We have to trust John McCain to deal with this, because as you may have heard, he was a POW for five years. That doesn’t qualify him for president, according to Fred Thompson’s teleprompter, but still… FIVE YEARS!
The unemployment rate soared in August and employers slashed jobs, as a weakening in the labor market accelerated. The numbers suggest there is little good news ahead for American workers, who face deepening stress from several sides.
The jobless rate was 6.1 percent last month, up from 5.7 percent in July, the Labor Department said today. It is the highest unemployment rate in five years, and compares to joblessness of 4.1 percent one year ago.
Meanwhile, employers cut 84,000 jobs, the eighth straight month of losses and yet more evidence that businesses are cutting back. The report also revised July’s jobs report to show steeper losses than previously estimated.
Five. Years.
UPDATE: Sen. Obama
“Today’s jobs report is a reminder of what’s at stake in this election – John McCain showed last night that he is intent on continuing the economic policies that just this year have caused the American economy to lose 605,000 jobs. John McCain may believe that the fundamentals of our economy are ’strong,’ but the working men and women I meet every day are working harder for less, the typical working age family’s income is down $2,000 since George Bush took office, and their purchasing power is as low as it’s been in a decade. John McCain’s answer is more of the same: $200 billion in tax cuts to big corporations and oil companies, and not one dime of tax relief to more than 100 million middle-class families. If I am President, I will cut taxes for 95% of all working families and provide an immediate $50 billion to struggling states so that they don’t have to cut back on health care and education and can rebuild roads and schools. That’s the change working families need right now,” said Senator Barack Obama.
So what are the most recent democratic talking points I’ve missed? Me and one million of my closest friends still don’t have electricity
You can’t blame Bush for this. after all, five years ago the president was…
I may have to re-think this talking point.
Team Hoover doing what they do best
I’m wondering why you never mention the 52 consecutive months of job growth. Is it cause it doesn’t fit your bitterly partisan agenda?
Just wondering.
J Mc,
How many jobs actually created versus how many President Bush said would be created versus how many created under President Clinton?
And I’m not bitter.
Yet.
I may be nit picking, bit is .4% (6.1 minus 5.7) , or .004, soaring ?
If there were a million people unemployed in July, that would make Aug’s 4,000 workers greater …
Sheesh .
I’m wondering why you never mention the 52 consecutive months of job growth. Is it cause it doesn’t fit your bitterly partisan agenda?
I’ll take “Lies, Damn Lies, and Statistics” for $500 Alex.
Fifty-two months of job growth doesn’t tell you much about what’s going on with employment. If the size of the work force grows faster than the rate of job growth, you can have increasing unemployment and job growth at the same time.
Job growth is good, but it’s an incomplete measure.
A decline in the number of jobs, however, is just about always bad news.
Frank, you have the wrong denominator for you calculation. The percentage given is the percent of the total work force.
If the work force was 100 million people and the percentage of unemployed increases by .004, that’s 400,000 additional unemployed.
maybe 40,000? still not much …
Not to mention those stats aren’t accounting for the quality of the jobs. One has to wonder how many of those are the replacement of one full-time position with two no-benefits part-time positions. Our statistics have a bad habit of treating everything in a particular data set as equal.
…unless you’re one of the 40,000. Or rather, 84,000.
http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.nr0.htm
But hey, you 84,000 new unemployed people shouldn’t worry, because we had 52 months of job growth! Everything’s hunky dory!
592,000 new unemployed people, even less cause for worry!
I’m wondering why you never mention the 52 consecutive months of job growth.”
Because that “job growth” does not exist.
Based on your assertion lets see here..
Ah, the unemployement rate 4 years and 4 months ago (April / 2004)
5.6 percent
Unemployement rate For August 2008 (thats this month, mccann)
6.1 Percent.
Clinton’s job growth was largely the dot com boom, which if you didn’t notice, went belly up the last year of his administration and continued into the Bush admin.
Don’t let facts get in the way of your bias though.
Blah–nothing some community college and Ebay can’t fix
Dick Cheney sez so!
Clinton’s job growth was largely the dot com boom, which if you didn’t notice, went belly up the last year of his administration and continued into the Bush admin.
Don’t let facts get in the way of your bias though.
That’s a good example of my point, mccann.
Even with the dot-com bust, job growth in absolute numbers never really faltered. The raw number of jobs fell back, at worst, a few hundred thousand in year over year comparisons.
Job growth is an incomplete measure.
Doesn’t really matter whether or not it goes up or down. The loony left Obamalytes have an argument either way.
If the jobs increase:
“They are just minimum wage, dead end jobs!”
And when they go down:
“See, america is bleeding away the middle class!”
In either case, the assertion are unsourced and unfounded.
The liberal desperation here is so prevalent that it is worthless to even try to refute what they are writing now. They can’t stay on one point long enough to argue it, they are off chasing another windmill of “hidden” files, or republican “corruption”.
What’s the onomatopœia for that noise you make when you flap your lips up and down with a finger? I’ve always wondered how you’d type that noise. Duh’s last post is one way of doing it, but it seems a bit long winded.
Guess a whole cornfield of straw men spouted since I last visited.
Oh Noes!!! Where’s the Palin (cough! McCain!) bounce?!!?!??
10 by October. Diebold be dammed…
“If the jobs increase:
‘They are just minimum wage, dead end jobs!’”
You realize the average income for the middle class has gone down over the last 8 years, right? You are aware of that fact, correct?
You are not just talking out of your ass, right?
This is just the beginning according to insiders and experts. Our friend, an accounting professor here in NY, just gave his usual gloom and doom that matches insider blogs at Wall Street: Depression is coming. Buy Gold!
Not sure if I agree…but when professionals are getting very anxious about the House of Cards that Finance has built. It’s not pretty. He’s saying gold at 3500 an ounce in two years, a new monitary system within two to four years, GM bankrupt within a year. Most financial powerhouses are bankrupt now…but due to a fail safe decree to not allow them to be sold short…the financial train wreak will be slow and unremitting no matter who’s in the White House. (My argument is that a Democrat is the only partisan that can deal with the public with less harm…with McCain…it’s only the Keatings of the USA that’ll get the attention. ) The professor sees the dow going down to 5000 approx. He’s been buying gold for some time now.