Posted by Tina
Almost five years after the recovery from the last recession the American people are still looking at a very bleak job situation in the country. The participation rate, which is the percentage of working aged people who have jobs, dropped to a low not seen since the dismal Carter economy of 1978. Only 74,000 jobs were created in the month of December, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistic, in a month that normally sees an increase in temporary retail jobs. 525,000 Americans that had been seeking employment simply gave up on the on the prospects of finding a job. These figures make the reported lower unemployment rate of 6.7% irrelevant since it is more likely due to senior citizens retiring rather than younger Americans finding jobs.
Despite the underlying bleak realities in people’s lives that these numbers represent, the media, a media that was very critical of a much better Bush economy, has chosen to brag effusively. Breitbart’s Big Journalism has the headlines:
Business Insider: PRIVATE SECTOR JOBS SURGE BY 238,000 IN DECEMBER
CNN: Strong job gains at end of 2013
NBC News: Jobs report could show things are looking up
Bloomberg: Companies in U.S. Added 238,000 Jobs in December, ADP Says
Wall Street Journal: U.S. Private-Sector Adds More Jobs Than Expected
BusinessWeek: Companies in U.S. Added 238,000 Jobs in December, ADP Says
This is pathetic!
The unfortunate news is that the President has shown no interest in changing his overall economic policy. Instead he has proposed incentives to help a few small regions, Promise Zones, where poverty is extremely high:
Obama announced he was designating the first promise zones in neighborhoods in Los Angeles, Philadelphia and San Antonio as well as swaths of southeastern Kentucky’s coal country and the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma.
The announcement comes as Washington marks the 50th anniversary this week of President Lyndon Johnson launching his War on Poverty.
In establishing the five promise zones, Obama is a following up on a plan he first unveiled during last year’s State of the Union to target 20 of the hardest-hit towns for economic revitalization by the end of his presidency.
With the designation, the communities receive preferential consideration for 25 federal grant programs and the federal government will invest direct technical support as the communities try to revitalize languishing neighborhoods.
This sounds more like a campaign plan than an economic plan. While such a gesture will be greatly appreciated in the targeted communities, this plan does nothing for the rest of America. What message does it sent to those who have seen their hours cut, are working part time when they want full time work, are working at a job below their skill or education level, or that have given up finding a job altogether? What message does it send to young people, particularly minorities? What message does it send to companies that would like to grow and hire people but have been stifled in a slow growth economy?
Here’s another thought. The fed has been engaging in something called Quantatative Easing. That’s a fancy name for creating money out of thin air and shoving it into the stock market to prop it up. The bad news at the end of this road is usually inflation and that means your dollars have less value. Janet Yellin is in a tough spot. One economic expert on FOX Business this morning imagined the folks at the Fed sitting around the board room table over coffee this morning with their palms turned up…”What the heck are we going to do now?”
Any way you look at it this is a terrible way to begin a new year and I don’t hold out hope that it will get better any time soon. If this is “fundamental transformation” Obama and his ilk can stuff it! This is just sad.
