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U.S. Experiencing Worst Episode of Prolonged Unemployment Since Great Depression
Adjusting for demographic factors, current labor market downturn steeper than '82-'83 recession.
Washington, D.C. - As the nation contends with a long and sustained labor market recession, a new study from the Center for Economic and Policy Research demonstrates that the current unemployment rate is higher than the conventional measure shows.
"An unemployment rate that has hovered above 9 percent for several months is striking, but the jobs picture is even worse than it looks," said report author and CEPR Economist David Rosnick.
The study, "The Adult Recession: Age-Adjusted Unemployment at Post-War Highs," adjusts the current unemployment rate to account for demographic differences and finds that the unemployment rate has not fallen below 10.8 percent in the last 12 months. During the worst episode of the recession of the 1980s -- the second half of 1982 and the first half of 1983 -- unemployment passed 10 percent for 7 months.
The analysis notes that the population is older today than it was in the 1980s, which has the effect of lowering today's unemployment rate relative to the past. Since they change jobs more frequently and are more likely to move in and out of the labor market, Young people have a higher unemployment rate than older workers. Adjusting for this older workforce shows that the United States is experiencing the weakest labor market since the Great Depression.
The severity of the current unemployment situation suggests that policy makers should consider measures that would slow or reverse this trend. Additional stimulus such as work sharing or the extension of unemployment benefits by Congress would go far in addressing the plight of the millions of unemployed Americans suffering as a result of this downturn.
The full analysis can be found here.
96 Comments so far
Show All. . . the current unemployment rate is higher than the conventional measure shows.
The "conventional measure" qualifies for the term 'Fucking Lie', as is most any statistic, statement or action emanating from the totally and hopelessly corrupt and incompetent United States government.
P.S. This is a depression, not a recession. Just because it doesn't look like 1933 doesn't mean it's not a depression.
Well, I am certainly in a depression.
When is Obama going to get those new Lithium mines in Afghasistan producing?
One "bright" spot: There are still lots of jobs in the weapons plants and the military. All you have to do is sell your soul.
We are experiencing neither recession nor depression, we are experiencing a paradigm change...a new normal...we are not going back to the old normal.
Reactivating the manufacturing base and engaging in WWII pulled the US out of the great depression. The US manufacturing base is too limited and we are already at war, so those are not solutions.
The paradigm change realization is perceptive. We are in the shift now and must suffer hardships until the great majority of minds change or shift. Then a rebirth will take place. The substance of that rebirth is currently a stew of chaos and uncertainty. Clarifications will emerge in time. The government is just a side show of mistakes enabling collapse and chaos.
The jobs and manufacturing rebirth should involve public transportation, infrastructure, renewable energy, retrofitting for conservation, and shoring up education to fully funded levels providing jobs.
I agree, donnalou. But that is not what our government nor the military-industrial complex have in mind. We are going to have to fight for this. I am not sure how, but step 1 is to stop believing that anyone in power will do this voluntarily. They are very happy just the way things are for them. It will take force of some kind, preferably non-violent.
Joe
Well said, all.
"Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired, signifies in the final sense a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed." ~ Eisenhower
"Find out just what any people will quietly submit to and you have the exact measure of the injustice and wrong which will be imposed on them." ~ Frederick Douglass
"The rule is, jam tomorrow and jam yesterday - but never jam today." ~ Lewis Carroll
That's my perception as well, based on hundreds of little observations.
Joe
Raydelcamino: "We are experiencing neither recession nor depression, we are experiencing a paradigm change...a new normal...we are not going back to the old normal........Reactivating the manufacturing base and engaging in WWII pulled the US out of the great depression. The US manufacturing base is too limited and we are already at war, so those are not solutions".
Great post, so on the mark. The following is from the back cover of my just published book.
CAPITALISM, DEMOCRACY & EMERGING CHRISTIANITY
As the world seems to be self-destructing with war, social upheaval, terrorism, rapid ecological damage, global warming, financial meltdowns, dire poverty, and increasing disparities of wealth, humankind is being forced to mend its ways or become an extinct species.
There is also emerging in the world a higher consciousness that can be said to be the evolutionary destiny of humankind in providing for its own survival. It is about seeking a more just, sustainable and compassionate world. It is “the great turning” that social scholars are speaking about like David Korten, Paul Hawken, Eckhart Tolle, Wendell Berry, and Leonardo Boff. Many Christians as well view this emerging higher consciousness as the incarnate spirit of the risen Christ now dwelling within all of humankind.
To the author, this evolutionary shift in human consciousness is challenging and delegitimizing the forces of global corporate capitalism throughout the world. This higher consciousness is beginning to challenge these forces with the spiritual dynamics of democracy. The author warns us though that the continuous waging of war by the U.S. will probably never end without persistent and massive creative nonviolent civil disobedience.
The author also speaks of the emerging Christianity movement as being part of this shift in global consciousness. Also within this challenge is the dysfunction of the human ego. Institutional consumer capitalism feeds on the human ego. This is what makes for a dysfunctional society. The power of the human ego can only be dealt with through a contemplative mind. Thus, emerging Christianity, with its more prophetic and contemplative faith, can serve as an important praxis to this shift in global consciousness.
The author summarizes his essay with the thoughts that universal justice and democracy should be a major focus of the emerging Christianity movement. This is to engage all of humankind. The freedom to think great thoughts is what will give credibility to the emerging Christianity movement.
What we are seeing in the contemporary context is a concentration of wealth and power that goes far beyond anything seen in the past. I am not sure that I would call that a paradigm shift. But if it is a new paradigm, it is going in the wrong direction.
Yeah, the other viable option is to join the ranks of the largest prison population on earth. The Corrections Corporation of America needs more profits.
"Fucking Lie" is correct. Really.
The good news (if you want to call it that) is that these dip-shits are quickly all running out of excuses and theories. The air is thick with the smell of their desperation to keep it all afloat. The dubious "stimulus" was (I believe) a lie itself. An empty shell in hopes the psychology of the notion itself would provoke people to spend.
No dice.
The media: one minute its all turning around, the next its not all that bad.
Truth is, Washington and all of its liars have finally hit the wall. For good or bad, this time they've got nothing.
To top it off, we have the ongoing death of the gulf coast. (Sabotage, again in my opinion) and this murderous, illegal war of theirs.
It gets more interesting by the day.
It is a depression for those losing their homes, businesses, jobs, and their family. Times are good for the detached elite political, economic, and media classes. It's not a depression unless it touches us personally; therefore, no meaningful action will be taken until it is too late to correct the down-slide. Economists are lap dogs who ignore the truth to keep living the good life.
"totally and hopelessly corrupt and incompetent United States government."
Au contraire.....the US Goverment is a highly efficient implement of money transfer from the general public (to whom they tell "fucking lies") to the elitist wealthy greed-mongers (who already know the truth).
Touche. You got me there.
This is true.
While the conventions of liberal economics insist that the failure of demand (i.e., no one has any money to spend or barely even jobs to generate survival income) is the death knell for capitalist states, I don't think this matters much any more to the ruling elites.
There is ample evidence that they intend to proceed in their rapacity– sans even the pretense of offering crumbs to millions of Americans who are not situated comfortably in the upper tiers and echelons of wealth.
The trajectory of American capitalism is the event horizon of an ever more exigent barbarism. Death by a thousand cuts and no quarter given. Is that not historically obvious?
Severe unemployment and the ensuing Depression seem to be afterthoughts and the ruling classes have no intention to voluntary relinquish patterns of elite consumption or clean up the concomitant mess and suffering they have imposed.
That is what they have Fascism for.
Elections? Well, what can one say about that!
Those 'circle jerks' are for the fools and the rabble: A pony show with a few dogs thrown in, amounting to a macabre carnival of the obscene.
Obama is the Herbert Hoover of the 21st century. When Obama took office his first action was to make the banks whole - just like Hoover. In 1932, the first thing Roosevelt, a socialist, did was give people much needed paychecks/jobs. We were very lucky to have Roosevelt in 1932. Germany was not so lucky. Germany had fascism. If Roosevelt had not been elected Hitler may well have won WWII. Hitler had a lot of fascist support in America. Listen to the following BBC program to hear just how close we came: (search youtube.com for whitehouse coup 1932)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UXGUgFXoRu4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UGPb6ulVEK0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mav69K2zkgw
The BP catastrophe may be the last straw for our economy. It may be 1932 all over again. I wish Obama was a Roosevelt.
the problem is I don't think america would even vote FDR into office at this point - oh hell no - we'd rather go for the "blame the hispanics(jews)" leadership of fascism.....we'd vote for hitler over fdr at this point -
and after the next election we may very well do that w/ palin or some oher idiot - although I still put my money on a bush coming back(jeb) - because like cockroaches you just can't get rid of them! and the bush family is a bunch of fascist COCKROACHES!
notice many many people have no problem what-so-ever with the anti-constitutional racist immigrant baiting law in arizona......
and they have NEVER passed a law against illegal employment of these immigrants....
we have an illegal employer problem NOT an illegal alien problem....... if the corporate schumcks didn't hire them then they wouldn't be flocking into america.....
Miggy: Yes, I believe the next Republican presidential candidate will be Jeb Bush, far more ruthless than any previous Bush. Notice how there seems to be presently no Republican leader......Jeb will emerge at the most effective moment. Note that Jeb Bush was one of the authors of the Project For The New American Century (PNAC).
Actually, the Obama campaign did project the message that Obama was a new FDR. I'm sure it was highly effective in deluding people.
-TIA
Back to the Land!
Since Goldman-Sachs et al are determined to drive down labor costs of American workers to about that of the average Haitian ($3.50 per DAY), the only way to have a reasonably secure life - since the jobs aren't coming back - is to grow your own food and live close to the bone, as most people always did until recent decades.
Build yourselves raised-bed gardens (no treated lumber) so stoop labor and machines are not needed - build them 2' high, 4' wide, 8-10-20' long, no top, no bottom, fill with good soil/compost (no sewer sludge), plant seeds standing up, weed standing up, harvest standing up, and put by for winter as much as you can.
Next spring, build another raised bed and another and help your neighbor build some, too. Only by food independence can we survive this onslaught of pesticided, genetically-modified, irradiated, crushed to death industrial "food" that Monsanto et al want to force us to eat.
Get a few chickens for eggs (your primary protein), let them graze on grass, feed them organic grain or leftovers from your organic gardens, get more in touch with the natural order of nature. Survival is the word now.
excellent...
I agree wholeheartedly, and will celebrate your post at this moment, only hinting at the conflicts we may encounter with those that hold title to the planet's surfaces...
What about the tens of millions of apartment dwellers with no land and no capital? Remember for the past 100 years US has become a densely urbanized country in which most people have survived working for others. Most of the land is owned and rather expensive. Many cannot even afford rent and subway fare since losing their jobs, no less moving and buying a plot of land, seeds, implements etc. For them, this is like a Marie Antoinette solution.
Your ideas can can work for some people who have a little cash and mobility. Perhaps if there were organizations where people pooled resources and bought some land, the idea can expand. But it is kind of cruel to suggest this to people who have to improvise toilet paper while leaving untouched the wealth of the top 2%.
Joe
"An unemployment rate that has hovered above 9 percent for several months?" WRONG! The actual unemployment rate is over 16%
We're in an F'n "D E P R E S S I O N!"
Here is PA, because they haven't passed a budget, "NO ONE!" is getting their unemployment. NADA! They vote again July 5th on a budget. The "Banksters" got their loot though didn't they? Yeah!
So for those having to pay their mortgage and "put food on your family?" Too bad! Have a nice Fouth of July.
Oh! Don't forget to fly the flag and enjoy your CAKE!
If you go to shadow stats -- the unemployment numbers look more like between 20% and 22% -- and the numbers have been that high for quite some time.
Last time I checked, NY State, and the poor excuse we have for a state legislature had NOT yet passed a budget, either.
The flag needs to be flown upside down -- we are in DISTRESS!
On I-95 all the way to Richmond, I see a lot of cars with NY license plates. We could see more people moving from NY to VA and the Carolinas if it gets worse in your state.
Some of us are still trying to figure out what to do. What does one do when thousands of dollars in debt with student loans (having gone back to school late in life to change careers) and medical bills, approaching age 50 with no retirement savings, just laid off from a teaching job- not enough money to relocate and few jobs, teaching or otherwise, available? Do we really need to be borrowing another $34B for troops buildup?
Sorry about your situation. And the answer is no. Most of those billions go to the extravagent markups of war profiteers.
Joe
Shhhhh, don't tell this to the American electorate who still thinks that the US is doing better than Europe and ready to "fly" like Peter Pan. Thank you, however, for elaborating on the reality. A nation being honest with itself is a trait this nation has yet to attain.
"Shhhhh, don't tell this to the American electorate who still thinks that the US is doing better than Europe and ready to "fly" like Peter Pan."
–(Jennifer Beddingfield)
Jennifer, while your indefatigable optimism in the "American electorate" is admirable, you are not alone in the inability to recognize that what the 'American electorate' does, or does not do, matters not all in a de facto fascist state with a sham democracy.
This happens to be true irregardless of how informed the American voting public ever becomes about the reality of things as they are.
Europe now offers scant hope as a model, despite the recent French protests. Even parliamentary democracy and 'Euro-Socialism' is now in crisis as the decidedly right wing drift from the British elections all too readily attests. Sure it's better than the U.S., but that truism says very little: What isn't better than the U.S? The failure of the massive French protests to catch fire and challenge the state also are evidence of a political cul-de-sac.
It is not that kind of a world anymore and has not been for quite some time. It is better to recognize that and not be tempted by old habits.
Not to sound rude, or sarcastic but it is better to start looking for solutions elsewhere than in putting one's eggs in the basket of American elections, however difficult that may be to change one's frame of reference.
There will be no exhumations of Ralph Nader, Dennis Kucinich or any other avatars emerging from the utter failure and dead end of American politics as now configured.
That– if there is not evidence enough already– draws flies, who soon die of exhaustion from inhaling the toxic emanations from the fumes of something that has died too long ago to continue to argue it.
Visit the 'Daily Kostapo' for an update if you can get out alive without retching up your lunch in disgust.
"Jennifer, while your indefatigable optimism in the "American electorate" is admirable, you are not alone in the inability to recognize that what the 'American electorate' does, or does not do, matters not all in a de facto fascist state with a sham democracy."
I don't hold any optimism in the American electorate given the deteriorated thinking. I was pointing out their false sense of thinking that they were doing better than other nations just because Europe's woes are being magnified while the worst of what is happening in the US is being kept secret. These people are conditioned into limited thinking at best and not seeing the whole picture. How to change all that I don't know but I certainly won't hesitate to confront that bad thinking as we have no choice but to battle it out. I am aware that what we have is an illusion of democracy at best with most of the electorate voting exactly how the elites want them to but I don't see how not voting at all helps anyone. Even a write in is better than nothing.
"Not to sound rude, or sarcastic but it is better to start looking for solutions elsewhere than in putting one's eggs in the basket of American elections, however difficult that may be to change one's frame of reference."
I never suggested that we should focus only on the elections and I thought I made it clear that I was concerned about the regressing mindset getting worse beyond what any of us here anticipated. I am already one step ahead on finding solutions of our own. Even that only goes so far and going too far on individualism is what gives us bad leaders who will divide and conquer us just like that. I vote on all levels of elections that I have and I don't mind having tough conversations with people who are conditioned into thinking conformist when they pick between D and R. I still believe that elections do matter because the difference between who gets elected often gets reflected in how stressful our lives get. Better leaders not only do better things for their people but also don't interfere with people's goodwill efforts. For seven eggs that I carry, two of them are placed in the elections basket.
The voting apathy in the US is already high given that 40-55% of the voting age population don't vote which would explain why the pols think that they can take us for granted. On local levels, turnout is even worse so pols there too take us for granted that nobody is listening. On presidential and congressional races alone, the US is one of the lowest on voter turnout compared to other nations. On local and state elections compared to other nations, it is worse. I saw your comment where you said about voting and who it is for and I thought that I should bring this up. I have no idea how much better our nation would be if average voter turnout went from 50% to 70% on all levels but I would say a lot better than what we have now. However, I could be wrong so I respect your position on voting in the US especially given that the way most people vote is as good as not voting.
"Visit the 'Daily Kostapo' for an update if you can get out alive without retching up your lunch in disgust."
No thanks. They only exist to elect Democrats regardless of what they stand for.
"Europe now offers scant hope as a model, despite the recent French protests. Even parliamentary democracy and 'Euro-Socialism' is now in crisis as the decidedly right wing drift from the British elections all too readily attests. Sure it's better than the U.S., but that truism says very little: What isn't better than the U.S? The failure of the massive French protests to catch fire and challenge the state also are evidence of a political cul-de-sac."
Yes, all is not rosy in Europe either but I still commend them for doing a better job and I know why they are protesting the way they do. In France, people engage more in collective thinking and actions and get less cocky about individualism unlike the US where it's individualism gone amuck. I know France has its issues and problems but unlike the US, the people and even the pols are not as ignorant or in denial mode about the problems and will stake in out. In many ways, the US could learn a lot from countries like France set aside their nuclear reactors.
Jennifer,
Your points are all well taken. Our apologies for mistakingly jumping to conclusions regarding your thinking.
Keep up the good work.
–Kim & Vashkar.
Kim and Vashkar, no problem. I am glad that we were able to discuss this all out. You do raise interesting points on voting. Many have correctly stated that voting is controlled by the nature of the M$M and if that isn't enough, diebolding the machines is there as their backup plan. It might take me a while to put it together since it takes a lot of connecting the dots but I can somewhat see where voting is almost as good as not voting. Thank you for your thoughts and input. I look forward to more posts from you as well. Take care. :)
Jennifer: Beautiful post !!!!!
I won't tell, Jennifer. However, take heart in knowing that the majority of Americans have their heads so far up their backsides that they all share a common brown hue on all they see. The fable about "rose-colored glasses" is only a fairy tale.
The common American medical affliction you are referring to has an economic and scientific name: posterior craniosis. It has been spreading faster in the last 3 decades than any plague in recorded history. It was first noticed in the general population when George Bush became head of the CIA under Nixon. Their love child, Ronald Reagan, then spread this disease like a clap-infected Marine on leave in Tijuana. There is no cure but wearing a cactus on your head appears to slow the initial infection rate among Tea Party members. Just sayin'.
WPA needed.
California is about to have the mindSHIFT earthquake! Gov Arnold wants to cut state employees pay to minimum wage. The Controller is saying, that he doesn't have the computer system to do that and he doesn't believe in it anyway!
I'm sure that the courts will agree and decide that the people exist for the good of the state. Is it true, "As California goes, so goes the nation?"
That's one way to pull out of Afghanistan, Arnold. There will have to be martial law in that big state, because there are more hungry and angry citizens there, than in uniform!
I keep thinking that it can't get any worse....and then.....it actually does.
Let us celebrate the glory of our freedoms and independence.
Good Grief.
Well it looks like most in the US Government subscribe to the notion that WW11 got the USA out of the Depression.
Apparently the wars on Iraq and Afhanistan are just not BIG enough a stimulus in their opinion so they have to up the ante and start WW3 in order to "save the economy".
Yes.
The news coming out of the Persian Gulf is that the bombing of Iran, if not imminent is surely more than impending.
"The severity of the current unemployment situation suggests that policy makers should consider measures that would slow or reverse this trend."
This familiar prescription from the lesser evil faction of the elite establishment seeks toward a dead-end that the USA has already arrived at. Policy-makers would to better to jump off a bridge than to continue making policy.
Indeed, the net result of USan federal policy-making over the past decade has been deeply negative, such that we would be better off today had they simply shut down the whole policy-making enterprise there in Washing-town.
Everybody knows this. It's the news to the world at the central front in the world-wide class war.
The answer to the unemployment question is the people taking the economy into their own hands. Create demands according to society's better interests, e.g. demand locally-grown food. Write a contract with your gardener neighbor to supply you with heirloom vine-ripened sustainably-grown food. Thus it becomes YOUR economy, and something you will want to defend, with the torch and the pitchfork.
Didn't the president have experience running a lemonade stand one a few decades ago? That level of experience is coming in mighty handy now.
Most of our ancestors (if you are an American) migrated from some country to North America. Maybe, now is the time to migrate again. I am currently in southern China for non-professional reasons. I have been successful in my earlier work, though by no means "rich". I am 54 years old.
Anyway, opportunity abounds here. If a person can speak decent English (gee, kiddies, did you learn anything in school?) teaching and tutoring is easily available. No need to be certified. The wages may not be to American standards, but living is super cheap here. I have a nice apt, with AC, washing machine, solar dryer (clothes line), hi-speed Internet. With utilities, less than $150/month. Plus, I can buy Pabst Blue Ribbon Beer, one of the loves of my life!
Don't believe all the crap you see and hear from the MSM about China. It is fairly wide-open! Just don't bad-mouth the government, but things are not bad here.
Last year in America, I paid a dentist over $4000 to repair a bad tooth. He botched the job and would have charged me more to fix it. I got the tooth fixed here for a grand total of (drum roll) $88! And that comes with a guarantee! Gee, this socialized medicine is horrible, don't tell the tea-party-people!!!!
I could go on-and-on, but I detest the long post on CD.....
You would be surprised to find the number of those same tea party people flying to China or India just to get their operations done dead cheap and enjoying those great results.
More Americans fly OUT of the USA to get Medical treatments abroad then the sum total of the worlds population that flies IN to the United States to get medical treatment.
Now there some 300 million Americans total versus 6 billion plus for all those other countries.
I was in India in 2008 and China in 2009. My dad got to see how customers get lined up for treatments. Most of them are Americans but Europeans are also increasingly flying over to get their treatments despite having a better health care system. I know the Philippines gets a lot of patients flying in from the west as well. They get their treatments first in line while the native residents are put through longer waiting periods. I have mixed opinions of these kinds of practices since there's plenty of good and bad to it. But don't forget that for the past 3-5 decades, foreign doctors have been migrating to the US and later more of them to Europe. It's no secret that more Americans and probably Europeans are turning to Asian born/descended doctors be it on the homeland or flying to their mother lands. The health care mess would have been worse in both the US and Europe without Asian (immigrant or descendant) doctors. It's a complicated picture. Let me know if you can help me out some more on it.
As long as your white you can teach English .
I've heard plenty of stories of blacks being turned away for teaching jobs in Asia just based on race alone( Japans an exception to this, look for "Rhyming Gajin " on youtube, theres a young black teacher who blogs about his experiences in Japan).
Now to be fair If i walked to into a Chinese class and saw some white dude from Canada I'd feel riped off, eh its not fair ohh well.
Plus I'm a little scared of how China treats there people.
The unemployment rate there is around 10% and for the uneducated( or those who have been "left behind" by the economic progress) its not uncommon to find people working 14 hour days, 6 days a week only to be left in poverty.
But hell my sister enjoyed it.
In India, there are darker colored people who teach English rather well. Unfortunately, that's mainly in South India. I went to China last year and some of what you mentioned is all too familiar. When you mentioned blacks and Japan, you reminded me of the movie "Rising Sun", a must see movie.
I get the sense that the elite just don't care about American people anymore. They are pushing hard for one central bank, one world government, with slave colonies in China, India, and the domestic US.
If you've got to slave at two jobs just to keep the wolf from the door, and your savings in dollars now have half the purchasing power they did in 2000, well, you're already a slave by any definition of the word.
But don't slave to a car or a boat or a pile of sticks and mortar. The man who has all their time off is the richest man in the world. Downsize and be free.
We went through this indentured serf/tax thing before. In 1770 Samuel Adams lectured his fellow townsfolk of the evils of falling prey to the yoke of the "taskmaster". It is but up to each of us, to rediscover the keys and wisdom of the Founding Fathers and why they risked it all to escape the mad King George's War tax (that's what it was: a tax to pay for the ruinous Seven Years War; the real first World War.)
And we have a whopper of a tax coming soon to all of us: Food and Water price inflation to pay for all these freaking wars. I don't think anybody except the rich, Like Jim Roberts, who have re-invested all their dough and moved to China, can escape this coming tax.
Liberation may mean moving to a poor country, marrying into the population and dropping out. Dick Cheney Moved to the United Arab Emerites along with Eric Prince. Those war criminals know the shitstorm they made is coming soon to all of us, and they've already bailed out of the Titanic. How many other ticking time bombs did Dick Viper leave for us out in the Gulf I wonder?
With Ex-Vice Presidents like him, who needs terrorists?
TJ