Author Topic: U.S. in longest stretch of unemployment since the depression. (Read 1640 times)

powderman · « **on:** February 18, 2012, 01:08:54 PM »

CBO: US in Longest Stretch of High Unemployment Since Depression Friday, 17 Feb 2012 02:09 PM
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The United States is experiencing the longest stretch of high unemployment since the Great Depression, according to a new study by the Congressional Budget Office.

U.S. unemployment in the United States has exceeded 8 percent since February 2009, making the past three years the longest stretch of high unemployment in this country since the Great Depression, writes CBO Director Douglas Elmendorf on the CBO Director’s Blog site.

Further, the agency projects that the unemployment rate will remain above 8 percent until 2014.

Editor's Note: Economist Warns: 50% unemployment, 90% stock market drop, 100% inflation.

See the Evidence. Click Here to Watch the Aftershock Survival Summit Now.
“The share of unemployed people who have been looking for work for more than six months — referred to as the long-term unemployed — topped 40 percent in December 2009 and has remained above that level ever since,” Elmendorf writes.

Among the major drivers of the current high unemployment rate:

• Weak demand for goods and services, as a result of the recession and its aftermath, which results in weak demand for workers.

• Mismatches between would-be employers’ needs and the skills or location of the unemployed.

• Incentives for people to stay in the labor force and continue searching for work that result from extensions of unemployment insurance benefits.

• The erosion of unemployed workers’ skills and the belief of some employers that people who have been unemployed for a long time would be low-quality workers, a phenomenon sometimes called “stigma.”

The major reason has been weak demand, in the CBO’s view, Elmendorf writes. “However, when aggregate demand ultimately picks up, as it eventually will, so-called structural factors — specifically, employer-employee mismatches, the erosion of skills, and stigma — may continue to keep unemployment and long-term unemployment higher than normal.”

The CBO offered several solutions to the problem, including training programs and, interestingly, cutting back on unemployment insurance programs to encourage workers to return to the workforce.

However, even if enacted, such policies would be unlikely to make dent in the topline number over the next two years, the director wrote.

Official unemployment of 8.3 percent is contested by data supplied by the polling form Gallup. It puts the jobless rate at 9 percent, up from its previous estimate of 8.6 percent. And it predicts things will worsen shortly.

"Gallup's mid-month unemployment reading, based on the 30 days ending Feb. 15, serves as a preliminary estimate of the U.S. government report, and suggests the Bureau of Labor Statistics will likely report on the first Friday of March that its seasonally adjusted unemployment rate increased in February," the firm said when releasing its mid-February numbers.

Editor's Note: Economist Warns: 50% unemployment, 90% stock market drop, 100% inflation.
See the Evidence. Click Here to Watch the Aftershock Survival Summit Now.

Read more: CBO: US in Longest Stretch of High Unemployment Since Depression

Junior1942 · « **Reply #1 on:** February 19, 2012, 02:35:11 AM »

Thank GWB & Company for that. One more tax break for billionaires and Great Depression II would have happened. Look for the DJIA to top 13,000 one day next week. Compare that to ~6200 shortly after the great tax cutter left office.

magooch · « **Reply #2 on:** February 19, 2012, 04:44:28 AM »

Quote from: Junior1942 on February 19, 2012, 02:35:11 AM

Thank GWB & Company for that. One more tax break for billionaires and Great Depression II would have happened. Look for the DJIA to top 13,000 one day next week. Compare that to ~6200 shortly after the great tax cutter left office.

Exactly how does a tax break for anyone lead to a depression? Taxation causes people to move their money to sanctuaries and take it out of circulation. Tax breaks stimulate investment. Over regulation discourages business and investment. Too much government kills business. Less taxation has never caused a depression.

bilmac · « **Reply #3 on:** February 19, 2012, 05:36:59 AM »

Shouldn't be any surprise at all, we keep extending unemployment benefits. You shouldn't need to look any farther than plain ol common sense for that answer, but statistics from the past also bear this out.

jimster · « **Reply #4 on:** February 19, 2012, 06:32:14 AM »

Quote

Exactly how does a tax break for anyone lead to a depression?

It doesn't and couldn't. It's just another way of a socailist telling you government spending is the way out of a depression, in order to spend more money they need more tax money. Backwards math math

Junior1942 · « **Reply #5 on:** February 19, 2012, 08:04:37 AM »

Like it or not, the president y'all call a socialist has saved our capitalist system. You can't argue with the facts of a DJIA of ~6200 and tanking vs one of ~13000 and rising.

teamnelson · « **Reply #6 on:** February 19, 2012, 08:22:49 AM »

Quote from: Junior1942 on February 19, 2012, 08:04:37 AM

Like it or not, the president y'all call a socialist has saved our capitalist system. You can't argue with the facts of a DJIA of ~6200 and tanking vs one of ~13000 and rising.

First, its artificially propped by soft nationalism - facts you can't argue with.
Second, its obscured with creative statistc-ry - facts you can't argue with, CBO, Gallup and ever non-partisan research organization has proven Obama's BLS is cooking the numbers.
Third, costs for household items have gone up 20% on average, as high as 83% for gas, under this socialist President. Of course I would expect the DOW to grow proportionally.

Its going to fall, everyone knows it, I suspect at least once the GOP has selected its candidate, possibly sooner as the artificial props begin to lose their legs.

DJIA growth is insufficient to demonstrate wealth if costs have gone up as well. IOTW, the 1% raise in my salary I might get next year looks like a 1% growth in the numbers, but if my costs have gone up 5%, I'm actually down 4% in spending power when compared to last year.

As for tax breaks, we don't have a revenue problem, we have a spending problem. We should not be tying up our capital in government where it cannot produce wealth; our capital should be free to produce more capital in the private sector where wealth is built. When the size of capital increases in the private sector, the existing tax laws generates more revenue. A 2nd grader can figure that out. 1% of a dollar is a penny. 1% of 2 dollars is 2 pennies. Didn't need to change the 1%, just needed to two dollars to tax.

yellowtail3 · « **Reply #7 on:** February 19, 2012, 09:54:04 AM »

It's been an ugly time in America. I had very little professional work in 2009-10, and burned through savings to pay rent whilst paying child support/alimony (that's blackmail money).

I've about had enough of polite society, and am ready for a state of nature; I can think of a couple attorneys and judges whose attitudes would be improved by draw across the throat.

2011 was better... 2012 unknown.

Junior1942 · « **Reply #8 on:** February 19, 2012, 11:25:57 AM »

Quote from: TeamNelson on February 19, 2012, 08:22:49 AM

Quote from: Junior1942 on February 19, 2012, 08:04:37 AM
Like it or not, the president y'all call a socialist has saved our capitalist system. You can't argue with the facts of a DJIA of ~6200 and tanking vs one of ~13000 and rising.

First, its artificially propped by soft nationalism - facts you can't argue with.
Second, its obscured with creative statistc-ry - facts you can't argue with, CBO, Gallup and ever non-partisan research organization has proven Obama's BLS is cooking the numbers.
Third, costs for household items have gone up 20% on average, as high as 83% for gas, under this socialist President. Of course I would expect the DOW to grow proportionally.

Its going to fall, everyone knows it, I suspect at least once the GOP has selected its candidate, possibly sooner as the artificial props begin to lose their legs.

DJIA growth is insufficient to demonstrate wealth if costs have gone up as well. IOTW, the 1% raise in my salary I might get next year looks like a 1% growth in the numbers, but if my costs have gone up 5%, I'm actually down 4% in spending power when compared to last year.

As for tax breaks, we don't have a revenue problem, we have a spending problem. We should not be tying up our capital in government where it cannot produce wealth; our capital should be free to produce more capital in the private sector where wealth is built. When the size of capital increases in the private sector, the existing tax laws generates more revenue. A 2nd grader can figure that out. 1% of a dollar is a penny. 1% of 2 dollars is 2 pennies. Didn't need to change the 1%, just needed to two dollars to tax.

Good spin job there, TN. You have successfully made positives negatives, grasped at straws, etc., etc., and beat all around the bush. Fact is, Obama is the reason the bank on the corner is still open. Republicans, Bush & Company, in the White House were a near disaster--to all but Osama bin Laden. Obama in the White House was his disaster.....

nomosendero · « **Reply #9 on:** February 19, 2012, 02:22:30 PM »

Quote from: Junior1942 on February 19, 2012, 02:35:11 AM

Thank GWB & Company for that. One more tax break for billionaires and Great Depression II would have happened. Look for the DJIA to top 13,000 one day next week. Compare that to ~6200 shortly after the great tax cutter left office.

To all of us out there that are tax payers: If we had only paid more we would be much better off.

And to go along with that the same numbskulls say if we are deeper in dept we can grow the economy more, same as telling our kids to double their credit card dept so that they can pay it off quicker.

NO President will do a good job until they deal with the dept, which means Bush did a very bad job & this Pres. has done the WORST OF ANY PRES. IN HISTORY, PERIOD!!!

I am pretty tired of this retarded crap.

bilmac · « **Reply #10 on:** February 19, 2012, 04:48:22 PM »

So junior, have you invested a lot of money in stocks lately??? After all Obummers got us all fixed up now right. Handing out our dollars right and left to his fat cat buddies like Solendra, the whole world is all fixed. How much money have you put where your mouth is??

Singleshotsam · « **Reply #11 on:** February 20, 2012, 04:50:04 AM »

Quote

Shouldn't be any surprise at all, we keep extending unemployment benefits. You shouldn't need to look any farther than plain ol common sense for that answer, but statistics from the past also bear this out.

As far as the OP goes bilmac summed it up perfectly. It's not going to get better until the Fed quits paying people to not work.

magooch · « **Reply #12 on:** February 20, 2012, 06:11:23 AM »

What Junior and a couple of others don't remember is that the reason for the economy going into the crapper was basically people getting mortgages that they had no chance of paying off and that led to an avalanche of bad paper that the big banks tried to palm off on unsuspecting investors untill everyone got wise to what was going on and then the whole thing collapsed.

My investment guy tried to talk me into buying into those packaged mortgage backed secuities--telling me there was really no gamble, because the government would back them. I was very skeptical and told him no thanks. I thank myself every day that I learned a long time ago to trust my own instincts.

I also remember when the Obamanation was shouting about the economy being the worst since the Great Depression and that was when unemployment was in the 5% range. What he should have been saying is that the economy would be the worst and unemployment would be the worst if we elected a stupid socialist president to go along with the idiot socialist House and Senate that was elected in 2006. Then he would have been correct.

powderman · « **Reply #13 on:** February 20, 2012, 11:19:06 AM »

If honest figures were used the rate of unemployment would probably be much closer to 20 % than 8 %. Millions are no longer counted. POWDERMAN.

teamnelson · « **Reply #14 on:** February 20, 2012, 12:28:27 PM »

http://www.shadowstats.com/

Real unemployment spiked from below 15% in 2008 (pre-Obama) to over 20 in 2009, and is now pushing 25%. (The same spike was validated by the White House, just proportionally smaller.) This is based on a common sense calculation of unemployment - people who could be working but aren't. If you go the site, the calculations are explained. It also has some real numbers on the inflation rate, and the actual impact of the payroll tax jimmy that'll hit in 2013.

The CBO numbers, which are still more accurate than the numbers cooked up by Obama's team, are skewed as they do not include people whose unemployment benefits have expired, or those who have taken a mcjob to pay bills en lieu of finding another position in their field, nor does it calculate the ranks of young people who have yet to enter the workforce. In my day, most every 16 yo and older boy in my 4,000 student high school had employment of some kind. Today, my son is an exception, easily the youngest employee at our local McDonalds by 2 years. And he will not show up in the White House calculations, or the CBO calculations, eventhough he will be paying taxes.

There's not a single number that's been put out by the Obama administration that hasn't been proven false by the actual experts in the related subject. When he began a speech with Good evening, I still looked out the window to verify that it was getting dark.

powderman · « **Reply #15 on:** February 20, 2012, 12:42:16 PM »

TEAMNELSON. Good post Sir, thanks for the link, I'm sure the obamaites here will enjoy it as much as I did. POWDERMAN.

teamnelson · « **Reply #16 on:** February 20, 2012, 03:36:01 PM »

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-11-17/how-household-debt-contributes-to-job-cuts-commentary-by-mian-and-sufi.html

Interesting study on the relationship between high personal debt and unemployment. In sum, when Americans over reached their reasonable debt levels and the artificial bubble popped, their consumption dropped which created a ripple effect across the goods and services markets, which in turn laid off employees, who were already upside down in debt ... snowball effect.

The next such snowball will be student debt, which is why the Occupy movement and the White House (who drafted language together on this issue) are advocating a debt forgiveness legislation, basically letting debtors off of their responsibilities. Economists are uncertain which snowball will be bigger - if we let if fail, or if we prop it up with the OWS concept, which will force the businesses to fail, and the businesses attached to those businesses, and the investors, and their investees who entrusted their retirement funds to them, who will not be able to retire, will have to stay on the job, keeping recent college graduates from entering the work force, and ergo not paying their student loans off. The circle of debt will produce even greater unemployment.

Then there's the 15.2 trillion debt, and growing, at the federal level, for which the President has proposed cutting 800,000 jobs in DOD. Interestingly enough, data is coming out that this administration is blocking veteran hiring and his DOJ refuses to investigate unfair hiring practices discriminating against veterans.

There's only one way to grow jobs, and that's in the private sector, which increases tax revenues which in turn increases jobs in the public sector. Public sector jobs do not produce growth in the private sector.

Singleshotsam · « **Reply #17 on:** February 21, 2012, 12:39:47 AM »

It's like was said before,

People that really want to make a living are finding jobs right now. They most certainly aren't dream jobs but they're out making a living and taking care of their family.

People who don't want to work are living off the government. Why would they get off unemployment when the Fed is more than happy to pay them for being a victim. The government wants this. More people dependant on the government means more power and control for those who wish to have power.

jimster · « **Reply #18 on:** February 21, 2012, 01:50:02 AM »

Quote

There's only one way to grow jobs, and that's in the private sector, which increases tax revenues which in turn increases jobs in the public sector. Public sector jobs do not produce growth in the private sector.

Yep, the one thing the socialists can't do is the math, the private sector holds it all up, government employees and their blood sucking unions, all government programs, all the lazy people who sleep all day and party all night. There are a ton of those by the way.

What really bothers me is why the socialists lowered the bar. Obama's numbers are worse than any other president, but they are OK with that? Really odd. They lower the bar for everything, education, work ethics, basic morality, Nobel Peace prize, flags at half mast, economy, everything they touched the bar has been lowered to a new low standard.

Well, the lefties had all of congress in 2006, then in 2008 they had the white House and congress, things got progressively worse the whole time, and as things got worse the bar got lower. Now the bar is so low, anyone can be president, no experience or math skills or morals needed...just a big mouth and an ideology. As the "takers" grow larger than the "makers" we will keep going down hill.

gypsyman · « **Reply #19 on:** February 21, 2012, 03:05:43 AM »

Obama has had over 3 years, and at best, it's been a stalemate, as far as unemployment. I actually think it's gotten worse, but the way the WH and media lies, there going to tell you it's improving.If unemployment was figured the way it was 20-30 years ago, it would be around 18%. Too bad that some here take the PeeWee Herman approach to Obama, and talk to the hand view. When they finally open their eyes to his shinanigans, it'll be when somebody is breaking in to their house stealing food or valubles. They'll blame that on Bush too. gypsyman

SwampThing762 · « **Reply #20 on:** February 21, 2012, 07:00:31 PM »

Three years ago, last week, Obummer signed the stimulus bill that was supposed to drop unemployment below 7%, and it is at 8.4% right now. By his own admission and instruction, he should be a one term president. But, he can't do that, he loves the power drug too much.

ST762

Duke0313 · « **Reply #21 on:** February 21, 2012, 08:26:41 PM »

What's starting to chap my @$$ is that those of us who are employed are seeing changing attitudes from our employers. The job market is bad and they know it. So now they can treat us like livestock knowing that we have very few options.

Singleshotsam · « **Reply #22 on:** February 22, 2012, 12:25:48 AM »

Quote

What's starting to chap my @$$ is that those of us who are employed are seeing changing attitudes from our employers. The job market is bad and they know it. So now they can treat us like livestock knowing that we have very few options.

Thats why you have to diversify your skill sets. Its no longer adequate to know how to work as part of an assembly line anymore. Education, Education, Education. A person with multiple skill sets, who is willing to work will always find a job.

powderman · « **Reply #23 on:** February 22, 2012, 04:07:53 AM »

Quote from: gypsyman on February 21, 2012, 03:05:43 AM

Obama has had over 3 years, and at best, it's been a stalemate, as far as unemployment. I actually think it's gotten worse, but the way the WH and media lies, there going to tell you it's improving.If unemployment was figured the way it was 20-30 years ago, it would be around 18%. Too bad that some here take the PeeWee Herman approach to Obama, and talk to the hand view. When they finally open their eyes to his shinanigans, it'll be when somebody is breaking in to their house stealing food or valubles. They'll blame that on Bush too. gypsyman

GYPSYMAN. Good post Sir.
Same to ST, and Duke. POWDERMAN.

crustylicious · « **Reply #24 on:** February 22, 2012, 06:16:53 AM »

With all the talk about republicans being "job creators" I got to wondering if that was actually true. This little chart shows the percent change in unemployment by president over the last 63 years. It makes the change in unemployment quite evident when only 1 republican president was able to leave office with a lower unemployment rate than when he entered. Every Democrat has however reduced the unemployment rate... So it makes you wonder who the job creators really are...

http://maddowblog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/07/05/7019598-chart-presidents-and-unemployment

Bring back Clinton!!

crustylicious · « **Reply #25 on:** February 22, 2012, 06:20:57 AM »

When President Obama makes his pitch to voters next year on why they should elect him to a second [size=100%][/size][size=inherit]term[/size][size=100%][/size], he'll likely point to some version of this chart.
What the following chart shows is that Obama inherited a bum economy but that, under his watch, things have begun to turn around. In the past year, the unemployment [/size][size=100%][/size][size=inherit]rate[/size][size=100%][/size] has dropped a full percentage point amid improving job growth. Assuming those trends continue, Obama will be able to say that, yes, the economy needs to be much stronger, but that it's currently heading in the right direction.

Read more: http://articles.businessinsider.com/2012-01-23/politics/30485008_1_unemployment-rate-obama-election-day#ixzz1n8G2dkzV

teamnelson · « **Reply #26 on:** February 22, 2012, 08:07:48 AM »

crustylicious, I went back through and compared the numbers used in your charts with the formulas used to reach those numbers. In the first chart, it was under a democratic administration that the CBO employment formulas were changed to make the numbers more politically appealing. On your second chart, the uptic does not account for the number of people who have been blocked from entering the work force, or who have rolled off of unemployment. If you do not factor those in, then you really cannot compare one end of the chart with the other since the formula changed over time. They're pretty charts though, and effective at what they were designed to do. I take it you accept them at face value?

jimster · « **Reply #27 on:** February 22, 2012, 08:46:17 AM »

Ya gotta love charts and graphs. Where I work they had fancy charts and graphs showing how great it was to outsource our work here to other companies...all was well until I showed them the actual cost of outsourcing instead of running the jobs ourselves....seems we spent over 400,000 bucks last year outsourcing instead of running the jobs in house. They all wondered why this info I dug up did not come out on the charts. I just told them someone didn't want it there, so it wasn't. We have an "outsource" dept where we work. They need jobs I guess. This dept. does not like me so much as I have been bringing back the jobs, but instead of doing what's right for the company, they did what was right for them. I think it works that way everywhere.

The charts above do not show the truth because someone does not want it to...simple as that. Figures can lie and liars can figure.

Dixie Dude · « **Reply #28 on:** February 22, 2012, 09:08:44 AM »

Yes, Obama has removed millions OFF the unemployment by REDUCING the total work force. They say people have retired or no longer NEED to work. That is BS. If you figured it the old way, it would be about 12%. With a total of 18% unemployed and UNDER employed. My brother is one of them. The Uniroyal factory he worked at shut down 2 years ago (on Obama's watch), with about 1200 being laid off. He was paid unemployment for 24 months, but used that time to go to heating and air/conditioning school, (he is 51). Hard to change in middle age. He only made it because his wife was/is a teacher with a masters, and she is working on her phd. He found a job as a maintenance man in January, for a real estate agency that handles a lot of apartments. He has work, but only makes half what he was making. This is UNDER employment. Yes, people have found jobs in retail, restaurants, and other odd jobs, but they don't pay as much as they once were making. I did notice that both Reagan and Kennedy both cut taxes and the unemployment went down. They went down with Johnson because of the Vietnam War and drafting 500,000 troops keeping them out of the job market. Nixon ended the war, and soldiers came home, and shot up the unemployment. Today Obama's people have "fixed" the unemployment numbers by changing the rules.

Obama has also took food and gasoline OFF the inflation index, and added the price of an average new home. This keeps inflation under 2%. However, my grocery bill went up 25% from last year. My wife keeps all receipts and keeps a record. My power bill went up 12% because of shutting down some coal plants, and having to pay higher prices for natural gas or nuclear power. Gasoline has gone up under Obama's watch. When it went up under Bush, it was because he is an "oil" man. Well, what is Obama's excuse? No drilling? To much dependence on foreign oil.

Some guys will say well we are exporting oil. This is true, however, most Alaskan oil goes to Japan in the BIG tankers that cannot get through the Panama Canal. So we trade Japan oil from the middle east for the Alaskan oil because of shorter shipping distance. IF they could get an unloading terminal in California, and a PIPELINE built from California to Texas, MAYBE we could use our own Alaskan oil. Pipelines are harder to build because of environmental regulations, even natural gas ones even if they leak and go into the upper atmosphere and don't contaminate groundwater.

Bush was somewhat socialiast also, and I don't like he created "Homeland Security". KGB in Russian stands for Homeland Security. However, he did do a lot more good things that Obama has done. We didn't need Obamacare, but needed industry and business to get started back up to reduce unemployment quicker, and thus increase tax revenue.

jimster · « **Reply #29 on:** February 22, 2012, 10:23:45 AM »

Agreed Dixie Dude...good post.

If they made a chart or graph with the actual information on what's really going on it would be a line running straight down to hell.