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STOCK MARKET WATCH -- Friday, 18 April 2014
[font size=3]STOCK MARKET WATCH, Friday, 18 April 2014[font color=black][/font]
SMW for 17 April 2014
AT THE CLOSING BELL ON 17 April 2014
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Dow Jones 16,408.54 -16.31 (-0.10%)
[font color=green]S&P 500 1,864.85 +2.54 (0.14%)
Nasdaq 4,095.52 +9.29 (0.23%)
[font color=red]10 Year 2.72% +0.07 (2.64%)
30 Year 3.52% +0.07 (2.03%) [font color=black]
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[font size=2]Market Conditions During Trading Hours[/font]
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[font size=2]Euro, Yen, Loonie, Silver and Gold[center]
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[font color=black][font size=2]Handy Links - Market Data and News:[/font][/font]
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Economic Calendar
Marketwatch Data
Bloomberg Economic News
Yahoo Finance
Google Finance
Bank Tracker
Credit Union Tracker
Daily Job Cuts
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[font color=black][font size=2]Handy Links - Economic Blogs:[/font][/font]
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The Big Picture
Financial Sense
Calculated Risk
Naked Capitalism
Credit Writedowns
Brad DeLong
Bonddad
Atrios
goldmansachs666
The Stand-Up Economist
The Automatic Earth
Wall Street on Parade
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[font color=black][font size=2]Handy Links - Essential Reading:[/font][/font]
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Matt Taibi: Secret and Lies of the Bailout
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[font color=black][font size=2]Handy Links - Government Issues:[/font][/font]
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LegitGov
Open Government
Earmark Database
USA spending.gov
[/center][font color=black][font size=2]Handy Links - Videos:[/font][/font]
[center]
Charlie Rose talks with Roubini
Charlie Rose talks with Krugman
William Black: This Economic Disaster
Bill Moyers with Kevin Drum and David Corn
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[font color=red]Partial List of Financial Sector Officials Convicted since 1/20/09 [/font][font color=red]
2/2/12 David Higgs and Salmaan Siddiqui, Credit Suisse, plead guilty to conspiracy involving valuation of MBS
3/6/12 Allen Stanford, former Caribbean billionaire and general schmuck, convicted on 13 of 14 counts in $2.2B Ponzi scheme, faces 20+ years in prison
6/4/12 Matthew Kluger, lawyer, sentenced to 12 years in prison, along with co-conspirator stock trader Garrett Bauer (9 years) and co-conspirator Kenneth Robinson (not yet sentenced) for 17 year insider trading scheme.
6/14/12 Allen Stanford sentenced to 110 years without parole.
6/15/12 Rajat Gupta, former Goldman Sachs director, found guilty of insider trading. Could face a decade in prison when sentenced later this year.
6/22/12 Timothy S. Durham, 49, former CEO of Fair Financial Company, convicted of one count conspiracy to commit wire and securities fraud, 10 counts of wire fraud, and one count of securities fraud.
6/22/12 James F. Cochran, 56, former chairman of the board of Fair, convicted of one count of conspiracy to commit wire and securities fraud, one count of securities fraud, and six counts of wire fraud.
6/22/12 Rick D. Snow, 48, former CFO of Fair, convicted of one count of conspiracy to commit wire and securities fraud, one count of securities fraud, and three counts of wire fraud.
7/13/12 Russell Wassendorf Sr., CEO of collapsed brokerage firm Peregrine Financial Group Inc. arrested and charged with lying to regulators after admitting to authorities he embezzled "millions of dollars" and forged bank statements for "nearly twenty years."
8/22/12 Doug Whitman, Whitman Capital LLC hedge fund founder, convicted of insider trading following a trial in which he spent more than two days on the stand telling jurors he was innocent
10/26/12 UPDATE: Former Goldman Sachs director Rajat Gupta sentenced to two years in federal prison. He will, of course, appeal. . .
11/20/12 Hedge fund manager Matthew Martoma charged with insider trading at SAC Capital Advisors, and prosecutors are looking at Martoma's boss, Steven Cohen, for possible involvement.
02/14/13 Gilbert Lopez, former chief accounting officer of Stanford Financial Group, and former controller Mark Kuhrt sentenced to 20 yrs in prison for their roles in Allen Sanford's $7.2 billion Ponzi scheme.
03/29/13 Michael Sternberg, portfolio mgr at SAC Capital, arrested in NYC, charged with conspiracy and securities fraud. Pled not guilty and freed on $3m bail.
04/04/13 Matthew Marshall Taylor,fmr Goldman Sachs trader arrested, charged by CFTC w/defrauding his employer on $8BN futures bet "by intentionally concealing the true huge size, as well as the risk and potential profits or losses associated."
04/04/13 Matthew Taylor admits guilt, makes plea bargain. Sentencing set for 26 June; faces up to 20 years in prison but will likely only see 3-4 years. Says, "I am truly sorry."
04/11/13 Ex-KPMG LLP partner Scott London charged by federal prosecutors w/passing inside tips to a friend in exchange for cash, jewelry, and concert tickets; expected to plead guilty in May.
08/01/13 Fabrice Tourré convicted on six counts of security fraud, including "aiding and abetting" his former employer, Goldman Sachs
08/14/13 Javier Martin-Artajo and Julien Grout charged with wire fraud, falsifying records, and conspiracy in connection with JP Morgan's "London Whale" trade.
08/19/13 Phillip A. Falcone, manager of hedge fund Harbinger Capital Partners, agrees to admit to "wrongdoing" in market manipulation. Will banned from securities industry for 5 years and pay $18MM in disgorgement and fines.
09/16/13 Javier Martin-Artajo and Julien Grout officially indicted on charges associated with "London Whale" trade.
02/06/14 Matthew Martoma convicted of insider trading while at hedge fund SAC (Stephen A. Cohen) Capital Advisors. Expected sentence 7-10 years.
03/24/14 Annette Bongiorno, Bernard Madoff's secretary; Daniel Bonventre, director of operations for investments; JoAnn Crupi, an account manager; and Jerome O'Hara and George Perez, both computer programmers convicted of conspiracy to defraud clients, securities fraud, and falsifying the books and records.
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[font size=3][font color=red]This thread contains opinions and observations. Individuals may post their experiences, inferences and opinions on this thread. However, it should not be construed as advice. It is unethical (and probably illegal) for financial recommendations to be given here.[/font][/font][/font color=red][font color=black]
41 replies
= new reply since forum marked as read
= new reply since forum marked as read
http://truth-out.org/news/item/23075-was-marx-right
We participated in a Room for Debate forum at the New York Times, on the topic of “Was Marx Right?” Readers are likely to say, “But of course!” Yet Marx had such a large opus and his forecasts were so bold that any fair reading has to come to more nuanced conclusion. But at least Marx is suddenly fashionable after many years of being The Economist Who Could Not Be Named....
But I wanted to take the unusual step of taking issue with an small but crucial part of Doug Henwood’s post. And I hate making Henwood an object lesson, since I really like his work and the statement he makes is widely accepted as true. But it turns out it is more accurately seen as corporate propaganda that is widely accepted as true.
Here is the critical section of Henwood’s post:
I recall Matt Stoller looked into this (using Fed Flow of Funds data) on his iPad when we were both at a Financial Times conference a few years ago and finding that corporate profit grew in the 1970s after they recovered from the nasty oil-shock recession of 1973-1974. That’s not inconsistent with my recollection of the business press as a young MBA in 1979 and 1980. Stock prices were terrible, and the business press was very critical of American companies, particularly American manufacturers.
But lousy stock prices didn’t mean lousy or falling profits. Here are some of the big reasons why the stock market was so depressed: Inflation, inflation, inflation. Want to know why the Fed is so obsessed with containing inflation, to the extent that they are happy to hobble the economy?
I asked Stoller to revisit his work and he obligingly put up a post:
While there may be other ways to cut the data to come up with a story that conforms better with the official one, an inflation-adjusted look at corporate profits in the 1970s says they weren’t falling on a secular basis. The economy had a bad recession. But despite being mired in stagflation, corporate profits were still rising after the 1974-1975 downturn. Executives were no doubt frustrated by being faced with tougher-than-ever foreign competition, press that showed them little deference, and far less favorable domestic prospects than they’d enjoyed in the 1950s and 1960. But a more hostile environment is not at all the same as showing a profit decline.
Businessmen were overplaying their weakness at the time, to try to extract concessions from the government. As we recounted in ECONNED, the Carter Administration was desperate to do something, anything, to get the economy out of low gear. Business executives and lobbyists sold the Administration on the idea the the US was falling behind in innovation. But that was simply untrue if you looked at any objective measure, like patent filings. Carter’s science advisor nevertheless embraced the idea, while still calling it a “perceived innovation gap.”
And what was the remedy? Deregulation, natch, when regulation has been a major spur to innovation (air quality standards led to major improvements in automobiles, as well as changes in manufacturing facilities like paper mills).
So this would hardly be the first case where businesses sold themselves as being in more desperate shape than they were to win more concessions from government.
AND THERE'S SO MUCH MORE! LOTS OF LINKS, TOO
We participated in a Room for Debate forum at the New York Times, on the topic of “Was Marx Right?” Readers are likely to say, “But of course!” Yet Marx had such a large opus and his forecasts were so bold that any fair reading has to come to more nuanced conclusion. But at least Marx is suddenly fashionable after many years of being The Economist Who Could Not Be Named....
But I wanted to take the unusual step of taking issue with an small but crucial part of Doug Henwood’s post. And I hate making Henwood an object lesson, since I really like his work and the statement he makes is widely accepted as true. But it turns out it is more accurately seen as corporate propaganda that is widely accepted as true.
Here is the critical section of Henwood’s post:
How can this all be explained? The best way to start is by going back to the 1970s. Corporate profitability — which, as every Marxist schoolchild knows, is the motor of the system — had fallen sharply off its mid-1960s highs.
I recall Matt Stoller looked into this (using Fed Flow of Funds data) on his iPad when we were both at a Financial Times conference a few years ago and finding that corporate profit grew in the 1970s after they recovered from the nasty oil-shock recession of 1973-1974. That’s not inconsistent with my recollection of the business press as a young MBA in 1979 and 1980. Stock prices were terrible, and the business press was very critical of American companies, particularly American manufacturers.
But lousy stock prices didn’t mean lousy or falling profits. Here are some of the big reasons why the stock market was so depressed: Inflation, inflation, inflation. Want to know why the Fed is so obsessed with containing inflation, to the extent that they are happy to hobble the economy?
High inflation means you discount future cash flows assuming the continuation of inflation. Those high discount rates mean future earnings are worth very little, which really hurts stock prices and other long-duration assets
High inflation also means investors can’t rely on financial statements. Asset values are in historical dollars, and understated. Depreciation is understated because it is based on historical asset values. That probably means companies are paying more than they should because the value of their depreciation tax shield has eroded. You can’t be sure of profit levels since it depends on whether you use LIFO (last in, first out) accounting, or FIFO (first in, first out). Investors do not like flying blind, so the “I can’t trust the financials” factor makes them even less keen about stocks.
American managers getting their lunch eaten by the Germans and increasingly the Japanese. Both countries were running better manufacturing operations and increasingly making better products. Some of this was by virtue of having newer plants (all post World War II), but much of it was due to being more innovative (for instance, Japanese just-in-time manufacturing) and better labor relations. American management was regularly depicted as sclerotic, and the managers themselves didn’t disagree that much with that assessment.
High inflation also means investors can’t rely on financial statements. Asset values are in historical dollars, and understated. Depreciation is understated because it is based on historical asset values. That probably means companies are paying more than they should because the value of their depreciation tax shield has eroded. You can’t be sure of profit levels since it depends on whether you use LIFO (last in, first out) accounting, or FIFO (first in, first out). Investors do not like flying blind, so the “I can’t trust the financials” factor makes them even less keen about stocks.
American managers getting their lunch eaten by the Germans and increasingly the Japanese. Both countries were running better manufacturing operations and increasingly making better products. Some of this was by virtue of having newer plants (all post World War II), but much of it was due to being more innovative (for instance, Japanese just-in-time manufacturing) and better labor relations. American management was regularly depicted as sclerotic, and the managers themselves didn’t disagree that much with that assessment.
I asked Stoller to revisit his work and he obligingly put up a post:
I’m putting up this post at the request of Yves Smith. She tells me that the conventional story of the 1970s is that corporate profitability declined as foreign multinationals became competitive with US multinationals. Thus, so goes the story, there was a real impetus to cut labor costs.
Now, I’m no wizard with economic data, so it’s quite possible I have this wrong. But It doesn’t look like corporate profits dropped. The story is more interesting than that. Here’s corporate profits against inflation.
So why the story of lost profits? Well, these narratives serve a purpose, and in this case that narrative is organized around the idea that labor costs needed to go down. Where did the corporate sector get that idea? Well, what grew even faster than corporate profits in the 1970s? Social insurance costs. You see, in 1965, Lyndon Johnson implemented this program called Medicare, and that increased the amount that corporations had to pay to cover the medical costs of older people. And this cost stayed with the corporate sector even during recessions, because it was a labor cost.
Eventually, the corporate sector got a handle on these costs, probably by offshoring labor, breaking unions, and financializing. All three of these reduce social insurance contributions to the corporate sector. Check out the following graph.
Today you can see there’s a massive difference between social insurance contributions (blue line) and corporate profits (red line), with roughly $1 in contributions for every $4 in corporate profits. Working your way backwards, there was a smaller yet significant bulge in the mid-2000s, a still smaller yet significant bulge in the mid-1990s, and a even smaller bulge in the early 1980s.
My sense is that this represents the corporate sector gradually shedding not just labor costs, but amount of profit generated by labor. That could mean financialization, increased monopolistic pricing power, offshoring, breaking unions, or all of the above.
Anyway, it’s an interesting phenomenon. Corporate America pays less in social insurance costs than it used to. That means that anyone who says that there used to be x number of workers for every y number of Social Security/Medicare recipients can be reminded that in the 1960s there used to be (roughly) one dollar of contribution to Social Security/Medicare for every two and a half dollars of corporate profits, whereas today there’s (roughly) one dollar of contribution to Social Security/Medicare for every five four dollars of corporate profits.
Now, I’m no wizard with economic data, so it’s quite possible I have this wrong. But It doesn’t look like corporate profits dropped. The story is more interesting than that. Here’s corporate profits against inflation.
So why the story of lost profits? Well, these narratives serve a purpose, and in this case that narrative is organized around the idea that labor costs needed to go down. Where did the corporate sector get that idea? Well, what grew even faster than corporate profits in the 1970s? Social insurance costs. You see, in 1965, Lyndon Johnson implemented this program called Medicare, and that increased the amount that corporations had to pay to cover the medical costs of older people. And this cost stayed with the corporate sector even during recessions, because it was a labor cost.
Eventually, the corporate sector got a handle on these costs, probably by offshoring labor, breaking unions, and financializing. All three of these reduce social insurance contributions to the corporate sector. Check out the following graph.
Today you can see there’s a massive difference between social insurance contributions (blue line) and corporate profits (red line), with roughly $1 in contributions for every $4 in corporate profits. Working your way backwards, there was a smaller yet significant bulge in the mid-2000s, a still smaller yet significant bulge in the mid-1990s, and a even smaller bulge in the early 1980s.
My sense is that this represents the corporate sector gradually shedding not just labor costs, but amount of profit generated by labor. That could mean financialization, increased monopolistic pricing power, offshoring, breaking unions, or all of the above.
Anyway, it’s an interesting phenomenon. Corporate America pays less in social insurance costs than it used to. That means that anyone who says that there used to be x number of workers for every y number of Social Security/Medicare recipients can be reminded that in the 1960s there used to be (roughly) one dollar of contribution to Social Security/Medicare for every two and a half dollars of corporate profits, whereas today there’s (roughly) one dollar of contribution to Social Security/Medicare for every five four dollars of corporate profits.
While there may be other ways to cut the data to come up with a story that conforms better with the official one, an inflation-adjusted look at corporate profits in the 1970s says they weren’t falling on a secular basis. The economy had a bad recession. But despite being mired in stagflation, corporate profits were still rising after the 1974-1975 downturn. Executives were no doubt frustrated by being faced with tougher-than-ever foreign competition, press that showed them little deference, and far less favorable domestic prospects than they’d enjoyed in the 1950s and 1960. But a more hostile environment is not at all the same as showing a profit decline.
Businessmen were overplaying their weakness at the time, to try to extract concessions from the government. As we recounted in ECONNED, the Carter Administration was desperate to do something, anything, to get the economy out of low gear. Business executives and lobbyists sold the Administration on the idea the the US was falling behind in innovation. But that was simply untrue if you looked at any objective measure, like patent filings. Carter’s science advisor nevertheless embraced the idea, while still calling it a “perceived innovation gap.”
And what was the remedy? Deregulation, natch, when regulation has been a major spur to innovation (air quality standards led to major improvements in automobiles, as well as changes in manufacturing facilities like paper mills).
So this would hardly be the first case where businesses sold themselves as being in more desperate shape than they were to win more concessions from government.
AND THERE'S SO MUCH MORE! LOTS OF LINKS, TOO
http://wallstcheatsheet.com/politics/10-charts-revealing-americas-miserable-job-situation.html/?ref=YF
The textbook definition of a recession claims the Great Recession technically ended in the summer of 2009, after the economy stopped contracting and started to expand again. However, many Americans continue to feel the aftershocks of the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression as the labor market remains a sore spot for millions of households.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics recently reminded everyone that the so-called “jobs recovery” is sluggish at best. In March, the U.S. economy added 192,000 jobs. An additional 37,000 jobs appeared from revisions in the prior two months. The report is likely good enough to keep the Federal Reserve dialing down its bond purchases, but the results were worse-than-expected. Economists expected around 200,000 jobs to be added last month.
More jobs were lost in the recent recession than any other post-World War II downturn. Making matters worse, the quality of jobs that have been added to the economy in recent years are a serious concern. Here’s a a look at 10 charts showing the bigger jobs picture.
1. Unemployment Rates
The headline unemployment rate came in at 6.7 percent last month, unchanged from the previous month. That is below the peak of 10 percent in 2009, but the unemployment rate has been stuck at 6.7 percent in three of the past four months.
Additionally, the U-6 unemployment rate, which includes everyone in the headline rate — plus people who are employed part-time but prefer a full-time position, or want work but have stopped looking — increased one-tenth of a percentage point and remains stubbornly high at 12.7 percent.
2. Part-Time Workers
The number of people employed part-time because of economic reasons is around 7.4 million. These individuals had their hours slashed or were unable to find a full-time job. They are also one reason for the high U-6 unemployment rate. As the chart above shows, a more reasonable number for the amount of part-time workers is around 3 to 5 million.
3. Manufacturing
The backbone of the U.S. economy and employment used to be manufacturing, but this is clearly no longer the case. The manufacturing sector has been bleeding jobs for decades. The number of employees in the manufacturing sector is near its lowest point since 1946. Over the past decade, more than 2.6 million manufacturing jobs have been destroyed.
4. Employment-to-Population Ratio
Despite the decline in the headline unemployment rate over recent years, the percentage of working-age Americans with a job is under 59 percent, its lowest level since 1983. This ratio will have difficulty improving. The adult population increases by about 200,000 people each month, but the economy has averaged a monthly gain of only 187,000 jobs over the past 12 months.
5. Quality
A growing number of analysts and economists are beginning to realize a quality issue with the jobs being created. Leisure and hospitality employment increased by 29,000 jobs in March, the second most of any category. Retail jobs — another low-wage industry — added 21,000 jobs in March. Over the past year, these two industries are responsible for more than 800,000 new jobs.
6. Paychecks
Wages and salaries as a percentage of GDP have been declining for over four decades. According to recent data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, employees in seven of the 10 largest occupations typically earn less than $30,000 a year. A retail salesperson — the most popular occupation — earned an average of only $25,310 in 2012. In fact, according to new data from the BLS, nine of the top 10 jobs in America pay $34,000 or less per year.
7. Job Hunt
Financial advisors often advocate an emergency savings fund of around eight months. The simple reason for this is that it takes the average unemployed person about 36 weeks to find a new job. That is below the high of 41 weeks seen in recent years, but well above historical standards.
8. Hours Worked
The typical work week has also seen a dramatic change over the decades. The average amount of annual time worked per employed person in the U.S. has declined from 1,900 hours in 1970 to about 1,760 hours in 2011. Making matters worse, hourly wages are failing to grow. In March, the average earnings slipped one cent to $24.30 an hour.
9. Labor Force
A large catalyst for the declining headline unemployment is due to job hunters dropping out of the labor force. The share of working-age Americans who were employed or looking for work rose to 63.2 percent last month, its highest level since September. However, on a longer timeframe, the gauge is still near its lowest level since 1978 — a time when fewer women were participating in the labor force.
10. Long-Term Unemployment
In March, the total number of unemployed persons came in at 10.5 million while the number of long-term unemployed, those jobless for 27 weeks or more, was about 3.7 million. Those individuals constitute 35.8 percent of the unemployed, and their numbers have shrunk by just 837,000 over the past year.
The textbook definition of a recession claims the Great Recession technically ended in the summer of 2009, after the economy stopped contracting and started to expand again. However, many Americans continue to feel the aftershocks of the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression as the labor market remains a sore spot for millions of households.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics recently reminded everyone that the so-called “jobs recovery” is sluggish at best. In March, the U.S. economy added 192,000 jobs. An additional 37,000 jobs appeared from revisions in the prior two months. The report is likely good enough to keep the Federal Reserve dialing down its bond purchases, but the results were worse-than-expected. Economists expected around 200,000 jobs to be added last month.
More jobs were lost in the recent recession than any other post-World War II downturn. Making matters worse, the quality of jobs that have been added to the economy in recent years are a serious concern. Here’s a a look at 10 charts showing the bigger jobs picture.
1. Unemployment Rates
The headline unemployment rate came in at 6.7 percent last month, unchanged from the previous month. That is below the peak of 10 percent in 2009, but the unemployment rate has been stuck at 6.7 percent in three of the past four months.
Additionally, the U-6 unemployment rate, which includes everyone in the headline rate — plus people who are employed part-time but prefer a full-time position, or want work but have stopped looking — increased one-tenth of a percentage point and remains stubbornly high at 12.7 percent.
2. Part-Time Workers
The number of people employed part-time because of economic reasons is around 7.4 million. These individuals had their hours slashed or were unable to find a full-time job. They are also one reason for the high U-6 unemployment rate. As the chart above shows, a more reasonable number for the amount of part-time workers is around 3 to 5 million.
3. Manufacturing
The backbone of the U.S. economy and employment used to be manufacturing, but this is clearly no longer the case. The manufacturing sector has been bleeding jobs for decades. The number of employees in the manufacturing sector is near its lowest point since 1946. Over the past decade, more than 2.6 million manufacturing jobs have been destroyed.
4. Employment-to-Population Ratio
Despite the decline in the headline unemployment rate over recent years, the percentage of working-age Americans with a job is under 59 percent, its lowest level since 1983. This ratio will have difficulty improving. The adult population increases by about 200,000 people each month, but the economy has averaged a monthly gain of only 187,000 jobs over the past 12 months.
5. Quality
A growing number of analysts and economists are beginning to realize a quality issue with the jobs being created. Leisure and hospitality employment increased by 29,000 jobs in March, the second most of any category. Retail jobs — another low-wage industry — added 21,000 jobs in March. Over the past year, these two industries are responsible for more than 800,000 new jobs.
6. Paychecks
Wages and salaries as a percentage of GDP have been declining for over four decades. According to recent data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, employees in seven of the 10 largest occupations typically earn less than $30,000 a year. A retail salesperson — the most popular occupation — earned an average of only $25,310 in 2012. In fact, according to new data from the BLS, nine of the top 10 jobs in America pay $34,000 or less per year.
7. Job Hunt
Financial advisors often advocate an emergency savings fund of around eight months. The simple reason for this is that it takes the average unemployed person about 36 weeks to find a new job. That is below the high of 41 weeks seen in recent years, but well above historical standards.
8. Hours Worked
The typical work week has also seen a dramatic change over the decades. The average amount of annual time worked per employed person in the U.S. has declined from 1,900 hours in 1970 to about 1,760 hours in 2011. Making matters worse, hourly wages are failing to grow. In March, the average earnings slipped one cent to $24.30 an hour.
9. Labor Force
A large catalyst for the declining headline unemployment is due to job hunters dropping out of the labor force. The share of working-age Americans who were employed or looking for work rose to 63.2 percent last month, its highest level since September. However, on a longer timeframe, the gauge is still near its lowest level since 1978 — a time when fewer women were participating in the labor force.
10. Long-Term Unemployment
In March, the total number of unemployed persons came in at 10.5 million while the number of long-term unemployed, those jobless for 27 weeks or more, was about 3.7 million. Those individuals constitute 35.8 percent of the unemployed, and their numbers have shrunk by just 837,000 over the past year.
