Are You Better Off Today?
The unemployment rate went down to 8.1% today. Whoopie.
Does anyone really believe the numbers that this administration is throwing out at us? As far as I can see, the economy is not getting better, it’s getting worse. Retail sales are down because people are not spending their money. Why? Because they’re afraid they might not have a job next week. I can’t tell you how many friends I have who’ve either been laid off or lost their entire businesses.
But don’t just take it from me. Read this guy’s comment from the opinion section of a Bloomberg News article about the economy:
drofmanythings
Here are some mico-stats from my neighborhood. These stories might sound familiar to most of us who live with our eyes open. A lifelong nurseyman is out of business and piddles around his house while looking for work. He was self-employed, and doesn’t show up in the stats. He raised three kids on his former nursery. An experienced engineer is doing day labor, light construction, building custom walkways and scraping by. He’s underemployed and doesn’t show up as unemployed. A recent grad can’t find a job, so he tutors for low wages at a big church part-time. Employed, but barely. A single mom with three kids is laid off from her nursing home position, since they were cutting back by eliminating their recreational specialist. She now babysits an elderly man during the day for minimum wage, and searches for real work on-line. A good friend was the city’s leading home builder, constructing over 400 homes per year with a huge payroll as recently as 2007. He is down to one crew and will complete 15 or so houses in 2012. I can only imagine all the unemployed construction workers from this former boom town. My former “personal banker” was laid off. I didn’t know her whereabouts until she appeared at the window at Chik-fil-A, serving me a drive-thru sandwich at a salary that’s less than a third of what she earned before. She had a smile on her face, as always, but is waaaay underemployed. A guy who is a master brick mason details cars while roaming the business park for hard earned cash. My own wife has two advanced degrees and 35 years of professional work, but her job will be eliminated in a few months due to university budget cuts. She and others are updating their resumes. These stories are in every town in America, but far less so in only one place: Washington, DC, where the economy hums and housing goes up…all fueled by borrowed money to grow the government. Lies, damn, lies, and statistics are offered up when we all KNOW how dark it is in the American economy. It’s 8.1%? Really? How so with fewer and fewer people working? If all the job seekers would just quit looking for work, then the unemployment rate would be zero in a great depression. Use your head and eyes, not phony messages from an administration that is opaque and deceitful to the core. ABO ’12
Now THAT guy speaks the truth. And if you’re interested in some stats, here’s a chart that lays out the REAL stats of our economy. So I’m curious. How bad is it in your part of the country, HillBuzzers?
© 2012, TheTamminator. All rights reserved.
Help HillBuzz by Shopping Amazon
"Bee" Advised!
I look forward to your comments. Please follow these simple guidelines:
- Please do not complain about your comment not yet showing up
- Stay on topic of the article ("This is OT, but..." = bad!)
- I will STING if you troll, spam, bait, swear or attack someone
http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t15.htm
Rep. Paul Ryan was on a radio program today, and said he prefers to look at the U6 number.
I would like to see that chart with numbers beginning in ’06 when the
democrats took over both houses. One minor adjustment – the change in the “reported” unemployment rate, based on the chart, should read +.7% not +9%
I was talking to a 61 year old woman the other day and she told me she and her husband lost their small business. He re-trained as a truck driver and she went into real estate. She was holding an open house where the owners were willing to list the property at 100 thousand below what they paid for it. Another property in she knew about had been on the market for 2 years. I can’t sell my house because I would take a substantial loss. I keep working two years past 65 because I am afraid to stop earning even though I have saved wisely. My point is that there is a lost of misery out here in the country, much like what was described above. People are holding on but no one feels good. We are all preparing for the worst. Yet, Barry goes along his merry way, George Clooney throws a gala fund raising event and the MSM won’t report a damn thing.
I hear you, Katherine. Just talked to my neighbor, who has worked at Best Buy headquarters for years, and she’s panicking that she may get laid off. She’s in her late 50′s.
The misery/fear is palpable.
My husband just turned 52. He worked for a big airline for 33 years – yep, from the time he was 18 years old. He worked his way up from loading bags on airplanes to the general offices in that time – earning his bachelor’s and then MBA along the way. The hard, hard work finally got him to where he was making a better-than-average wage and had a great deal of responsibility. That lasted a few years – only to be laid off after a merger during cost-cutting downsizing. He’s been searching for work for SEVEN months. He scours the Internet, networks through LinkedIn, etc and applies to jobs nearly every day. Finally looks like he may be getting something soon, but very few companies seem to be in a hurry to hire – afraid to make the investment not knowing how the gov’t will squeeze them next. I know so many people who are living the same story right now. I’m so glad I have my faith.
Wow. Hang in there, Susan. I’m praying for your family.
My husband was laid of and unemployed for almost 2 years and now works from home doing web work so he doesn’t show up as unemployed. My brother just called me yesterday to say he was laid off, this is the 2nd time for him in under 2 years. We are in the process of short selling our house before it gets foreclosed on. The last 3 years have been the most stressful time in my life and I can only pray that people wake up and we have time to turn this all around. I truly fear for my children and their future.
It never ends. I’m praying for you too, Lisa.
We have GOT to get Obama out of office.
I fear for all of the children of our country.
The truly adverse effect on our economy started during Barky’s first year in office. Unemployment figures skyrocked, and it was widely reported that those who stopped seeking employment were not counted, and those who were underemployed were not counted. We all saw it in our communities.
I rode down the elevator at work with a group of businessmen who were discussing what we all were seeing – businesses and banks were afraid of the new rogue government. O’Commie and his czars froze the economy by using the heavy hand of the government against it, and businesses knew it. Small businesses were targeted for failure. Large businesses started holding onto their money and stopped hiring because they were afraid. People stopped investing. Credit card companies were scrambling in order to survive. The Free Market took a nosedive.
O’Loser froze the economic growth of our nation’s economy because he made it very clear that he does not give a darn about the balance of powers – he will do what he wants, and neither Congress nor the Supreme Court will stop him. How is business supposed to react?
Small and even large businesses have learned that under the Obama administration, there are no rules – only the whims of his czars and him.
Our economy has no chance for recovery unless we get that runaway freight train currently occupying the White House sent home on a rail.
One of the phenomena I’ve noticed is that a number of people who have been laid off aren’t willing to accept lesser employment or take (free) training until their unemployment runs out. A sad thing – it makes the hit harder when the help is no longer available.
We are seeing the same things mentioned in the article. My very best friend’s husband’s business went out of business in 2009 and took 100 jobs with because he could not get the liguid to keep things going.
A good friend of my husband’s is going into bankrupcy after losing his mid level mortgage officer position.
My husband was in real estate, notice the was, he now does real estate on the side as a hobby to keep in the game. He is now underemployed at a nonprofit organization with no benefits and we are considering ourselves lucky, we have savings and parents who could help if we really started going south. I went back to work Election Day 2008 because I knew this dolt would ruin the economy. I have type one diabetes and I basically work part time to pay for my disease. I am also having to cyber school my youngest child at home because the suburban school district we reside in in PA is more concerned with labeling and getting subsidizes from the government than teaching children. So hey the last four years have been a laugh riot. We are running through our savings and my hubs is applying for every job within 1 hour drive of our home.
I work in a hospital organization and everyday I see the writing on the wall with Obamacare pending. It is going to be really bad. Our entire practice is crossing fingers and praying it gets struck down, even the dems. Right now I feel like a patient who has had a biopsy and has to wait 6 mths for the results. If Obama wins in Nov. our country is probably finished as we know it, and my family will really be in a struggle for our survival financial.
I feel for all those suffering through this presidency and pray for those who have it so much worse.