by Frank James
If there's any good news in today's employment report from the Labor Department, it's that the December numbers weren't vastly worse than the economists had predicted.
With the economy losing 524,000 jobs last month, the numbers were higher than the 500,000 consensus estimate, higher but not shockingly higher.
Still, the December data made 2008's 2.6 million jobs lost the sharpest cut in jobs since World War II.
Because of how employers are shedding jobs, the unemployment rate rose to 7.2 percent from 6.8 percent in December.
And while that percentage is painfully high, many experts are saying we haven't seen anything yet, that the rate will continue to rise like Hurricane Katrina's floodwaters until it tops out above 10 percent sometime next year.
The December number adds to the pressure for Congress and President-elect Obama to pass a large economic stimulus, definitely something closer to the top end of what Obama appears to be targeting, about $775 billion.
And it's certain that given the December employment numbers, calls will rise for some quarters that the stimulus to be even be higher.
Comments
Since George Bush took office, nearly 3,000,000 people have lost their jobs. I place most of the blame at his feet and the rubberstamp Congressional Republicans.
Since Bush took office, the values of our 401k's and other investments have lost over $2,000,000,000,000.00 in value. And we are not out of the woods yet.
Posted by: Doug R. | January 9, 2009 1:50 PM
Come on...the Bush/Republican years weren't that bad, were they? I mean, Republicans are the fiscally responsible party, right? How bad could it be?
UNEMPLOYMENT RATE
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Then: 4.2% (Bureau of Labor Statistics, January 2001)
Now: 6.7% (Bureau of Labor Statistics, November 2008)
CONSUMER CONFIDENCE
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Then: 115.7 (Conference Board, January 2001)
Now: 38.0, which is an all-time low (Conference Board, December 2008)
U.S. BUDGET
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Then: +236.2 billion (2000, Congressional Budget Office)
Now: -$1.2 trillion (projected figure for 2009, Congressional Budget Office)
.
http://www.americablog.com/2009/01/nothing-is-better-after-eight-years-of.html
Ok. Never mind.
Posted by: Big Orange Satan | January 9, 2009 3:12 PM