Jobless rates rise in 30 states

[brentspeak]

And this week, Obama, through Ron Kirk, told the nation to essentially "stuff it" in regards to renegotiating NAFTA. Who said he and the Republicans didn't see eye-to-eye on things?

http://articles.moneycentral.msn.com/Investing/Dispatch/market-dispatches.aspx?post=1692177&_blg=1,1692177

Five states saw record unemployment rates in January.
Posted by Elizabeth Strott on Wednesday, March 10, 2010 1:01 PM

The jobs picture just got a big uglier if you live in 30 of the 50 United States.

The Labor Department reported that 30 states and the District of Columbia saw unemployment increases in January from December. Only nine states saw their jobless rates fall, and 11 states had no change.

The jobless rate in Michigan fell to 14.3% from 14.5% in December, the biggest drop in January, but it was still the highest jobless rate in the country.

Nevada had the second-highest jobless rate at 13% followed by Rhode Island at 12.7%, South Carolina at 12.6% and California at 12.5%.

[denimgirly]

1. Geitner and Burnanke have done their Job. Nuf said.

[jefferson_dem]

2. NAFTA?

Not going to argue the merits (because, frankly, i'm agnostic on NAFTA) but it's a total red herring in this case. After all, it was in place during Clinton terms when Perot's "giant sucking sound" never materialized. We created 23 million jobs, remember. And, by all accounts, today's jobs market is turning around. Not soon enough...but it's turning.

I look forward to your positive OPs when the boom is in full swing.

[brentspeak]

3. "We created 23 million jobs, remember"

You're referring to the tech bubble jobs, which are no longer in existence. So what was the point of you mentioning NAFTA, which has destroyed jobs here in the U.S.? What are the NAFTA-created jobs? 23 million jobs created through NAFTA -- can you name one?

"And, by all accounts, today's jobs market is turning around"

By the account I just posted, evidently, the job market is not turning around.

[jefferson_dem]

4. Ah...the shifting goal posts routine.

It's tough to keep up with your ever-evolving justification for opposition to everything Obama.

I never said NAFTA created jobs. I said NAFTA was firmly in place AS 23 million jobs were created. Therefore, it's obviously not an impediment to job creation. Your rebuttal: those weren't real jobs. Well...ok then. Have a good one. :hi:

[dmallind]

6. Tech bubble? 23 million??

The IT industry at its peak never employed more than 15% of that number and it's not like there are zero IT people now. Thje tech bubble was a tiny blip on the employment screen, and mostly went to enrich a few lucky startups enormously and see hundreds of garage shop wannabes fail - they never employed anything that would even shift the needle on jobs by a hundredth of a percent though.

[brentspeak]

11. That was the other poster's figure, not mine

I was just responding to his disingenuous claim that NAFTA was responsible for the 90's employment boom.

[dmallind]

12. It's not the 23M I have a problem with - that's factual

It's the silly rejoinder that that jobs boom was in any significant let alone holistic way driven by the tech bubble that I was refuting.

[brentspeak]

13. Ok, then what did drive the jobs boom?

[dmallind]

14. exonomic growth and increasing global demand nt

[brentspeak]

15. Can you be more specific?

What jobs were created and in what industries?

[dmallind]

17. Question - if I actually bother to investigate that by going through archive BOL data

Would it do anything to change your opinion? If it clearly shows that many years after Nafta jobs increased will your response be:

a) Wow OK - looks like under Clinton and NAFTA we really did see a broad increase in real jobs. Damn those Republicans for screwing it up and let's see if Obama can duplicate the feat!

b) Well those obviously weren't REAL jobs because (insert specific industry or factory in your area) had to close! Besides these are politically motivated manipulated lies that don't reflect reality!

All too often demands for detail are thinly veiled passive-aggressive indications that the requestor will use only to seek out tiny nuggets of bad news that continue to bring demands for more data, without taking the aggregate numbers from the official source of this historical data at face value. Maybe you're not like that - so just let me know if you are actually persuadable and if official data will do it.

[brentspeak]

20. Instead of writing some non-response, you could have simply looked it up

http://www.epi.org/publications/entry/issuebriefs_ib120/">More than 394,000 net jobs lost in just the first three years after NAFTA

http://www.epi.org/publications/entry/briefingpapers_bp147/">More than 879,000 net jobs lost by 2002

And that's just data from the first 8 years of NAFTA. Also, the jobs lost were largely high-paying manufacturing positions; anything created were largely Wal-Mart-type positions.

Yes, NAFTA has been an unqualified disaster for the United States.

[dmallind]

21. You mean I could have relied on parsed biased selected data?

Tell me - what happened to number of jobs in those years? Were more people working in 1993 or 2000? Look that up.

[dmallind]

22. BTW here's the real data folks

ftp://ftp.bls.gov/pub/suppl/empsit.ceseeb1.txt


1992- Pre Clinton and NAFTA

Total Employment 108.7M
Private Emp 89.8M
Goods Producing 22.5M

2000 - Clinton leaves after 7+ years of NAFTA
Total Employment 131.8M (that's the 23M jobs folks!)
Private Emp 111.0M (almost all in private employement gains
Goods Producing 24.7M (10% growth in "real" jobs under Clinton and NAFTA)


And that "IT tech boom" canard?

1992 2.64M
2000 3.63M - less than 1m of those 23m Clinton jobs were IT and guess what - 2.8m of those information sector workers are still employed this year - significantly over the "pre tech bubble" number in the middle of a major job loss recession!

May all the gods save us from such horrible effects and terrible consequences as Clinton produced under NAFTA for year after year.

[Oregone]

5. "Perot's "giant sucking sound" never materialized"

:rofl:



"because, frankly, i'm agnostic on NAFTA"

:rofl:

[jefferson_dem]

7. Oregone's posts

:rofl:

[depakid]

18. "Perot's "giant sucking sound" never materialized???"

Millions of folks in manufacturing can well attest to the fact that it did... right alongside a rather sharp rise in undocumented migration caused by deteriorating market conditions for Mexican famers and reductions in wages and working conditions in urban areas.

[JVS]

19. "i'm agnostic on NAFTA" is like saying "Evolution is just a theory"

[uponit7771]

8. It's all Obama's fault, Obama killed Bambi too

[jefferson_dem]

9. Obama burned my toast this morning!

And it's raining in Atlanta right now. If only...Obama wasn't President! :(

[brentspeak]

10. It's not Obama's fault the jobless rates are rising

But it is his fault in making sure that they will continue to rise, via keeping the nation's suicidal trade policies. Corporate welfare for banks, corporate welfare for multinationals.

[donco6]

16. When teacher contracts end in August, you'll see it shoot up more. n/t