Friday, April 04, 2008

80,000 Jobs Lost, Unemployment Spikes

The Bush legacy of failure continues unabated.
U.S. employers slashed jobs for the third straight month in March and unemployment rose to a nearly three-year high, offering the latest signs that the economy has fallen into a recession.

The Labor Department's much anticipated report, released Friday, showed a net loss of 80,000 jobs last month. That marks the third straight month that jobs have fallen - the longest period of decline since early 2003.

Economists surveyed by Briefing.com had forecast that payrolls would fall by 50,000 in the latest reading.

The new report also pegged job losses in January and February at 76,000 each month.

Those revisions added an additional 67,000 job losses to previous readings. The Labor Department now estimates that the economy has shed 232,000 jobs in the first three months of this year.

"The revisions are the real surprise in the report," said John Silvia, chief economist for Wachovia. "If we had known it was anything like that, there would not have been any debate going on about whether we were in a recession. It's pretty stark."

The job losses were widespread, with the battered construction sector losing 51,000 jobs and manufacturing employment falling by 48,000. But there were also losses in key service sector industries. Retail employment dropped by 12,000 jobs, and business and professional service employers cut staff by 35,000.
Oh and lets not forget the unemployment rate which we have been told is so low. Too bad they don't tell you that once your benefitshave expired you are no longer counted. What is the true unemployment number?
The unemployment rate jumped to 5.1% from 4.8% in February. The new reading is the highest level since September 2005 in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. Economists had forecast that unemployment would rise to 5%.
Hurricane Bush has destroyed everything in his path and the destruction can be felt in almost every household in the country except of course his rich cronies who have made out like bandits during his reign of terror.

The mess being left for the next President is enormous and the damage from this administration could be felt for generations. We can not afford to get the next election wrong.

Thursday, April 03, 2008

Jobless Claims Rise More Than Expected

Can we call it a recession yet?
New filings for unemployment claims surged in the latest week to the highest level since September 2005, according to a government report released Thursday.

The Labor Department said applications for unemployment benefits rose to 407,000 in the week ended March 29, up from a revised 369,000 claims in the previous week.

The last time claims were this high was in the week ended Sept. 17, 2005, just after Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf Coast.

A consensus of economists polled by Briefing.com had expected initial jobless claims to fall to 365,000 from the originally reported 366,000.

"There has been a slow deterioration in the labor market," Paul Kasriel, chief economist with Northern Trust, said. "We're starting to see a speed-up in this deterioration," he added.

The surge in jobless claims comes a day before the government's closely watched March employment report. Economists surveyed by Briefing.com expect that report to show a decline of 50,000 jobs.

The job market has suffered from the deepening economic slump. On Wednesday, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke told Congress that a "recession is possible," and that the economy could contract over the first half of the year.
Come on Ben can you please be straight with us? We are in a recession already no matter how you try to spin this. The American people are suffering economically but hey there is a silver lining to this. The illegal immigrants are going home. This should make every immigrant hating fool feel better. We have finally found the way to stop our illegal immigration problem. If we just kill the economy entirely they will all leave and Mexico will have to build a wall to keep Americans out.

Tuesday, April 01, 2008

Banking Industry To Lose 200,000 Jobs

Financial research firm says cuts will appear over 12 to 18 months as subprime crisis hits other areas of the banking industry.
The U.S. financial industry has been shedding jobs at a record clip, and some analysts predict the pace will only accelerate over the next year-and-a-half as banks cut costs in the face of the housing market slump and the weak economy.

Analysts at the financial research firm Celent LLC said in a report Tuesday that they expect the U.S. commercial banking industry - essentially, all companies that lend or collect deposits - to lose 200,000 of its two million jobs over the next 12 to 18 months.

An annual loss of 200,000 jobs at the nation's commercial banks would be an unprecedented number.
That is 10% of the banking workforce. These are white collar jobs with good benefits. Those that oversaw this nightmare will never have to work again but those who did nothing will pay the price. It appears the American public has finally woken up and can see their standard of living decreasing but did they wake up too late?

This second period of the robber barons in our history has once again caused financial hardship not seen since the Great Depression. It seems though we never learn from history and just keep repeating the same mistakes over and over.