Federal Reserve Says Unemployment High Until 2015

[Guest Ron]

The problem as I see it. Those in power put their global citizenship above their country citizenship. When a company goes international it loses it allegiance to its founding country. Like the wind they move to the best tax shelter and the cheapest labor pool.

[Guest Puritans]

Is it possible that our Federal Reserve has had some hand in bailing out Greece? The fact is, we don’t know, and current laws exempt agreements between the Fed and foreign central banks from disclosure or audit.

[Guest Navy42]

You watch. This out of control banking system will turn its back on the elderly who brought prosperity to the system.

[Guest GlennBeckTV]

Face To Face interviews Senator Harry Reid on his meeting with President Obama in Las Vegas. The planned bail out of Nevada and the strategy of employing the tactical nuclear option(aka reconciliation) to pass the socialized health care bill are discussed. The jobs/stimulus bill is also discussed. The effectiveness of the stimulus bill is brought into question. Senator Reid takes credit for "saving the world from a worldwide depression."

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fm3zdPEAlew

[Guest Cullen Schwarz]

CONGRESSMAN PETERS SPEAKS OUT AGAINST FAILURE OF SENATE TO EXTEND UNEMPLOYMENT BENEFITS

 

Extended Unemployment Benefits Expire Sunday; Peters Urges Residents to Call Senator Blocking the Bill

 

The Senate failed today to extend emergency unemployment benefits despite the fact that the extended benefit program is set to expire Sunday, kicking hundreds of thousands of Americans off unemployment roles. An estimated 100,000 or more Michigan residents are set to exhaust unemployment insurance benefits in March without an extension, approximately 10,000 in Oakland County alone. 1.1 million are set to exhaust benefits nationwide. The Senate is not scheduled to reconvene until Tuesday.

 

“This failure is bad for many across the country, but it’s especially hard on Michigan,” said Congressman Peters. “My office has been flooded with calls from people who badly need this extension, and I’ve called many of them back to talk with them personally. I’ve spoken with parents who are trying hard but unable to find work and are struggling to keep their heads above water, and this could be the blow that sends them over the edge. The partisanship and dysfunction that led to this failure shows that the process in the Senate is truly broken.”

 

Extended unemployment benefits, along with COBRA health insurance subsidies for the unemployed, are set to expire on Sunday. The House passed a six-month extension of these benefits in December but the Senate never acted on that extension. Earlier this week the House passed an extension through the end of March to give the Senate more time to act. In order to quickly pass the House bill without procedural hurdles, the Senate attempted to pass it through “unanimous consent” to send it to the president to sign by Sunday. However, one Senator, Republican Jim Bunning of Kentucky, decided to object to unanimous consent, defeating the proposal.

 

The Senate stayed in session Thursday night to try to resolve this matter and, according the New York Times, Senator Bunning complained that led to him missing Kentucky’s basketball game vs. South Carolina.

 

I encourage everyone who cares about this issue to call Senator Jim Bunning,” Congressman Peters said. “His phone number is 202-224-4343. Extending unemployment benefits is something that Congress has done every recession for the past several decades. It’s wrong for Senator Bunning to block it while the job market is still slumping."

 

Jim Bunning may have thrown a no-hitter for the Tigers, but the fact that he’s now shutting out Michigan families when they need it most is unacceptable.

[Guest Vicki Escarra]

Clearly, the economic recession, resulting in dramatically increasing unemployment nationwide, has driven unprecedented, sharp increases in the need for emergency food assistance and enrollment in federal nutrition programs. Hunger in America 2010 exposes the absolutely tragic reality of just how many people in our nation don’t have enough to eat. Millions our clients are families with children finding themselves in need of food assistance for the very first time.

 

Many of the people served by Feeding America food banks report they are struggling with unemployment, difficult choices between food and other basic necessities along with the pressures of skyrocketing healthcare costs. While 36 percent of client households have at least one adult working, Hunger in America 2010 reports a 68 percent increase over four years ago in the number of adults seeking emergency food assistance who have been unemployed for under a year. More than 46 percent of clients served report having to choose between paying for utilities or heating fuel and food; 39 percent said they had to choose between paying for rent or a mortgage and food; 34 percent report having to choose between paying for medical bills and food; and 35 percent must choose between transportation and food.

 

It is morally reprehensible that we live in the wealthiest nation in the world where one in six people are struggling to make choices between food and other basic necessities. These are choices that no one should have to make, but particularly households with children. Insufficient nutrition has adverse effects on the physical, behavioral and mental health, and academic performance of children. It is critical that we ensure that no child goes to bed hungry in America as they truly are our engine of economic growth and future vitality.

[Guest LAW]

The Labor Market

Employment and Unemployment

 

After falling sharply in the first half of 2009, employment continued to contract through the remainder of the year, but at a gradually moderating pace. Nonfarm private payroll employment fell 725,000 jobs per month, on average, from January to April of 2009; the pace of job loss slowed to about 300,000 per month from May to October, and to an average of 20,000 jobs per month from November to January. The moderation in the pace of job losses was relatively widespread across sectors, although cutbacks in employment in the construction industry continued to be sizable through January.

 

After rising rapidly for more than a year, the unemployment rate stabilized at 10 percent in the fourth quarter of 2009. In January, the jobless rate dropped to 9.7 percent, though it remained 4.7 percentage points higher than its level two years ago.

 

The slowing in net job losses since mid-2009 primarily reflected a reduction in layoffs rather than an improvement in hiring. Both the number of new job losses and initial claims for unemployment insurance are down significantly from their highs in the spring of 2009, while most indicators of hiring conditions, such as the Bureau of Labor Statistics survey of job openings, remain weak. The average duration of an ongoing spell of unemployment continued to lengthen markedly in the second half of 2009, and joblessness became increasingly concentrated among the long-term unemployed. In January, 6.3 million individuals--more than 40 percent of the unemployed--had been out of work for at least six months. Furthermore, the labor force participation rate has declined steeply since last spring, a development likely related, at least in part, to the reactions of potential workers to the scarcity of employment opportunities.

 

However, in recent months, labor market reports have included some encouraging signs that labor demand may be firming. For example, employment in the temporary help industry, which frequently is one of the first to see an improvement in hiring, has been increasing since October. In addition, after steep declines in 2008 and the first quarter of 2009, the average workweek of production and nonsupervisory employees stabilized at roughly 33.1 hours per week through the remainder of the year, before ticking up to 33.2 hours in November and December and 33.3 hours in January. Another indicator of an improvement in work hours, the fraction of workers on part-time schedules for economic reasons, increased only slightly, on net, in the second half of the year after a sharp rise in the first half and then turned down noticeably in January.

Productivity and Labor Compensation

 

Labor productivity surged in 2009, reflecting, at least to some extent, the reluctance of firms to increase hiring even as demand expanded. According to the latest available published data, output per hour in the nonfarm business sector increased at an annual rate of 6-3/4 percent in the second half of 2009, after rising 3-1/2 percent in the first half, and about 1 percent in 2008.

 

Despite large gains in productivity, increases in hourly worker compensation have remained subdued. The employment cost index for private industry workers, which measures both wages and the cost to employers of providing benefits, rose only 1-1/4 percent in nominal terms in 2009 after rising almost 2-1/2 percent in 2008. Compensation per hour in the nonfarm business sector--a measure derived from the worker compensation data in the NIPA--showed less deceleration, rising 2.2 percent in nominal terms in 2009, only slightly slower than the 2.6 percent rise recorded for 2008. Real hourly compensation--that is, adjusted for the rise in consumer prices--increased only modestly. Reflecting the subdued increase in nominal hourly compensation, along with the outsized gain in labor productivity noted earlier, unit labor costs in the nonfarm business sector declined 2-3/4 percent in 2009.

 

http://www.federalreserve.gov/monetarypolicy/mpr_20100224_part2.htm

[Guest LAW]

Bunning Again Tries To Get A Pay-For

 

Washington, DC

Monday, March 1, 2010

 

From the floor of the United States Senate:

 

Mr. Bunning: Mr. President, it's -- it's amazing to me that the Senator from Illinois has what we call a convenient memory just last week, there was a bipartisan bill proposed by Senator Baucus and Senator Grassley that would have covered these extension of unemployment benefits, cobra health care assistance, flood insurance, highway bill assistance, the doc fix, small business loans and the rural satellite television viewer act, and his convenient memory loss allowed him to forget that his Leader, Senator Reid, did not allow that bill to come to the floor, and instead substituted his jobs bill which was also not fully paid for, by the way. $10 billion wasn't, $5 billion was. And so $10 billion from the jobs bill that was passed went to the bottom of the deficit.

 

There comes a time when 100 senators are for something that we all support. If we can't find $10 billion to pay for it, we're not going to pay for anything. We will not pay for anything fully on the floor of the U.S. Senate. Now, he said I only offered one way to pay for this. That's untrue. I offered more than one way. I negotiated with the Leader -- the Leader's staff, rather, and we had worked out two-week extension to $5 billion with a different pay-for. The debt that we have arrived at , even the head of the Federal Reserve Bank, Chairman Bernanke, said it's not sustainable. It's unsustainable. What does that mean to the American people, to the same people that are struggling to pay their bills, that are on unemployment, that could have been covered had the Baucus-Grassley bill been considered, and could have been covered not for 30 days but for three months?

 

Now, because there were some tax extenders in that bill, the Democrat majority stopped the bill from being considered. I'm not filibustering the bill. A filibuster is -- a filibusterer is somebody who talks a long time. I am exercising my right as a senator duly elected from Kentucky to object to a U.C. that's completely different than filibustering. Everybody knows that a member of this body that anybody, 100 of us, can object to anything that is brought to the floor of the U.S. Senate, whether it be a nominee, whether it be a judge, whether it be somebody that is appointed to the Treasury. Anybody can object. And there is a procedure that takes place that you can overcome that objection. Why doesn't the Democratic majority use that procedure?

 

So I'm going to make one more shot, and as long as we continue to have the extenders being brought forth and paid for, I'm going to make it. I ask Unanimous Consent that the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of H.R. 4691, that the amendment at the desk which offers a full offset be agreed to, the bill be amended -- as amended be read a third time and passed, and the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table.

 

The Presiding Officer: Is there objection?

 

Mr. Durbin: Mr. President,... I object.

[Guest NIA]

The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) released unemployment numbers today for the month of February 2010. We saw a payroll decline in February of 36,000 jobs. If you discount the hiring of 15,000 temporary census workers, 51,000 jobs were lost. The official unemployment rate stayed the same at 9.7%, but including "discouraged workers" the U-6 unemployment rate increased by 0.3% to 16.8%. Interestingly, the BLS revised payroll data for April through July 2009, which included the addition of 54,000 payrolls in April of 2009 for people that had been hired in preparation of the census. If the BLS can't accurately count the number of people hired to work for the census, NIA wonders how on earth these census workers will be able to accurately count the hundreds of millions of people living in this nation?

 

If you have recently watched any financial show on television, 90% of the guests talk about the "economic recovery beginning to take hold." NIA believes it is impossible for there to be an economic recovery when the imbalances that need to be corrected are growing larger than ever. Although U.S. consumer spending was up 0.5% in January, the U.S. savings rate fell to a 15-month low of 3.3%. In order for our economy to be on a road to recovery, we need to see a sharp contraction in consumer spending along with a savings rate north of 10%. The truth is, any positive U.S. economic data only serves as an indicator that inflation is beginning to take hold.

[Guest CBO]

Even though economic activity began to increase again during the second half of 2009, the unemployment rate continued to rise, finishing the year at 10.0 percent. Hiring usually lags behind output during the initial stages of a recovery because firms tend to increase output first by boosting productivity and by raising the number of hours that existing employees work; adding employees tends to occur later. CBO expects that the unemployment rate will average slightly above 10 percent in the first half of 2010 and then turn downward in the second half of the year (see Summary Figure 3). As the economy expands further, the rate of unemploy­ment is projected to continue declining until, in 2016, it reaches 5 percent, which is equal to CBO’s estimate of the rate of unemployment consistent with the usual rate of job turnover in U.S. labor markets.

[Guest LMRDA]

In the absence of economic policies that generate 450,000 jobs per month for at least 60 months, the U.S. will remain mired in a recession that will linger for years if not decades. To give the economy the traction it needs, Ur Union of Unemployed (UCubed) is calling for the immediate establishment of a public job creation program far larger than anything proposed thus far.

 

"America needs 100,000 jobs per month right now just to match the growth in the labor markets and another 350,000 new jobs each month for five years before we can hope to return to full employment levels,” said Rick Sloan, acting executive director of Ur Union of Unemployed. “We need solutions on the scale of the problem we are trying to solve.”

 

Ur Union of Unemployed is calling for a massive public job creation program similar to Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s Works Progress Administration (WPA), which employed millions of out-of-work Americans in every state during the Great Depression.

[Guest American for Progress]

Coburn is taking a page directly out of the playbook of Sen. Jim Bunning (R-KY). In late February, Bunning objected to Reid's request for unanimous consent to approve a month-long extension of unemployment insurance benefits. Bunning finally relented after several Republicans began pressuring him. This time, however, the GOP leadership is standing solidly behind Coburn. In fact, Sen. Jon Kyl (R-AZ) is even saying that Republicans should have given Bunning more support. "It took an act of courage like Sen. Bunning's to perhaps jolt people into the awareness of how bad it had really gotten," he said. The issue for Republicans is that no unemployment benefits should be extended unless Congress offsets the cost of the move by taking funds out of the stimulus. Coburn has actually tried to argue that out-of-work Americans will appreciate the GOP obstruction: "Hopefully they're not going to stay unemployed, and when they're reemployed, one of two things is going to happen: Either we're going to cut spending or somebody's going to raise their taxes." However, as the National Employment Law Project's Judy Conti explained, offsetting unemployment benefits is just bad economics. "Every economist from every side of the political spectrum will tell you that unemployment benefits are most stimulative when they are not offset," she said. "In the history of the unemployment program, we have never off set these programs." Democrats are arguing that the unemployment benefits extension is considered "emergency spending" and therefore not subject to paygo rules. Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-MI) has also wondered why the GOP insists on fiscal responsibility only at the expense of the less well-off: "Under President Bush, under the Republican Congress, that went away pretty fast. By not paying for tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans, somehow, that was OK."

 

REAL EFFECTS: The expiration of unemployment benefits will hit Americans across the nation. The Labor Commissioner of Maine, where approximately 1,500 people will lose benefits this week, said that Congress' delay is an "administrative nightmare." New York is estimating that 46,000 residents will lose benefits. In Utah, where 1,300 people will see their benefits lapse today alone, the Department of Workforce Services is urging people to continue filing their weekly benefit claims in the hope that Congress will quickly pass an extension that will apply retroactively. However, it's not only unemployment benefits that Republicans are blocking; the package they're holding up also included extensions for COBRA health insurance subsidies, a delay on cuts in Medicare payments to doctors, poverty guidelines, and authorization for the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP). Record amounts of rainfall in the Northeast have brought the critical nature of the NFIP into focus in recent weeks. Flooding in Rhode Island was the worst it's been in 100 years, Boston saw its wettest March since record keeping began in 1872, while "bridges and highways have washed out from Maine to Connecticut and sewage systems have been overwhelmed to the point that families were asked to stop flushing toilets." National Guard troops were mobilized to aid residents in both Rhode Island and Massachusetts. According to the Property Casualty Insurers Association of America, there are 5.5 million flood insurance policy holders in flood plains, homeowners who are now unable to renew their policies. If any of those homeowners were victims of the current flooding, they will "face complications" filing claims.

 

GOP BASHING UNEMPLOYED AMERICANS: Despite backing Coburn's blockade, Kyl on Sunday claimed that he supports "extending unemployment benefits because unemployment is so high." In fact, Roll Call reported last week that Republicans are planning to blame Democrats for the lapse in benefits, believing the issue "can play to their favor." Senate Republicans are pointing to the fact that House Democrats refused to go along with a plan agreed to by Reid and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) to pass a one-week extension of the benefits. The House, however, had already voted for the one-month extension. Additionally, it's unclear whether Republicans actually want to renew the benefits at all. Last month, Kyl said that unemployment benefits dissuade people from job-hunting "because people are being paid even though they're not working. ... [C]ontinuing to pay people unemployment compensation is a disincentive for them to seek new work." Rep. Steve King (R-IA) has warned against turning the "safety net" of unemployment benefits into a "hammock," and Rep. Dean Heller (R-NV) has said that the government may be creating "hobos." Americans aren't receiving unemployment benefits because they're lazy, despite the GOP's claims. In this recession, the "share of the long-term unemployed who have been out of work and pounding the pavement in search of a new job for at least six months is at a record-breaking 44.1 percent, or 6.5 million workers." A major reason for this long-term unemployment is that there just aren't enough jobs for the unemployed, with more than "six unemployed workers per job opening."

[Guest LAW]

Written Statement by

Alan B. Krueger

Assistant Secretary for Economic Policy and Chief Economist

U. S. Department of the Treasury

before the

Joint Economic Committee

May 5, 2010

 

Chair Maloney, Ranking Member Brady, Vice Chairman Schumer and other members of the Committee, thank you for giving me the opportunity to discuss jobs in the United States. We are meeting at a time when the U.S. labor market is beginning to show signs of what I expect will be sustained improvement after moving through the worst downturn since the 1930s by some measures, and since the early 1980s by other measures. The current unemployment rate is 9.7 percent. That is down from a recent high of 10.1 percent last October. This is an improvement, but the rate is still unacceptably high. The economy gained an average of 54,000 jobs per month in the first quarter of 2010, a vast improvement over the 750,000 jobs lost per month in the first quarter of 2009. Yet even with the recent improvement, losses since the start of the recession amount to 8.2 million jobs.

 

While the collapse in the job market in the wake of the financial crisis has been devastating, job growth in the earlier part of the 2000s was also poor compared to the preceding decade. In my testimony I will focus on two periods: First, I will contrast job growth in the decade of the 1990s with job growth in the 2000s prior to the most recent recession; and second, I will analyze the job losses in the recession that began in December 2007 and the recent stabilization and probable improvement of the job market.

 

The theme of my remarks is that the U.S. job market is not destined for poor performance because of globalization, technological change, or demographics. Other advanced nations that are subject to these same macro forces have seen stronger job growth than the U.S. in the last decade. I will also elaborate on how the financial crisis affected various segments of the job market, and highlight the lingering effects of the crisis on labor demand, especially among small businesses.

 

Longer-Term Job Trends Have Not Been Favorable

 

A look at the jobs picture over the years in the previous decade before the recession indicates that job market performance in the U.S. was poor relative to the 1990s across a number of key metrics. In other words, while the recession has taken a terrible toll on American workers, the job market during the first eight years of the decade of the 2000s--before the recession--was already under-performing.

 

Table 1 provides several labor market indicators. The number of nonfarm payroll jobs, derived from the monthly establishment survey conducted by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (or BLS), is a standard indicator of employment. Looking over a long stretch of history, despite occasional recessionary periods, the U.S. job market has steadily increased employment to accommodate our growing population until the 2000s. During the 1990s (specifically, from December 1989 through December 1999), the economy gained 21.7 million payroll jobs. By contrast, from December 1999 through December 2009, the economy lost 944,000 jobs. Indeed nonfarm payroll employment in the U.S. currently stands at about the same level as it did in September 1999. With no net jobs gained in more than ten years, it is no wonder that many analysts are calling this period the "lost decade." This poor performance is not only due to the recession at the end of the decade. Job gains in the 2000s are weak even if we exclude the losses that occurred during the recession: Over the first 8 years of the 1990s, the economy gained almost 16 million jobs; during the first 8 years of the 2000s, however, payroll employment rose by somewhat less than 7.5 million jobs, a little less than half of the previous decade's 8-year increase.

 

The lackluster job market performance that is evident in the payroll data also is evident in the BLS's Current Population Survey (CPS), which is a household survey. Consider first the employment-to-population ratio, which is the fraction of the working-age population who report being employed. As Figure 2 shows, the employment-to-population ratio rose 1.3 percentage points from 1989 through 1999, and peaked in April 2000 at a postwar high of 64.7 percent. In contrast, during the decade of the 2000s, the ratio fell nearly 5 percentage points, and is now at a level--58.6 percent--that was last seen immediately following the back-to-back recessions of 1980-82. The decline in the employment-to-population ratio was especially sharp after the recession began, but even prior to the recession the ratio had already given up all of its gains during the 1990s, an indication that job growth failed to keep up with population growth.

 

More detailed data allow us to compare the experience of individual demographic groups during the most recent decade with their experience in the 1990s. The data show that the trend toward increased labor market participation by women continued throughout the 1990s, but then was partly reversed prior to the 2007 recession; by the end of the decade the share of women working had returned to about the same level as it had been in 1989. The employment-to-population ratio for men edged lower during the 1990s, with an acceleration in this downward trend over the most recent decade. Male employment was then disproportionately affected by the 2007 recession: In the recession, the employment-to-population ratio for men fell more than 5 percentage points, and by 2009 the ratio had fallen to all time lows.

 

Employment-to-population ratios across age groups also display some noteworthy patterns. In particular, for workers age 55 and older, there was a modest uptrend in employment during the 1990s, cumulating in a 1.6 percentage point increase in the employment-to-population rate for the decade. This increase in employment among older workers accelerated during the 2000s, producing a 6.4 percentage point rise in the employment for the decade. The combination of the aging of the baby boom generation which led to an increase in the number of people over age 55 and the increase in their employment rate resulted in a 56 percent increase in the number of employees who were age 55 and over in the first decade of the 2000s. By contrast, the number of workers in each of the other age groups--as well as the share of the age group employed--declined from 1999 to 2009.

 

These data suggest that, while the effects of the recent recession have dominated changes in employment, the past decade saw considerable underlying softness in employment prior to the recession. BLS data from the Business Employment Dynamics (BED) program provide evidence of a related trend in gross job flows (as opposed to net job creation). The BED data measure the number of jobs added in business establishments that are opening or expanding and the number of jobs lost in business establishments that are closing or contracting. The BED data indicate a trend toward less churning--a reduction in gross labor flows across companies--beginning in the late 1990s and continuing through the 2000s. The BLS's Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS) likewise shows a decline in worker turnover in the 2000s.

 

The U.S. labor market is well known for its dynamism, in the sense that reactions to changes in economic conditions occur relatively rapidly, regardless where we are in the economic cycle. Millions of hires take place each month even in the depths of a recession, and millions of separations occur during an expansion. Although such dynamism can be disruptive for workers and companies, it also serves to reallocate workers from declining to expanding sectors, thereby boosting productivity and, ultimately, living standards for Americans. Therefore, the decline in gross labor market flows is a potential concern if it represents a fundamental shift toward a less dynamic U.S. economy.

 

The decline in churning that is evident in the BED and JOLTS data, however, is at least partly a result of an aging workforce. I make this inference from an examination of job tenure. A decrease in separations and hiring would be expected to result in longer job tenure, all else equal. Indeed, the average worker age 20 to 64 had job tenure of 7.0 years in 1998 and 7.4 years in 2008 according to tabulations of the Current Population Survey (CPS) data by Henry Farber of Princeton University. If age and education are adjusted for, however, Professor Farber finds that job tenure actually fell in this period for both men and women.

 

Older workers tend to change jobs less frequently than younger workers. It thus appears that that the aging of the Baby Boom generation has led to a more stable workforce, leading to lower separations (and thus less need for external hiring) and less churning within companies. This older, more experienced workforce is likely a source of higher productivity.

U.S. Job Growth Lagged Other Economically Advanced Countries in the 2000s

 

Available international data suggest that job market performance in the U.S. in the 2000s was poor not only relative to previous decades, but also relative to the experience of foreign countries with advanced economies.

 

In Canada, for example, payroll employment rose by 2.3 million during the 2000s, a 19 percent increase that largely kept pace with population growth (see Table 2). The overall employment-to-population ratio fell 1.6 percentage points during the 1990s (when the U.S. ratio was rising). During the most recent decade, however, the overall employment-to-population ratio rose 1.1 percentage points in Canada, while the U.S. rate dropped sharply. From 1989 through 2009, the overall Canadian employment-to-population ratio edged down 0.5 percentage point, as the U.S. ratio fell by more than 3.5 percentage points.

 

Canada's age distribution is very similar to that in the U.S., with a large post-war baby boom cohort. Like the U.S., Canada experienced a sharp increase in employment of older workers in the 2000s. Unlike the U.S., however, Canada also saw a rise in employment for younger workers. Thus, generational crowding – when older workers hold on to jobs longer and crowd out younger workers from the labor market – is an unlikely explanation for the lackluster job growth in the U.S. in the 2000s.

 

In the U.K., payroll employment also rose during the 2000s, as the U.K. added 1.3 million workers from 1999 to 2009, about a 5 percent increase (see Table 3). The overall employment-to-population ratio rose 0.6 percentage point during the 2000s, in contrast to the sharp decline in the U.S. Across age groups, the U.K. shows a pattern more similar to the U.S., with sharp declines in the ratio for younger workers and a large increase for older workers. In contrast to the U.S., however, the employment-to-population ratio rose for prime-aged workers during the 2000s, in spite of declines associated with the worldwide recession.

 

Figure 3 illustrates the change in the fraction of the population working in the U.S., Canada, U.K. and Eurozone in the 1990s and various periods of the 2000s. (Comparable data for the Eurozone are not available for the 1990s.) In contrast to the 1990s, it is clear that job growth was dramatically worse in the U.S. than in these other countries in the 2000s, both in the period before the recent recession and in the recent recession. A likely contributing source of the stronger job growth in Canada and the U.K. in the 2000s is that the education levels of their workforces increased more strongly than was the case in the U.S. Interestingly, while the U.S. job market produced fewer jobs (relative to the population) than in these other economically advanced countries in the 2000s, productivity growth was stronger in the U.S. and total GDP growth was roughly comparable over the decade in all three countries.

 

The international data carry an important implication: The United States' poor labor-market performance in the 2000s was not inevitable. Canada and the U.K. were subject to the same international trends, had access to the same technological advances and faced similar demographic shifts as the U.S., yet they managed to produce significant job increases during the first decade of the 2000s, while the U.S. lost jobs. Based on reviewing other evidence, Council of Economic Advisers Chair Christina Romer has concluded that "structural factors are not central" to the poor performance of the U.S. labor market. Thus, there is little evidence that fundamental structural shifts have taken place that accounted for the weak record of job growth in the last decade.

 

Job Market Dynamics by Establishment Size over the Business Cycle – New Findings

 

A variety of comparisons indicate that the U.S. labor market underperformed throughout most of the first decade of the 2000s. But the dominant feature in the jobs picture of the last decade was the acceleration of the pace of job losses during the financial crisis. The aggregate job statistics--a loss of 8.4 million jobs from December 2007 through December 2009--tell only part of the story. Fully 4.2 million private sector jobs were lost in the six months after the fall of Lehman Brothers in September 2008. Job losses in this period exceeded what one would predict from the sharp concurrent contraction in GDP by about 25 percent.[1] The sharp loss in jobs around the time of the financial crisis resulted because the seizure of credit markets caused a sharp drop in economic activity, and because the panic that took hold of financial markets likely spread to employers in other sectors, causing them to react more than normally to a contraction in demand for their goods and services by shedding workers. Lingering uncertainty from the financial crises has also restrained hiring in recent months.

 

To better understand the dynamics behind the dramatic loss in employment that we have experienced in the past two years, we can examine data on job openings, hires, and separations. These data are collected by the BLS in a survey of business establishments called the Job Opening and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS), and published each month by industry group and by region.

 

Recently the BLS provided the Treasury Department with research data that include an unpublished, unofficial series of job openings, hires, and separations for establishments in multiple size classes. Analyzing employment trends among the different size businesses can help shed additional light on the mechanisms by which the financial crisis induced job losses, and can provide some clues as to policy actions that could be particularly effective in the current environment. Moreover, the research data provided by the BLS are available through February 2010, which makes them by far the most up-to-date data available on employment patterns in small and mid-size businesses.

 

We aggregated the JOLTS data by establishment size into three categories--establishments with fewer than 50 employees (representing about 40 percent of private sector employment); establishments with 50 to 249 employees (representing about a third of private sector employment); and establishments with at least 250 employees (representing about a quarter of private sector employment). The data on job openings shows that the number of job openings had been falling since early 2007, but openings fell precipitously around the time that the financial crisis moved into high gear, especially for larger businesses (Figure 4). The low job openings rate--defined as job openings as a share of employment plus job openings--reflects the continued difficulty that unemployed persons are having finding work, as there are relatively few job openings for them to apply for. Specifically, in the published February JOLTS data there were 5.5 unemployed persons for every job opening, as compared to an average of two unemployed per opening over the 2001-2007 period. As with the overall employment situation, the job openings rate stabilized last fall and has picked up in the past two months. The increase in job openings, however, is heavily concentrated among larger establishments.

 

Figures 5 through 7 plot the gross hires and the gross separations for small, mid-size, and large establishments. The difference between hires and separations equals net job gains or losses in the BLS establishment survey[2] Shortly after the financial panic reached its peak in September 2008, a large number of workers were separated from small establishments. Most of the increase in separations was due to layoffs and business closings, as the number of quits was trending down during this period. The elevated level of layoffs by small establishments continued through February 2009, after which layoffs began to trend down, although they still remain somewhat high in the most recent months compared with the historical average. From the start of the recession to last fall, hiring by small businesses fell at a moderate but steady pace which did not accelerate during the financial crisis. Today the hiring rate by small businesses remains well below its pre-crisis levels.

 

The experiences of mid-size and large establishments around the time of the financial crisis were notably different. As mentioned, small establishments responded by quickly laying off a large number of workers. Mid-size establishments and large establishments responded by sharply cutting back on hiring in the months immediately after the crisis, and while they also increased layoffs, the increase was not as large as that seen by the small establishments. Of course, the net effect is that total employment contracted severely across establishments of all sizes in the months following the crisis.

 

The JOLTS data can be used to construct a rough summary measure of notional net labor demand, which is a measure of companies' desired change in employment. Specifically, I define notional net demand as the net job change (total hires minus total separations) plus the total number of job openings, relative to total employment. It appears that notional labor demand increased steadily for large establishments throughout 2009. Notional labor demand is more volatile for mid-size and small establishments, but it appears to have increased at a more moderate pace than it has for large establishments.

 

The analysis of the JOLTS data highlights how the improvement in the labor market seen to date has been unevenly distributed across establishments of different sizes. On the positive side, labor demand has generally trended up at large private sector establishments since reaching a trough in February 2008. Moreover, large establishments have apparently increased employment in five of the six months since September 2009--a possible early sign of durable job growth. At the lower end of the size distribution, however, labor demand by small establishments has continued to be weak, with notably low rates of new hires. The challenges small businesses are facing remains a significant concern to policymakers within the Administration. The Administration has consistently supported efforts to assist small businesses through both numerous provisions in the Recovery Act as well as more recent proposals.

 

Consequences of a Low-Pressure Labor Market

 

The JOLTS data are consistent with a story in which many small businesses responded to the shock of the financial crisis by quickly laying off workers and shutting down operations, while the first line of response for larger companies was to freeze hiring. Large companies also increased layoffs over the ensuing months. This pattern is consistent with small employers having lower fixed costs associated with hiring and employment than large employers. It is also consistent with small companies being unable to access credit to maintain employment when demand for their products collapsed in late 2008. Larger companies, which also faced frozen credit markets and declining product market demand in the fall of 2008, eventually had access to corporate debt markets, which enabled them to reduce layoffs and expand employment as the financial markets improved in 2009. Small businesses, which are more dependent on bank financing which remains tight, however, are still facing severe challenges. The Administration's small business proposals, such as the proposals to create a $30 billion small business lending fund and raise the cap on SBA 7(a) loans to $5 million, are particularly well timed given the difficulties that small businesses continue to face in the aftermath of the financial crisis.

Arthur Okun characterized the 1960s as a high-pressure labor market. Lawrence Katz and I similarly described the 1990s as a high-pressure labor market in a 1999 Brookings Paper.[3] I think it is fair to say that we have had what could be characterized as a low-pressure labor market so far in the 2000s, punctuated by a deep recession at the end of the decade that in turn featured excess job losses as the financial crisis infected the rest of the economy. We don't know definitively what the causes were for the low-pressure labor market so far in the 2000s. The deep recession that began in 2007 obviously didn't help job performance. Nevertheless, it is clear that the tax cuts that were intended to boost the economy in 2001 and 2003 did not result in better performance in the labor market than what was achieved in the 1990s, a period when government revenue increased and the deficit was reduced and eventually eliminated.

 

The consequences of a low-pressure labor market are obvious. Job growth that is not strong enough to accommodate a growing labor force results in higher unemployment. Unemployment carries severe personal and social costs, and can also reduce future economic performance as out-of-work individuals see their skills atrophy and their attachment to the labor market erode. But there are additional, more subtle consequences of a low-pressure labor market. When times are bad, workers are more likely to be forced to take dead-end employment, as opposed to having the opportunity to work more hours in better jobs with on-the-job training, career ladders and fringe benefits. A chronically weak labor market has also been found to raise income inequality and prevent families from leaving poverty. For all these reasons and more, the Administration is steadfastedly committed to working with Congress to enact policies that promote sustainable job growth and that lay the foundation for every American to enjoy the opportunity to share in the tremendous prosperity that our nation is capable of producing.

 

[1] See my July 2009 presentation to the American Academy of Actuaries for details of how excess job losses were calculated (available at http://www.ustreas.gov/offices/economic-policy/AK-Actuaries-07-20-2009.pdf ).

 

[2] This is the case over the year if one aggregates across all size classes. However, the data provided by BLS do not separately benchmark the hires and separations within each size class, so the difference between hires and separations may not equal the employment change within size classes, and even in the aggregate there can be small month-to-month deviations between hires less separations and the net employment change.

 

[3] Lawrence F. Katz and Alan B. Krueger, "The High-Pressure U.S. Labor Market of the 1990s." Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, 1:1999, pp. 1-87.

[Guest Rep. Candice Miller]

Where are the jobs? Where are the jobs? That is a question that continues to be asked by millions and millions of Americans, and certainly nowhere more than in my great state of Michigan that is going through a painful economic transition right now. And you know, when the Obama Administration and this majority last year when the Obama Administration first came in and we thought they were going to be focused on the number one issue at that time which continues to be the number one issue in America is the economy and jobs. This Conference of Republicans was willing to reach across the aisle and work with the administration on an economic stimulus plan that would have done something for America and focused on that issue of economy and jobs. Instead, what we ended up voting on was really unrecognizable and has been a failure by any reasonable standard.

 

Next up on their agenda was cap and trade, cap and tax as many have called it, because it was a tax-hiking, job-killing piece of legislation that passed the House and bounced over to the Senate. Next up on the agenda, rather than focusing on the economy and jobs, was the health care reform bill. So literally over a year and a half has gone by and the American people are still asking the question where are the jobs? Why isn't this administration, this Democratic majority focusing on the economy and jobs? But as we look out over the legislative horizon here, what do we see coming up? They're still in the Senate going to be talking about either climate change or immigration reform - important issues. But the number one issue continues to be the economy and the jobs, and the American people keep asking that question 'where are the jobs'?

 

The American people are speaking out, they continue to speak out, and the Democratic majority and this administration are not listening to them. The Republican party continues to want to work together with the Democratic majority and this Obama Administration on focusing on real job creation, cutting the deficit, and getting America back to work.

[Guest John Boehner]

You know the American people are asking around the country 'where are the jobs'? And we see Democrats here in Washington on autopilot.

 

Yesterday the Democrat leadership met with the same group of economists who they met with prior to putting the stimulus bill together. And this is the group that gave us the result of higher unemployment, no job creation, and I'm going to remind you one more time when the president signed the bill he said unemployment would not exceed 8 percent. Now we have unemployment near 10 percent. He said the stimulus bill would create jobs immediately, and yet over 3 million Americans have lost their jobs since this bill was signed into law.

 

It's time to get serious about job creation in America, because all we've gotten out of the stimulus bill is a big pile of debt on the backs of our kids and grandkids. The president says we'll start cutting spending somewhere down the road. Eric Cantor and I sent to the president back in February a letter asking him to use his rescission authority to send cuts up here so we can begin to cut spending now. We have not received a response from the President, so Eric and I, yesterday, sent the president another letter asking him if he would send up to the House rescissions. Let's begin the cutting and bring some sanity back to Washington. The sooner we do it, the better off the American people will be, and more importantly, the better off our kids and grandkids will be.

[Guest LAW]

Nonfarm payroll employment rose by 290,000 in April, the unemployment rate edged up to 9.9 percent, and the labor force increased sharply, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Job gains occurred in manufacturing, professional and business services, health care, and leisure and hospitality. Federal government employment also rose, reflecting continued hiring of temporary workers for Census 2010.

 

Household Survey Data

 

In April, the number of unemployed persons was 15.3 million, and the unemployment rate edged up to 9.9 percent. The rate had been 9.7 percent for the first 3 months of this year.

 

Among the major worker groups, the unemployment rate for whites (9.0 percent) edged up in April, while the rates for adult men (10.1 percent), adult women (8.2 percent), teenagers (25.4 percent), blacks (16.5 percent), and Hispanics (12.5 percent) showed little or no change. The jobless rate for Asians was 6.8 percent, not seasonally adjusted.

 

The number of long-term unemployed (those jobless for 27 weeks and over) continued to trend up over the month, reaching 6.7 million. In April, 45.9 percent of unemployed persons had been jobless for 27 weeks or more.

 

Among the unemployed, the number of reentrants to the labor force rose by 195,000 over the month.

 

In April, the civilian labor force participation rate increased by 0.3 percentage point to 65.2 percent, as the size of the labor force rose by 805,000. Since December, the participation rate has increased by 0.6 percentage point. The employment-population ratio rose to 58.8 percent over the month and has increased by 0.6 percentage point since December.

 

The number of persons employed part time for economic reasons (sometimes referred to as involuntary part-time workers) was about unchanged at 9.2 million in April. These individuals were working part time because their hours had been cut back or because they were unable to find a full-time job.

 

About 2.4 million persons were marginally attached to the labor force in April, compared with 2.1 million a year earlier. (The data are not seasonally adjusted.) These individuals were not in the labor force, wanted and were available for work, and had looked for a job sometime in the prior 12 months. They were not counted as unemployed because they had not searched for work in the 4 weeks preceding the survey.

 

Among the marginally attached, there were 1.2 million discouraged workers in April, up by 457,000 from a year earlier. (The data are not seasonally adjusted.) Discouraged workers are persons not currently looking for work because they believe no jobs are available for them. The remaining 1.2 million persons marginally attached to the labor force had not searched for work in the 4 weeks preceding the survey for reasons such as school attendance or family responsibilities.

 

Establishment Survey Data

 

In April, nonfarm payroll employment rose by 290,000. Sizable employment gains occurred in manufacturing, professional and business services, health care, and in leisure and hospitality. Federal government employment increased due to the hiring of temporary workers for Census 2010. Since December, nonfarm payroll employment has expanded by 573,000, with 483,000 jobs added in the private sector. The vast majority of job growth occurred during the last 2 months. (See table B-1.)

 

Manufacturing added 44,000 jobs in April. Since December, factory employment has risen by 101,000. Over the month, gains occurred in several durable goods industries, including fabricated metals (9,000) and machinery (7,000). Employment also grew in nondurable goods manufacturing (14,000).

 

Mining added 7,000 jobs in April, with most of the increase in support activities for mining. Since last October, mining has added 39,000 jobs.

 

In April, construction employment edged up (14,000), following an increase of 26,000 in March. Over the month, nonresidential building and heavy construction added 9,000 jobs each.

 

Employment in professional and business services rose by 80,000 in April. Temporary help services continued to add jobs (26,000); employment in this industry has increased by 330,000 since September 2009. Employment also rose over the month in services to buildings and dwellings (23,000) and in computer systems design (7,000).

 

In April, health care employment grew by 20,000, including a gain of 6,000 in hospitals. Over the past year, health care employment has increased by 244,000.

 

Employment rose by 45,000 in leisure and hospitality over the month. Much of this increase occurred in accommodation and food services, which added 29,000 jobs. Food services employment has risen by 84,000 over the past 4 months, while accommodation has added 18,000 jobs over the past 3 months.

 

Federal government employment was up in April, reflecting the hiring of 66,000 temporary workers for the decennial census.

 

Over the month, employment changed little in wholesale trade, retail trade, informa-

tion, and financial activities.

 

Employment in transportation and warehousing fell by 20,000 in April, reflecting a large decline in courier and messenger services.

 

In April, the average workweek for all employees on private nonfarm payrolls increased by 0.1 hour to 34.1 hours. The manufacturing workweek for all employees increased by 0.2 hour for the second straight month to 40.1 hours, and factory overtime was up by 0.1 hour over the month. The average workweek for production and nonsupervisory employees on private nonfarm payrolls increased by 0.1 hour to 33.4 hours in April.

 

Average hourly earnings of all employees in the private nonfarm sector increased by 1 cent to $22.47 in April. Over the past 12 months, average hourly earnings have increased by 1.6 percent. In April, average hourly earnings of private-sector production and nonsupervisory employees increased by 5 cents to $18.96.

 

The change in total nonfarm payroll employment for February was revised from -14,000

to +39,000, and the change for March was revised from 162,000 to 230,000.

[Guest HUMAN]

Okay; What areas in manufacturing, professional and business services, health care, and leisure, and hospitality?

 

Since you high lighted them, then you should be able to answer it.

 

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Job gains occurred in manufacturing, professional and business services, health care, and leisure and hospitality.

[Guest HUMAN]

Just so you understand what a message board is;

 

Definitions of Message Board on the Web:

 

•An ', or message board', is an online discussion site. It originated as the modern equivalent of a traditional bulletin board, and a technological evolution of the dialup bulletin board system. From a technological standpoint, forums or boards are web applications managing user-generated content.

 

 

 

 

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Okay; What areas in manufacturing, professional and business services, health care, and leisure, and hospitality?

 

Since you high lighted them, then you should be able to answer it.

 

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Job gains occurred in manufacturing, professional and business services, health care, and leisure and hospitality.

[Guest LAW]

Please read the remarks by the President on the monthly jobs numbers

 

THE PRESIDENT: All right. Good morning, everybody. On what seems like a daily basis, we’re barraged with statistics and forecasts and reports and data related to the health of the economy. But from the first days of this administration, amidst the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, I’ve said that the truest measure of progress would be whether or not we were creating jobs. That’s what matters in people’s lives. What matters is whether someone who needs a job can find work -- whether people can provide for their families and save for the future and achieve some measure of economic security.

 

Everything we’ve done has been with this goal in mind. And today, I’m happy to report that we received some very encouraging news. In April, the economy added 290,000 jobs, with the vast majority -- approximately 230,000 -- coming from the private sector. This is the largest monthly increase in four years. And we created 121,000 more jobs in February and March than previously estimated, which means we’ve now seen job growth for four months in a row. These numbers are particularly heartening when you consider where we were a year ago, with an economy in freefall. At the height of the downturn, around the time that I took office, we were losing an average of 750,000 jobs per month.

 

So this news comes on the heels of a report last week that the overall output of our economy -- our GDP -- is increasing. We now know that the economy has been growing for the better part of a year. And this steady growth is starting to give businesses the confidence to expand and to hire new people.

 

I should also note that the unemployment rate ticked up slightly from 9.7 to 9.9 [percent]. Given the strength of these job numbers, this may seem contradictory, but this increase is largely a reflection of the fact that workers who had dropped out of the workforce entirely are now seeing jobs again and -- are now seeking jobs again, encouraged by better prospects.

 

Now, I want to emphasize: The economic crisis we’ve faced has inflicted a lot of damage on families and businesses across our country, and it’s going to take time to repair and rebuild. Over the course of this recession, more than 8 million jobs were lost. So there are a lot of people out there who are still experiencing real hardship. And we’ve got to be mindful that today’s jobs numbers, while welcome, leave us with a lot of work to do. It’s going to take time to achieve the strong and sustained job growth that is necessary. And of course, long before this recession hit, for a decade middle-class families had been experiencing a sense of declining economic security.

 

So, yes, we’ve got a ways to go. But we’ve also come a very long way. And we can see that the difficult and at times unpopular steps that we’ve taken over the past year are making a difference. Productivity is up. The hours people are working are up. Both are signs the company may be hiring more workers in the months to come. We saw the largest increase in manufacturing employment since 1998. And we can see the benefits of our Recovery Act in the strong employment reports from construction and other sectors, where we’ve made key investments in creating and saving jobs.

 

Of course, there are limits to what the government can do. The true engine of job growth in this country will always be the private sector. That’s why we are very pleased to see the strong employment growth on the private sector side.

 

What government can do is help create the conditions for companies to hire again. What it can do is build the infrastructure and offer the incentives that will allow small businesses to add workers, that will help entrepreneurs take a chance on an idea, that will lead manufacturers to set up shop not overseas but right here in United States of America.

 

And that’s what we’ve been doing. Right now, a series of tax incentives and other steps to promote hiring are taking effect. Because of a bill I signed into law a few weeks ago, businesses are now eligible for tax cuts for hiring unemployed workers. Companies are also able to write off more of their investments in new equipment. And we’re spurring additional investments in school renovation, clean energy projects, and road construction, which will create jobs while laying a new foundation for lasting growth.

 

In addition, as part of health reform, 4 million small businesses recently received a postcard in their mailbox telling them that they’re eligible for a health care tax cut this year. It’s worth perhaps tens of thousands of dollars to each of these companies. And it will provide welcome relief to small business owners, who too often have to choose between health care and hiring.

 

So that’s what’s already come online. But we still have more to do. In my State of the Union address, I called for a $30 billion small business lending fund, which would help increase the flow of credit to small companies that were hit hard by the decline in lending that followed the financial crisis. And obviously small businesses are a major source of job creation.

 

This morning, we sent draft legislation to Congress on this fund, which now includes a new state small business credit initiative. This state initiative, which was designed with the help of governors and members of both the House and the Senate, will help expand lending for small businesses and manufacturers at a time when budget shortfalls are leading states to cut back on vitally important lending programs.

 

In addition, with state and local governments facing huge budget gaps, we’re seeing layoffs of teachers, police officers, firefighters, and other essential public servants -- which not only harms the economy, but also the community and the economy as a whole. So we are working with Congress to find ways to keep our teachers in the classrooms, the police officers on the beat, and firefighters on call.

 

A few months ago, I also proposed giving people rebates to upgrade the energy efficiencies of their home. This will not only save families money, it will create jobs in the hard-hit construction and manufacturing sectors, since things like windows and insulation are overwhelmingly made in the United States of America. I was gratified to see a bipartisan vote to pass this proposal, called “Home Star,” in the House of Representatives yesterday. I’m calling on the Senate to act as well. And I’m urging Congress to expand the clean energy manufacturing tax credit, which is helping create jobs across America building wind turbines and solar panels.

 

Even as we take these steps to increase hiring in the short and long run, we’re also mindful of other economic factors that can emerge. So I want to speak to the unusual market activity that took place yesterday on Wall Street. The regulatory authorities are evaluating this closely, with a concern for protecting investors and preventing this from happening again. And they will make findings of their review public along with recommendations for appropriate action.

 

I also spoke this morning with German Chancellor Merkel regarding economic and financial developments in Europe. We agreed on the importance of a strong policy response by the affected countries and a strong financial response from the international community. I made clear that the United States supports these efforts and will continue to cooperate with European authorities and the IMF during this critical period.

 

So this week’s job numbers comes as a relief to Americans who found a job. But it offers obviously little comfort to those who are still out of work. So, to those who are out there still looking, I give you my word that I’m going to keep fighting every single day to create jobs and opportunities for people. Every one of my team that's standing alongside me here has the same sense of mission. We’re not going to rest until we’ve put this difficult chapter behind us. And I won’t rest until you, and millions of your neighbors caught up in these storms, are able to find a good job and reach a brighter day.

 

Thank you very much, everybody.

[Guest Caldwell]

Since 1950, manufacturing has shrunk from 32% to 10% of non-farm employment. Hopefully this will change now.

[Guest flyover]

The US is a culture addicted to comfort. Six pack of soda-pop beer, bag of munchies, and a big screen TV with a game on. All is well.

[Guest mannfm11]

I don't buy employment is going up when unemployment claims are still running 100,000 a week over the last pre-recession peak. The highest unemployment claims I was able to find on the Bloomberg chart prior to recession was 349K, throwing out the Katrina bulge that was disaster related. An expanding economy would not be throwing another 450,000 people a month into the unemployment rolls.

[Guest LAW]

I think it is quite good news that the bulk of job creation last month came from the private sector, which added 231,000 positions. For months we have seen an economic recovery in the markets. Now hopefully we continued real jobs in the workforce. There has been an increase in the metal fabrication market due to infrastructure contracts won in China and Japan. In addition, more energy companies are getting into green technology.

 

As business confidence increases all indications point to wider growth in this sector. The need for medical workers will increase as baby boomers require more treatment and move through our healthcare system. More and more business representatives will need to travel more to get business. This requires more hotel stays.

[Guest Sam Good]

I love all these people who wanted it to turn around in a day. We all know it took months of 'less and less negative' before we finally hit positive territory. That's just how long it takes to turn this giant ship around. Some folks expected the massive red column to suddenly go positive one month after the inauguration... It doesn't work like that, folks... you can only climb so fast, and before you do that you've got to arrest the nosedive... it would appear that that has been done.

 

Many people have said the administration is doing everything wrong, but the trend is right there and it speaks for itself. If they've been wrong, they clearly haven't been wrong enough to stop the turnaround. Now can we quit fighting against every single step that's being taken here?

[Guest HUMAN]

Okay! Just general over all numbers from the white house press release.

 

Let me give you an example;

 

"In April, the economy added 290,000 jobs, with the vast majority -- approximately 230,000 -- coming from the private sector."

 

Now I could interpret that as being that 30,000 jobs came from government and 230k SOME WHERE from the private sector.

 

Even though none of us here know where they exactly came from in order to gauge in what area of the economy is actually picking up steam?

 

Even though the jobless rate went from 9.7% to 9.9%.

 

Am I on target?

 

 

 

 

 

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Please read the remarks by the President on the monthly jobs numbers

 

THE PRESIDENT: All right. Good morning, everybody. On what seems like a daily basis, we’re barraged with statistics and forecasts and reports and data related to the health of the economy. But from the first days of this administration, amidst the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, I’ve said that the truest measure of progress would be whether or not we were creating jobs. That’s what matters in people’s lives. What matters is whether someone who needs a job can find work -- whether people can provide for their families and save for the future and achieve some measure of economic security.

 

Everything we’ve done has been with this goal in mind. And today, I’m happy to report that we received some very encouraging news. In April, the economy added 290,000 jobs, with the vast majority -- approximately 230,000 -- coming from the private sector. This is the largest monthly increase in four years. And we created 121,000 more jobs in February and March than previously estimated, which means we’ve now seen job growth for four months in a row. These numbers are particularly heartening when you consider where we were a year ago, with an economy in freefall. At the height of the downturn, around the time that I took office, we were losing an average of 750,000 jobs per month.

 

So this news comes on the heels of a report last week that the overall output of our economy -- our GDP -- is increasing. We now know that the economy has been growing for the better part of a year. And this steady growth is starting to give businesses the confidence to expand and to hire new people.

 

I should also note that the unemployment rate ticked up slightly from 9.7 to 9.9 [percent]. Given the strength of these job numbers, this may seem contradictory, but this increase is largely a reflection of the fact that workers who had dropped out of the workforce entirely are now seeing jobs again and -- are now seeking jobs again, encouraged by better prospects.

 

Now, I want to emphasize: The economic crisis we’ve faced has inflicted a lot of damage on families and businesses across our country, and it’s going to take time to repair and rebuild. Over the course of this recession, more than 8 million jobs were lost. So there are a lot of people out there who are still experiencing real hardship. And we’ve got to be mindful that today’s jobs numbers, while welcome, leave us with a lot of work to do. It’s going to take time to achieve the strong and sustained job growth that is necessary. And of course, long before this recession hit, for a decade middle-class families had been experiencing a sense of declining economic security.

 

So, yes, we’ve got a ways to go. But we’ve also come a very long way. And we can see that the difficult and at times unpopular steps that we’ve taken over the past year are making a difference. Productivity is up. The hours people are working are up. Both are signs the company may be hiring more workers in the months to come. We saw the largest increase in manufacturing employment since 1998. And we can see the benefits of our Recovery Act in the strong employment reports from construction and other sectors, where we’ve made key investments in creating and saving jobs.

 

Of course, there are limits to what the government can do. The true engine of job growth in this country will always be the private sector. That’s why we are very pleased to see the strong employment growth on the private sector side.

 

What government can do is help create the conditions for companies to hire again. What it can do is build the infrastructure and offer the incentives that will allow small businesses to add workers, that will help entrepreneurs take a chance on an idea, that will lead manufacturers to set up shop not overseas but right here in United States of America.

 

And that’s what we’ve been doing. Right now, a series of tax incentives and other steps to promote hiring are taking effect. Because of a bill I signed into law a few weeks ago, businesses are now eligible for tax cuts for hiring unemployed workers. Companies are also able to write off more of their investments in new equipment. And we’re spurring additional investments in school renovation, clean energy projects, and road construction, which will create jobs while laying a new foundation for lasting growth.

 

In addition, as part of health reform, 4 million small businesses recently received a postcard in their mailbox telling them that they’re eligible for a health care tax cut this year. It’s worth perhaps tens of thousands of dollars to each of these companies. And it will provide welcome relief to small business owners, who too often have to choose between health care and hiring.

 

So that’s what’s already come online. But we still have more to do. In my State of the Union address, I called for a $30 billion small business lending fund, which would help increase the flow of credit to small companies that were hit hard by the decline in lending that followed the financial crisis. And obviously small businesses are a major source of job creation.

 

This morning, we sent draft legislation to Congress on this fund, which now includes a new state small business credit initiative. This state initiative, which was designed with the help of governors and members of both the House and the Senate, will help expand lending for small businesses and manufacturers at a time when budget shortfalls are leading states to cut back on vitally important lending programs.

 

In addition, with state and local governments facing huge budget gaps, we’re seeing layoffs of teachers, police officers, firefighters, and other essential public servants -- which not only harms the economy, but also the community and the economy as a whole. So we are working with Congress to find ways to keep our teachers in the classrooms, the police officers on the beat, and firefighters on call.

 

A few months ago, I also proposed giving people rebates to upgrade the energy efficiencies of their home. This will not only save families money, it will create jobs in the hard-hit construction and manufacturing sectors, since things like windows and insulation are overwhelmingly made in the United States of America. I was gratified to see a bipartisan vote to pass this proposal, called “Home Star,” in the House of Representatives yesterday. I’m calling on the Senate to act as well. And I’m urging Congress to expand the clean energy manufacturing tax credit, which is helping create jobs across America building wind turbines and solar panels.

 

Even as we take these steps to increase hiring in the short and long run, we’re also mindful of other economic factors that can emerge. So I want to speak to the unusual market activity that took place yesterday on Wall Street. The regulatory authorities are evaluating this closely, with a concern for protecting investors and preventing this from happening again. And they will make findings of their review public along with recommendations for appropriate action.

 

I also spoke this morning with German Chancellor Merkel regarding economic and financial developments in Europe. We agreed on the importance of a strong policy response by the affected countries and a strong financial response from the international community. I made clear that the United States supports these efforts and will continue to cooperate with European authorities and the IMF during this critical period.

 

So this week’s job numbers comes as a relief to Americans who found a job. But it offers obviously little comfort to those who are still out of work. So, to those who are out there still looking, I give you my word that I’m going to keep fighting every single day to create jobs and opportunities for people. Every one of my team that's standing alongside me here has the same sense of mission. We’re not going to rest until we’ve put this difficult chapter behind us. And I won’t rest until you, and millions of your neighbors caught up in these storms, are able to find a good job and reach a brighter day.

 

Thank you very much, everybody.