Is Unacceptably High Unemployment Going To Become A Staple Of American Life?

[DemocratSinceBirth]

There should be jobs for everybody that wants to work commensurate with their abilities and needs.

[MadHound]

1. Quite possibly,

After all, high unemployment keeps costs low, and makes for a ready pool of cannon fodder for the military.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

3. What If You Are Too Old?

And the military is funded by tax receipts. Where will the earnings come from to pay taxes if nobody has jobs.

[gophates]

2. With living wages, full benefits, and collective bargaining.

And strict limits on what you get paid if you're just "managing" the work instead of doing it.

[ixion]

4. Until we decide to take control away from Wall St.

Yes, it will be just like that, in my opinion.

[Scuba]

5. Not on this path. We're heading toward slavery.

[billlll]

6. info Jobs 4 all

www.njfac.org

Professor quality data 4 debates

[billlll]

7. PS Mexico 50% jobless?

True?

US ever. Ever? Have 0 jobless?

[TBF]

28. "Headed towards" slavery?

I'd argue we're already there. Take a look at average CEO salaries vs. average worker salaries.

[liberal N proud]

8. 30 million

10% of 308 million

[Catshrink]

27. Is that your calculation of the number of unemployed?

You might be off a bit. If the US has 300 million people, not all of them are working age. I'm just not sure where you were going with this.

[RKP5637]

9. The goal IMO is to reduce the labor rate in the US to the lowest global common denominator

and loss of jobs will follow until equilibrium is achieved and slave labor is achieved.

[WinkyDink]

17. Globalization, NAFTA, etc., were transparent predictors of such a scenario.

[Sisaruus]

10. Low-wage, no-benefits underemployment. when one does find a job.

My state (CT) now has the 4th highest long-term unemployment rate in the country and the highest level of underemployment in its recorded history. CT also has the highest per capita income in the country, reflective of that growing divide between the few haves and the very very many have-nots.

[atomic-fly]

12. .. they won't consider you if you've been long term...nt

[w8liftinglady]

33. you are correct.I live in a state that has a lower-than-average unemployment rate...

...because our average salary is less than the national
This is the separation of salary/unemployment per county...any guess as to where the rich have migrated?
Also,counties have a large degree of separation between poor and rich...the rich have massive incomes,-which offsets the poor and makes it look like everyone is doing better...on paper.Unfortunately,I see reality every day.It's not pretty.

http://www.ers.usda.gov/data/unemployment/RDList2.asp?ST=TX

[Sisaruus]

35. growing class of have-nots in a wealthy state

I work for the big regional food bank (a recession-proof job?). Our rapidly growing clientele is suburban, previously middle and upper-middle class. Plenty of six-figure salary people now coping (or not coping) on unemployment benefits. Donors now recipients.

[w8liftinglady]

39. for example-Tom Green County-where I spent 12 years

Home of Goodfellow AFB(where my dad was stationed)
Home of the largest Livestock Markets in Texas
Home of a significant amount of oil.
Large cotton producer

6.5% unemployment
$42,505 median income
84.9% of state average

largest incomes in the millions between oil and cattle.
smallest incomes(full-time) less than minimum wage ...bars and migrant workers.
many people shove whole families into one-bedroom shacks
military families live off base-most of them-in slightly better shacks
It is like feudalism...a small WEALTHY population...and massive percentage of poor.

[Gman]

11. That question has been asked many times in the past several decades

history shows the economy and jobs bounce back.

[mwb970]

13. History doesn't know about the Internet and the rise of global corporatism.

We are in uncharted territory, my friend.

[RKP5637]

34. Exactly! The old methodologies of basically the haphazard creation of jobs

based on supply/demand well might not work in the 21st century. The topology has changed and we're still trying to prop up and play by the old rules. The entire paradigm needs to be changed.

This is why IMO we are not seeing more jobs created. Also, wall street is out of control. The institutions we prop up as too big to fail do far better with globalization and investments than loaning to the common peasants of the land, us.

Those pulling the strings know exactly what they are doing... it's just what message do we feed to the masses while doing this... I see no magic in what is going on...

At what point do the masses rebel... We could vote in better politicians all the way around, but far too many Americans are asleep at the wheel and also fall for all of the propaganda. So, we sit here muddling in this mess called an economy.

[dixiegrrrrl]

42. "far too many Americans are asleep at the wheel"

I rad something that chilled my spine yesterday.
It was a sort bio of the now deceased Dr. Bronner,who made ( his son still makes) the famous soaps.
He was a Jewish German emigre' in 1933, landed in New York, tried to talk his parents into leaving Germany.
A few years later he got a last message from his parents, a single postcard that said:
"You were right. love, Dad.".
Never heard from them again.

THAT is my nightmare when I try to warn my younger family members.

[RKP5637]

43. Yep! I don't know if we're on autopilot yet or not, but the mindless adherence to

outright propaganda is quite troubling. I feel there is an operative machine behind it, that perhaps Beck, Limbaugh and the like are also being manipulated. Much as you, I just don't like what I'm feeling.

What has struck me over the past decade plus is the willingness of Americans to keep voting into power those least likely to serve their interests. The collective consciousness of the US is pretty far down on the awareness scale. Probably the country has had it so good that the citizens for the most part have never learned how to think critically. Instead, many seem to just be parrots.

[Gman]

47. There was nothing "haphazard" about the job creation in the past

if there was, those haphazardly created jobs weren't around very long at all.

[RKP5637]

49. Yep, they weeded themselves out. What I was thinking about is job creation

in general and the requirements for those jobs have never been very well matched as to demand across the economy. I worked for many companies where it was hire and fire, no thought given to long term employment, just hire and fire stuff, and they were huge companies.

What I'm thinking about is as productivity increases worker need, of course, decreases. Without demand planned across the economy IMO unemployment will remain high.

It's also conceivable at some point there just simply will be not enough jobs. We've been pretty much used to the concept of an expanding economy, but there are finite limits as to just how far an economy can expand.

[madrchsod]

15. i`ll agree with you about the past but today i have my doubts

with out trade reform,tax reform,and card check the future is very bleak

[WinkyDink]

18. The data:

http://www.google.com/#q=history+us+unemployment+rates&hl=en&sa=X&tbs=tl:1&tbo=u&ei=doyDTL3tA4S8lQe2uPWQDw&oi=timeline_result&ct=title&resnum=13&ved=0CEwQ5wIwDA&fp=fbb82a6afec8c3ff

http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0104719.html#axzz0yep3xRkX

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unemployment

[Gman]

46. Your data in chart 2 is what I'm talking about

I remember a discussion in an economics class in the early 90's as to whether 6% unemployment was a reasonable number to consider normal when, as you can see in your chart #2, a percent or another half more had been pretty much the norm. Then Clinton put the country back to work and you can see where the lowest was 4%. However, that question is asked more during times of chronic unemployment. We've got very high unemployment now, but, on a macro level, it's still too soon, IMHO, to call it chronic.

[eridani]

20. And history shows that the bounce-backs are getting slower and slower with each

--recession and recovery. This could mean social disaster on a large scale.

[dixiegrrrrl]

24. History also shows what happens

to create feudalism.
History shows that the "last few decades" were an anomaly, partly created by strong unions, which were created after years of bloody strife against the very kinds of oligarchies that are re-emerging now.

History shows that the middle class of many countries has been deliberately destroyed in the last 40 years,and now we are being targeted.

[RKP5637]

36. When the highly monied people meet, they certainly don't sit around to have

a few drinks... As you say, this is a strategy being played out... it is orchestrated and now it's our turn. Eventually the masses will wake up, but the propaganda is so very great in this country, pounded 7x24, it well might be too late. So, the masses are turned against each other, a highly effective way to break down resistance.

[billlll]

54. well said!

Eloquent.

[madrchsod]

14. yes it`s the new vision of america

permanent pool of temporary minimum wage workers to force down wage demands and suppress unionization.

[WinkyDink]

19. And it's being sold to the young as "freedom of movement", "flexibility", and "independence."

[WinkyDink]

16. Capitalism is not the system you suggest. Not that I'm objecting!

[Name removed]

21. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[dixiegrrrrl]

22. IF Unacceptably High Unemployment becomes A Staple Of American Life

then high unemployment becomes "acceptable".

Logically speaking.

[Bragi]

23. High unempoyment will become acceptable

However, people without work will still be seen as the agents of their own misfortune. If only they were smarter, worked harder, etc. then they would still have a job, a house, a pension, savings, good schools, health care, etc.

That all these benefits of life have disappeared is their fault, not the result of the systemic impoverishment of what used be called the middle class.

That's the key to "social stability" now. People have to continue to blame themselves for what is happening to them, not the system.

[dixiegrrrrl]

32. blaming the victim, a technique as old as time

and very effective.

[RKP5637]

37. Exactly!!! Well said!!! n/t

[IndianaGreen]

25. Don't forget that 16% of under-employed workers

Those are the ones that lost their full times jobs and are now working as temps, part timers, or at jobs paying thousands of dollars less of what they were making. If added to the unemployed figures, which are artificially kept below 10% to protect politicians, the true number of Americans unable to properly provide for their families would be a quarter of our population.

[leveymg]

26. The US gave up on the goal of "full employment" in the 1970s

That was part of the Fed's post-war mandate, but it has been all-but ignored since the Nixon and Ford Administrations. It stopped being even a policy goal under Reagan.

A long and deeply-rutted road.

[philly_bob]

29. High unemployment may be systemic, because of automation.

See Jeremy Rifkin's book "The End of Work", http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_End_of_Work.

Rifkin offers a solution:

"As the market economy and public sector decline, Rifkin predicted the growth of a third sector—voluntary and community-based service organizations—that will create new jobs with government support to rebuild decaying neighborhoods and provide social services. To finance this enterprise, he advocated scaling down the military budget, enacting a value added tax on nonessential goods and services and redirecting federal and state funds to provide a "social wage" in lieu of welfare payments to third-sector workers."

[WinkyDink]

31. And people said the Luddites were crazy.

[immoderate]

55. Bingo! I was wondering who would come up with that.

I have not read that book, but I did my own figuring, and because of automation, there is a shortage of work.

In 1850, 99% of work involved the production of food. Today it's less than 1%. Even if factories weren't overseas, the jobs are not there because robots do them.

The answer is a negative income tax. A basic living, with work as an elective to increase income. Health care, education, free. Otherwise, we are doomed.

--imm

[old mark]

30. I read comments by manufacturing CEO's a few weeks ago. One said

that his next new hires are now in 6th grade...I believe many of those now laid off will never get their jobs back, and many will never get ANY jobs aside from low-end service jobs. The CEO's said that the laid off workers are mainly "too old, not educated or familiar with new technology"...
older workers cost more in terms of insurance, sick time, pension plans, and all those benefits people need. Yet the government seems to be making retirement unattainable, health insurance and prescriptions unaffordable and are now limiting the money for new jobs.

I believe most people who are jobless now and over 50 will not work again, and if the republicans win more power, things will surely become even worse.


mark

[RKP5637]

38. There is a lot of truth in what you've said! I think in the future 40 might even

become the cutoff rather than 50. The model needs radical change, but not with the corned wealth of this country. In decades/centuries past change like this came about with rebellions and war, but I have no idea today how things will play out. The tools exist now for total submission and obedience to the system.

[dixiegrrrrl]

44. "The tools exist now for total submission and obedience to the system."

Too few of us are recognizing the truth of that.

[old mark]

50. To me, it has been in place for decades-since health care and old age protection were tied to

employers/work situations. I believe healthcare should be a right, and we should just extend medicare for everyone and eliminate the healthcare business and ANY connection with employment. I also believe we should have some sort of retirement/disability guarantee unrelated to work.

We should find ways to eliminate the wage slavery from life in the US - we are still an incredibly rich nation, but the bulk of our efforts goes to the rich, the corporations and military rathere than to service of the people.

Probably just a labor day fantasy, but there it is.

mark

[dixiegrrrrl]

53. Verily.

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&client=firefox-a&hs=kif&rls=com.ubuntu:en-US:unofficial&&sa=X&ei=ih2FTJWbM8Wblgfh1JXODw&ved=0CBEQBSgA&q=Down%27s+Syndrome+chromosome&spell=1

[area51]

40. Most likely,

unless TPTB start gaining empathy and start up a WPA to get people back to work. This economy will continue to be in Depression status.

[ipaint]

41. Probably and whatever is left of the middle class will be eaten up by it.

We have 6 and a half million long term unemployed. We have negative job creation numbers when you include those persons new to the job market. Millions more will join the long term unemployed in the next year or so. Food stamps are through the roof, 500,000 new recipients this past June alone.

I don't know where they intend to hide the increasing millions of long term unemployed. Combine that with business as usual among the fraudsters and criminals in the banks and on wall street and the next downturn due in a couple years will be a permanent depression.


The festering criminal rot at the center of our financial system needs to be purged or it will destroy the middle class completely.

[ThomCat]

45. Yes. That's what corporations want. And they now control both parties.

So that is what both parties are going to ensure.

We are going to see high unemployment from now on if there is any way either party can arrange in through deliberate economic policy.

Nobody is representing the needs and values of poor people and the middle class anymore. :(

[Fumesucker]

48. What is this "going to become" of which you speak?

Unacceptably high unemployment is a feature of Trickle Down v2.0, not a bug.

[wickerwoman]

51. Yes.

Because honestly we could feed, clothe, house and entertain everyone on the planet with only 20-30% of us working full time if we arranged things rationally. And advances in technology are only going to decrease the number of people who need to work to provide for all of our needs.

Productivity has gone up 70% since the 1970s but the work week has not been reduced because the profits from that increased productivity go straight into the pockets of a few people instead of to the workers.

Recently watched Capitalism: A Love Story and was struck by the bread factory co-op where factory workers were making $60,000 a year for unskilled work. Imagine if two people split that job, each working twenty hours a week and made $30,000 a year. They would still be making a living wage, spending more time with their kids and engaging in recreational activities that would, as likely as not, stimulate the economy.

The only way out of this mess would seem to be reducing the work week (without reducing salary) and distributing profits more equitably.

[Douglas Carpenter]

52. probably, as speculation has largely replaced production of goods based investment as the motor

that drives the economy and it is extremely difficult for a business to remain competitive without outsourcing most of the labor cost - with the demand for high returns on investment largely driven toward the the motive of rapid high return speculative oriented investment rather than long term production oriented investment the incentive for investment to move toward projects that create reasonable paying long term domestic employment, a new reality has been created. Even the incentive to start a business that may create jobs is largely undermined by the new reality.

With much of the demand for housing already way too costly for most people - yet an economy and banking structure utterly dependent on the real estate market outpacing the rate of inflation and the rise of incomes we find ourselves in a system that is completely unsustainable. This new reality requires that burdensome housing cost must rise higher and higher to have an "economic recovery." Yet this "economic recovery" may be unsustainable because housing cost have for sometime already been pushed by speculation well beyond what a natural market can bare.

[h8okra]

56. Untrepreneurial thinking

may keep unemployment high for some time. No not entrepreneurial, untrepreneurial - the unwillingness to invest in any financial undertaking that government does not grantee a large profit on. I have been watching financial analyst, news talking heads, politicians and investors crying that the public certainly can't blame banks and other fat cats for holding onto their funds because they might lose money. That is crazy enough but the American Public hears that and says .... Ummmm.. yeah... I can see that. Are we all nuts.?