just have that ol' positive attitude and people will break your door down whether you can actually do the job or not. Live in a job depressed area ... well just move to Podunk Iowa and start your business there.(/idiot pollyanna mode off).

[futureceo31]

Supply and Demand again my friend..:) Remember there was a big movement in the 90s for "Buy Ameican" and if I remember, Walmart had such a policy. That has all but evaporated and do not see that resurgence anymore since any any move to deviate from global economic policies can cause more catastrophes than good.

[clamper1797]

I've been out since Augest. Sine then I have had two "interviews" (H1B trolls in disguise). Other than getting married in Sept ... 2003 was on of the worst years of my life. 2001-2003 were the absolute worst 3 years including my time in Vietnam

[msdrby]

credit.

[FITZ]

it is the job of the government to provide jobs for the public???

Apparently the government is starting a new matching Mexicans to a job program. This is being worked out with Vicente Fox -- our government will bring in countless numbers of foreigners so that they can have jobs --- and that is in addition to treaties like NAFTA where our government provided jobs to those in Mexico.

[futureceo31]

I think that including that, the local consumers have to demand that they will not hire anyone who hires illegals (but see that less likely than local enforcement).
Secondly, I am also for denying medical emergency service to illegals but unless we institute laws that demand that hospitals see some sort of proof residence before giving any emergency service, this aint going to happen. And I do not see any politician brave enough to stand up and deny medical services (non emergency even) to anyone, even illegals for that matter. Most americans would be against that. So again, back to trying to find "common-sense" solutions...:)

[futureceo31]

It is congress's responsiblity to write the laws. Lets write to our congresspeople and ask them to reflect our points of view, but seeing that we only have a slight majortiy in congress, it is going to be skewed to the middle rather than the right and most if not all of the left would give amnesty to illegals including outright citizenship. So seems to be an impasse really.

[FITZ]

What the government could do to create a lot of new jobs for Americans is to start going after the illegal employers --- fine them big like they fine OSHA and IRS violaters. Many of the illegal employers are committing a multitude of crimes --- avoiding minimum wage laws, not paying into Social Security, Workman's Comp, not following OSHA regulations, IRS, and breaking many labor laws in addition to hiring illegals. Fine them right out of business --- that will open a lot of wonderful work opportunities to those employers and contractors who obey the law, they will need to hire Americans for all the new work they've got.

[futureceo31]

Since I am in the same high-tech field, what are your views on the millions if not billions of dollars that were poured down the drain during the .COM years and when companies hired staff of technies who sat on 1000 dollar Herman miller chairs, drank cappachinos and played video games? I think we are paying for those years of excesses with companies trying to go the opposite way and hire thousands in India who will work for low wages and not demand any of the perks that techies who didnt even have any knowledge in a lot of those areas that they were working on just becuase there was demand...

[jpsb]

"That has all but evaporated "

Yup (the GOP) NAFTA killed the buy American movement. The GOP drank the free trade, global economy cool aid and it is going to be the death of the GOP. This no jobs ecomony is going to generate at great deal of resentment towards the GOP. Now we have the GOP pushing to open the flood gates to millions of third world poor, pretty much killing American jobs in the trades.

I worked my butt of in 94 to elect a GOP congress, now I am going to work my butt of to throw the (GOP) bums out. The GOP has completely betrayed my trust in them. Right now the Constitutaional party looks good, maybe some other party will get going, but the GOP blew it.

[clamper1797]

I didn't work for a dot.com company nor am I some IT software weinie ... I helped design the computers in most of the military aircraft that flew in both Iraq wars ... I never saw anyone who sat on 1000 dollar Herman miller chairs, drank cappachinos and played video games where I worked.

[futureceo31]

I agree with ya completly my friend, but the fact of the matter is that being a politican is dancing to the tune of a drum and the drum is played by those that make a difference in the local enconomies and a lot of those employers who benefit from illegals are the ones that are beating the drums of local employers. In a perfect world, we would not have dead people voting, felons voting, illegals voting but say something against it and you are considered racist and bigoted and a vast majority of the country's opinion is shaped by these one liners. But having said that, change has to come from the local level and grassrots up in terms of illegal immigration, and I am on a contrian view here that what Bush has proposed has a lot of merit but it only serves to address the problem (which has been ignored by a majority of the american populatin) and not solve it. I agree with sarcasm's point also that local laws need to be enforced and maybe that should be one of the keypoints of Bush's immigration proposal.

[Monty22]

2003 was a hellish nightmare looking for a job. It took me almost the entire year, and I had to take a massive paycut too. Finally got something around Thanksgiving.

It was awful awful awful. And I doubt it's a whole lot better now too.

[futureceo31]

The fact of the matter is that a lot of these jobs existed in the .COM years and marginalized people like you. But having said that, I didnt think that defense type jobs were being outsourced to India. We have quite a bit of defense related jobs locally here in Central Florida and even naturalized citiens are not eligeble for some of them. And defense software related positions have seen a big rise in the last couple of years compared to pre 9/11 when lot of these jobs were gutted during the Clinton years. So if anything, it looks to me like being a tech person in defense and homeland security areas is one of the best fields to be in.
By the way not sure if you are aware but there is a new agency called HRPA I think its called that has hundreds of millions for companies (small businesses and the like) to bring out solutions related to homeland security and these are solely for american companies. So I am a bit surprised that you have a hard time or had a hard time finding a job in a defence related arena.

[jpsb]

So again, back to trying to find "common-sense" solutions

my two proposals are "common-sense" solutions. In fact nothing else will work, if you are not willing to implement them then you will soon be living in Aztland.

[futureceo31]

Good luck with that but my humble opinion is that you might want to try to influence your local GOP reps to cater towards your views than outright reject the GOP party as that will probably give the Democrats an additional vote. But then, who knows.. maybe you might succeed though dont see that happening in this decade..:) More power to the people I say...

[futureceo31]

Common-sense solutions that will be adopted by a majority of the public, otherwise nothing will get done...

[clamper1797]

I'm trying to get into Northrup right now ... they are NOT looking for someone with my recent experience BUT I may be able to get in with my old (10 years ago) experience. BUT ... check the job boards. You will see scant ads for even the defense industry

[futureceo31]

I dont know if you would mind moving but there seems to be a resurgence of defense related jobs in Central Florida, Lockheed Martin and the like. But then, I am trying to get into the HRPA and DARPA proposals and trying to work with the local university on one of these proposals. We shall see how that goes...:)

[Dialup Llama]

>Jobs Americans Won't Do: Voodoo Economics from the White House.

Thanks for that link. Good article. Missed it the first time. Surprised it came from NRO since they are usually in favor of flooding the market with cheap labor.

On FR, I read an article that said many companies transfer operations to China to avoid implementing automation (forget where that article was). They use the cheap labor to make inefficient processes miraculously profitable.