600,000 Jobs Lost - And Counting

[Purveyor]

Source: CNN Money

October 1, 2008: 10:57 AM ET

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Job losses have been mounting, and the slowing economy and credit crunch is likely to take an even greater toll in the coming months.

Analysts on average forecast that the monthly employment report expected Friday will reveal that the economy shed 105,000 jobs in September - the largest monthly loss in five years. The economy already has lost 605,000 jobs this year.

Unemployment is expected to remain at a relatively high 6.1%.

What's more troubling is that hiring trends have deteriorated even further in recent weeks - and that won't be reflected in government statistics until later this year.

---
"A complete lockup of the credit markets will reverberate throughout the economy in a very severe fashion," said Martin Regalia, chief economist at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, a business lobby group. "If the economy weakens further, we'll see truly dramatic unemployment."

Regalia expects unemployment to reach 6.5% by the end of the first quarter next year, and 7% if nothing is done by the government to free up the capital markets. While the economy may stop shedding jobs at that point, he said those stubbornly high rates of unemployment could persist until the end of 2009.

Read more: http://money.cnn.com/2008/10/01/news/economy/jobs_forecast/?postversion=2008100110

[radfringe]

1. unemployment in PA is around 6.5% already

heckava job, bushie

[WriteDown]

2. In Spain...

it is 11%. Huge.

[Cresent City Kid]

4. Now I get it

Maybe this is why McCain won't travel to Central America to meet with the Spanish Prime Minister.

[Purveyor]

3. Michigan has a 8.9% unemployment rate. Our local county is at 9.7%. eom

[Lorien]

5. The Obama camp needs to do an ad which does a tally of the devastation

BushCo has brought to our country, along with the tag line "we just can't afford more of the same"..

[livelongandprosper]

6. It's relative. EU has 7.5% and they don't whine. n/t

[Stellabella]

7. You think being unemployed and being distressed about it is

WHINING?

For God's sake. Have you ever been unemployed? It's devastating.

And BTW, the REAL unemployment rate is around 10-11 percent. The government stops counting when your six months of unemployment benefits runs out.

[superconnected]

15. They also now count ppl with part time jobs as fully employed - a change the bush administration

made in 2003 and why unemployment numbers are not relevant to compare to anything before 2003.

[tblue37]

8. But they also have something of a social safety net. nt

[HughBeaumont]

19. .. . versus the great DuhMerican "safety net", if you qualify.

Does anyone realize that just one third of laid off workers receive unemployment benefits, down from 50 percent a generation ago, and the federal program for UI and retraining has been de-funded by more than 10 billion dollars in the last quarter century?

That's pathetic and disgraceful. That is dogshit CRAP is what it is.

You read stuff like this and find it hard NOT to believe they're wanting America to become a neo-feudal country.

[dgibby]

9. And they have free health care

so, at least, if they're unemployed, they don't have to worry about getting sick.

[raccoon]

20. It's not free--they pay for it with their taxes. Whereas we Americans

pay our taxes for imperial wars.

[dgibby]

21. good point!

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

10. Without a doubt...

The single worst post I have read this week. Congratulations and enjoy your stay here.

Whining, indeed.

[Gemini Cat]

11. WTF!?

Do you make it a habit of posting about things you know nothing about?

[HughBeaumont]

17. Phil Gramm, is that you?

The real unemployment rate is about 1.5 - 2x what the actual number says it is. Read the U6 sometime. Unbelievable.

[Stuart G]

12. It is far worse than most realize..because....In order to just stay even...the economy

needs to create 150,000 jobs a month...every month. This number may be as low as 120,000 and as high as 190,000...

this is just to stay even...due to population growth.that is people entering the job market....

So any month we create ..say 30,000 jobs, the unemployed actually increase by about 100,000
....This concept is extremely important in understanding how bad the economy really is...

[Thor_MN]

14. Has * created even one job, when population growth is accouted for?

[HughBeaumont]

18. Technically, and this is with cooked numbers . . .

. . . on Bewsh's watch and ultra low corporate tax rates, it was early in 2005 that the first net new job was created. Since then, in 50 months I think the economy has met the job churn described above 6 or 7 times. We're soon to be headed towards nine straight months of job losses.

I know this because each 1st business Friday of the month I'm on Bloomberg looking at unemployment figures and tracking this for my job.

This is laissez-FAIL capitalism coming to it's horrendous conclusion.

[Odin2005]

13. That can't be true! I was told the fundamentals of our economy are strong!

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[OakCliffDem]

16. Kick