[Peace-discuss] More jobs down the tube

[LAURIE SOLOMON]

Me thinks it indicates that the ship is sinking and the crew is not bailing
out fast enough or with big enough buckets, is too dumb to fix the leaks,
and have no idea where to put the patches even if they have them.  It ain't
pretty; but maybe those who find themselves in the sinking ship have no
right to complain since they have directly and indirectly supported those in
charge of the ship over the past several decades in exchange for crumbs (and
probably will continue to do so until the ship actually sinks).

 

It looks like the new prime time show may be "The Rise and Fall of the
Amerikan Empire: welcome to the Third World Experience."   Ride the Downer!
Visit the simulated corporate reality; but do not attempt to save the
simulated suffering people who face simulated job loss , simulated home
loss, simulated health loss, and ultimately simulated death.  A new
corporate reality will be resurrected for the next show in one hour with new
simulated suffering people to be gawked at  and to cry crocodile tears over
while enjoying your beer and popcorn, cotton candy, and chemicals on a
stick.

 

From: peace-discuss-bounces at lists.chambana.net
[mailto:peace-discuss-bounces at lists.chambana.net] On Behalf Of Ricky Baldwin
Sent: Wednesday, December 03, 2008 11:08 AM
To: peace discuss
Subject: [Peace-discuss] More jobs down the tube

 

Today's news: "Private employers cut 250,000 jobs in November, the most in
seven years, a report by a private employment service said on Wednesday,"
(Reuters, 12-3-08).





And the experts are still "revising upward" their totals from previous
months, including:

 

Aug. 2008 - 127,000 for the month (revised upward from earlier
announcements)

 

Sept. 2008 - 284,000 for the month, incl. 201,000 service jobs (revised
upward from earlier announcements)

Sept. 2008 - Hewlett-Packard 25,000 announced

Sept. 2008 - unemployment hits 5-year high 

 

This is *official* unemployment, meaning unemployment *claims*, which only
counts people who are eligible - a category which shrank notably in the
Reagan years, artificially lowering the reported unemployment rate.  It only
includes people who are currently looking for work, but who have been
looking for only a few months (in other words, their benefits haven't run
out yet), they aren't students (even taking one class, even a night class,
even a vocational class), they are 100 percent unemployed (because working
even 1 hour a week disqualifies you).  Moreover, they recently had a job,
where they had worked for long enough and enough hours per week to qualify -
and they still only get a fraction of their former pay, from which they paid
into the system (it's unemployment *insurance* after all, not welfare).

It doesn't count millions of people who have given up looking, are working
even a little, or who are otherwise "unavailable for work" for *any part of
the day*, e.g. taking care of kids.

 

Oct. 2008 - Citigroup 22,000 cuts announced

Oct. 2008 - manufacturing 90,000 actual cuts

Oct. 2008 - leisure & hospitality 16,000 cuts

Oct. 2008 - construction 49,000 cuts

Oct. 2008 - professional & business services 45,000 cuts

Oct. 2008 - retail 38,000 cuts

Oct. 2008 - temp jobs 50,800 cut

Total for Oct. -  200,000 predicted, 240,000 actual for the month; 1.2
million cut for the year (most - 651,000 - in the preceding three months,
each of those months higher than the last)

Oct. 2008 - unemployment hits 14-year high

 

Again, this is *official* unemployment, i.e "claims."  "The so-called
under-employment rate, which counts those part-time workers, as well as
those without jobs who have become discouraged and stopped looking for work,
rose to 11.8% from from 11%, matching the all-time high for that measure
since calculations for it began in January 1994." - CNN

 

Nov. 2008 - Circuit City 7,300 announced (17 percent of its domestic
workforce)

Nov. 2008 - Hartford Financial 500 announced

Nov 2008 - GlaxoSmithKline 1,000 in sales positions announced

Nov. 2008 - Fidelity Investments 1,300 announced

Nov. 2008 - Mattel 1,000 announced

Nov. 2008 - Ford 2,600 announced  (+ total auto sales in US at 25-year low)

Nov. 2008 - Sun 6,000 (18 %)

(total tech sector 2008: 140,000; 107,300 in 2007; 131, 200 in 2006; 174,744
in 2005; 700,000 in 2001 when "dot-com bubble burst")

Nov. 2008 - Applied Materials 1,800 announced  (12 %)

Nov. 2008 - National Semiconductor 330 announced

Nov. 2008 - Citigroup 53,000 announced  (20 percent so far since 2007)

 

Our future?  300,000 job losses a month predicted (CNN) - they can always
"revise this up" later; Cisco Systems, Qualcomm, Nokia may announce layoffs
before the end of the year due to losses; and of course 2-3 million jobs
lost if even one of the Big Three goes belly up.

 

By the way, I noticed in all that hoopla last week that the recession was
finally "official" - and backdated to December 2007 - the same group said,
in answer to a reporter's question, they have "no official definition" for
the predicament that dare not speak its name: "depression."

 

 

 

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