A decade of high unemployment is looming: "It will be the mother of all jobless recoveries"

[Better Believe It]

A decade of high unemployment is looming
‘New abnormal:’ Some think 10 years won’t be enough to replace losses
Associated Press
December 27, 2009

The decade ahead could be a brutal one for America's unemployed — and for people with jobs hoping for pay raises.

At best, it could take until the middle of the decade for the nation to generate enough jobs to drive down the unemployment rate to a normal 5 or 6 percent and keep it there. At worst, that won't happen until much later — perhaps not until the next decade.

The unemployed number 15.4 million. The jobless rate is 10 percent. More than 7 million jobs have vanished. People out of work at least six months number a record 5.9 million. And household income, adjusted for inflation, has shrunk in the past decade.

Most economists say it could take at least until 2015 for the unemployment rate to drop down to a historically more normal 5.5 percent. And with the job market likely to stay weak, some also foresee another decade of wage stagnation.

All this would come after a decade that created relatively few jobs: a net total of just 464,000. By contrast, 21.7 million new jobs were generated between 1989 and 1999.

Economist David Levy, chairman of the Jerome Levy Forecasting Center, says the country faces a new era of chronically high unemployment, averaging 8 percent or more over the next decade.

Other analysts think the economy will recover the jobs wiped out by the recession by 2013 or 2014 but that the unemployment rate will stay high. They note that the healing economy will cause more people to stream back into the labor force, vying for too-few jobs.

"It will be the mother of all jobless recoveries," predicts economic historian John Steel Gordon.

Read the full article at:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/34601256/ns/business-us_business

[yourout]

1. Thank you NAFTA, CAFTA, GATT.

[dflprincess]

8. Weren't those some of the bad bills passed that they were

"going to go back and fix" later?

We never learn.

[Romulox]

37. There were promises to "fix" NAFTA as recently as the the 2008 primaries...

Yet another "I didn't campaign on the public option" moment...

[SammyWinstonJack]

78. Next up a Pacific Rim Free Trade Agreement.

Didn't Obama recently talk that up?

[Better Believe It]

11. And thank you bi-partisan Wall Street de-regulation 1999-2000.

[dysfunctional press]

52. i.e.- thank you bill clinton.

[leftstreet]

2. How does a jobless recovery work exactly?

:shrug:

K&R

[SharonAnn]

10. Wall street does well. Main street, not so well.

[Triana]

23. It doesn't. Jobless recovery = NO recovery.

Period.

[Edweird]

33. I hear the health insurance industry will be doing quite well....

[laughingliberal]

45. Pretty much looks like what we have right now. All the money stays at the top

and the peasants fight for scraps and a lot of them starve.

[Greyhound]

66. The parasites go back to stealing even more of the produce of the sheeple,

regardless of how badly the sheeple are deprived of necessities.

[sendero]

84. It doesn't..

..... "recovery" is a lame term economists use to describe a situation where certain numbers follow certain trends.

The fact that these numbers do not have the meaning they ascribe to them escapes them. "Jobless recovery" is an oxymoron in a consumer-dominated economy.

Regardless of the uptick of some meaningless numbers, we are in a recession/depression and we will be here for YEARS, maybe DECADES.

[Lindsay]

3. Too bad there's nothing the government

can do about it. Gotta pay for the wars, yanno.

[valerief]

5. And the derivatives. nt

[Hannah Bell]

32. and the profits. low-wage, high-unemployment economy = squeezing workers, squeezing small business

more economic concentration = higher profits.

[valerief]

4. Helllllllo, violent CRIME! nt

[Quantess]

74. One would think. But oddly enough, violent crime has actually decreased on average.

IIRC

[XemaSab]

76. Bank robberies have gone up here

:(

[dkf]

6. I see a lot of seniors working too

If they had decent retirements they could clear that job for younger people. That is the problem of expecting people to work until they are 75. Are there enough jobs for the entire populace aged 18-75? I think not.

[SmileyRose]

13. Another reason to pull the plug on grandma

If those old geezers would just die already, then there would be more jobs for people trying to raise a family !

:sarcasm: (obviously)

[dkf]

51. Don't you think it's sad though?

Both my parents retired their government jobs at 55 and are doing wonderfully well. I am so happy my parents picked jobs that ensured a very nice pension and double medical coverage.

I don't think I'll be able to do that even if I save well because medical coverage will still be very expensive by that time. But working til I'm 70+ would really suck.

[HughBeaumont]

54. Not to mention the 1980's risk-shift moved workers away from pensions and into 401ks.

401ks are great for bull markets; disaster for bear markets, since the average stiff cannot predict the future nor do they know what a safe fund is. What this means is that you can save and save and save until you're living in a frozen cramped hovel and eating Corn Flakes and Kraft Mac-n-cheese for 30 years and STILL not even have near what you would need to retire (assuming there's no job loss during this 30 years and the market doesn't wipe out any gains you've made).

I truly believe our parent's generation will be the last to be able to successfully retire. The economic climate, corporate climate, job security and peace of mind are simply not there for such an event to occur.

[onenote]

7. taking until 2015 would be roughly in line with the last time unemployment was over 10 percent

The last time unemployment topped 10 percent was in 1982. It wasn't until 1988 that unemployment had fallen back to at or below 5.5 percent.

[Better Believe It]

Except that recession wasn't nearly as bad and it was deliberately caused in order to curb inflation

The fed with Reagan's support put the screws on the economy.

It was not an economic meltdown and near depression like this.

[ixion]

9. there is no such thing as a jobless recovery

and it's important that the meme not be allowed to stand from the get go.

It's bad enough that the meme was accepted in the first "jobless" recovery in 2003

[SmileyRose]

12. Ya, thanks to poor black people who bought a house !!!111!@!!!!!

When this whole pile of crap started all I heard was how poor black people trashed the whole world because Bill Clinton made the banks loan people with a decent credit history and a steady job money for a house in more affordable neighborhoods.

Of course it was bullshit. Of course it was all designed to "reset" the economy more in favor the powerbrokers around the world. Of course it was intended to force down wages around the world and force up income for those "hardworking" economic predators.

[bhikkhu]

31. The American Dream Downpayment was a bush plan from 2003

http://www.hud.gov/offices/cpd/affordablehousing/programs/home/addi/

Which essentially did all those things - giving banks incentives to qualify low-income or sub-prime borrowers for low or no downpayment mortgages. And then trumpeting around about the boom in housing, behind which the rest of the economy tottered for years. It probably sounded like a good idea at the time, but you can also do the math and figure most people would be better off renting. Without somewhat deep pockets and resources, home ownership can go south on people quickly and easily for a number of reasons.

In any case, you can't hang it on Clinton - the time frame doesn't fit; it was the more recent bush initiatives that blew up.

[TheKentuckian]

69. Especially with the loanshark terms permitted...err..encouraged

I think many of the people who went belly up would have been okay with reasonable fixed rates if they also didn't get hit with job losses. Many of these folks were doing fine until the ARM kicked in and all the sudden the payment doubles and like a dog chained to the bumper they fought to keep up until their legs gave.

[varelse]

55. Yes, another framing of the have nothings by the "have mores"

:puke:

[amborin]

14. K&R

[Demeter]

15. This Country Cannot Survive a Decade of Joblessness

there will be revolution long before the ten years is up. It can either be a peaceful, put up tariffs and revive manufacturing at home revolution, or a tax and/or kill the rich and powerful and redistribute wealth revolution. It's the Masters of the Universe who have to decide, they have first refusal, and they haven't much time.

[cutlassmama]

43. We already did during the Great Depression I. This is the Great Depression II.

[Demeter]

63. In the Great Depression Part One, People could still go back to the Farms

a lot of what sustained people then doesn't exist now, and the Gold Men have no intention of bringing any of it back, either.

[galileoreloaded]

44. Your either funny or young.....

"kill the rich and powerful and redistribute wealth revolution". Yeah, not gonna happen dude. I don't think you realize how out-classed we really are.

[cbdo2007]

16. It seems to be a strange group that are unemployed currently....waiting for the jobs to come

to them rather than them go out and develop something that could work out. This isn't a kick to the job seekers out there, but it seems many in the media, like this article are about the jobs lost and wondering if those exact same jobs will come back. Yet, even in his example here that "21.7 million new jobs were generated between 1989 and 1999" - Right, that's because there was an entirely new sector being created, the Internet, which drove much of the technology industries which all blew up during that time.

The economy doesn't decide whether it is a "jobless recovery" or a jobfull (?) recovery, nor is that up to the government or the current business owners out there. Rather, it's up to the job seekers who need to find new ways to make the economy work for them in new businesses and new industries, otherwise they're all going to be left behind in the dust.

The current economy is going to recover, whether the jobless rate is 12% or 6%, so the jobless need to decide where they fit into that picture.

[daleo]

21. The jobless will go where the jobs are

It is a fallacy to think joblessness is due to the jobless being unwilling to adapt to new industries. It is like saying a famine is due to the unwillingness of the hungry to look for food. Though I have no doubt that the well off said exactly that, during famines of the past.

[madrchsod]

25. really? i`ve heard that for the last 30 years

and where did that get us? the same place this country was in 1980. today there are tens of thousands of empty buildings that used to have machines that created wealth. those machines and their tenders are in the lowest wage rate countries.

what happened to the great technology industry?.... they moved production to the cheapest labor they could find.

[tonysam]

36. If there are NO jobs, what in the hell are the unemployed supposed to do?

It's our federal government elected officials that are the problem. They could easily fix the economy, but so many of them are on the take they won't do it.

Don't hand me the garbage 15 million unemployed can just go out and be self-employed. If nobody is buying anything, then the self-employed aren't making money, either.

[Hannah Bell]

41. they're supposed to "develop" their own jobs, didn't you read the poster?

like: recycling cans, cleaning houses, building their own jet planes, you know.

[Romulox]

38. Yeah. The poor should just pull themselves up by their boots!

:shrug:

[leftstreet]

48. They should be MAKING their own boots first!

[Romulox]

62. That's fine for the sick and elderly.

For the rest of us, it's not enough to want leather! A lot of it comes down to crossbow skill.

[laughingliberal]

46. Pass a law mandating everyone to have a job and mix it with your idea=

problem solved.

[bhikkhu]

75. Somehow that sounds familiar -

Jobs are good and everyone wants a job, so we can best encourage people to have jobs by making it a law that they have to have a job or they get fined. Maybe we could even create jobs that way too - somebody has to track down the people who don't have jobs and make them pay their fines. That's a job!

[laughingliberal]

88. Lol! A whole new industry. Who says we are no longer innovative? nt

[Ikonoklast]

67. You're still here?

Amazing.

And here I thought all the Rand worshippers had a forum somewhere else to be crazy in.

[undeterred]

77. VSP

Very stupid post.

[SammyWinstonJack]

80. You're out where the buses don't run.

:crazy:

[haele]

85. Problem is, there's only so many full time jobs. How many private contractors can be hired?

What NAFTA and CAFTA and all those other wonderful for union-busters agreements did was get rid of the major full-time employers of a low to medium skilled workforce. With the race to cut payroll, stagnent wages and "privatization", reduced hours, and "contract workforce" - all of which are designed to cut payroll even more, what jobs can the majority of the workforce go to? Retrain? To what? Where are the job openings? Nursing? Repairman? Long haul truck driving? Customer Service desk?
The major industries that left - toymakers, garment makers, ceramics, parts and processing plants, appliance makers, steel mills - these all facilities employed tens of thousands of people - heck, whole towns and counties in some areas. A plant goes, where are 10K people with at best line skills going to go? Especially since 1) it costs to move, and 2) wages have stagnated over 20 years and people were starting to suck into their savings and 3) most people have roots there - have lived in that area for generations - those factories and facilities had been there since the 1930's or earlier in most cases.
Again, there are only so many good IT jobs. There are only so many scientific, livable wage "liberal arts" jobs (social work, lawyer/paralegal/management), or medical jobs out there. Only so many people can get into the military, and even then, they have to qualify. Heck, Costco only hires so many, and when they hold open applications twice a year, the line stretches four or five blocks just to get a crack at two or three entry level positions...

Every job opening that's listed in the paper is answered by dozens of applications; at Monster.com or other sites like that, they're are flooded with anywhere from hundreds to thousands of resumes. All people begging for work, or a better job with a wage that they can pay rent on - something other than slinging sliders at BK or manning a cash register or receptionist desk.
So what do you do with at least a quarter of the millions of un/under-employed who are just hanging on?
Throw them an occasional bone of regulation or stimulus jobs, or wait until they decide to go all Bastille on the asses of the few tens of thousands who are sucking the country dry.
Honestly, 350 - 400x the average salery of your workforce is not a salery anyone "deserves" unless they both figured out a legitimate way to keep that asteroid from hitting the earth and not destroy the world in the processs, and fixed the greenhouse effect problem while they were doing that.
Well, unless the average salery of their workforce was 5 cents a day...and with wage stagnation and taking into account inflation, it seems we are getting to that point, doesn't it?

Haele

[tonysam]

17. It's easy to fix, but these politicians in Washington D.C.

don't have the political will to do what is necessary.

I guess they want social unrest.

[daleo]

18. The 90'seemed hopeless at the start, too

So you never know. Still, the combination of global war fever and it's associated squandering of wealth along with global trade fever and its associated squandering of human talents don't look good for North America.

Both of these developments also prevent due attention being paid to looming environmental catastrophes, such as rising CO2 concentrations in the global atmosphere.

[elleng]

19. Haven't we heard of THE LEVY CENTER?

The one rs have been quoting since . . . .

[Better Believe It]

26. No. But I know what you're getting at. Everything is fine and getting better every day!

So let's all join you in a singalong!

Ahhh one and a two and a three ....

http://www.smart-central.com/happydays.htm

[madrchsod]

20. welcome to america!

work until you die and leave nothing for your heirs.

[HeresyLives]

22. Move to globalization and the knowledge economy,

or get left behind. Simple as that.

[girl gone mad]

34. lol..

a nation full of paper pushers, hair stylists and burger flippers. Sounds workable..

[earth mom]

40. Those service economy jobs require a 4 year degree now. nt

[girl gone mad]

50. Welcome to the new America, where we engineer bureaucracy..

and manufacture sandwiches.

[The River]

24. I Guess I Should Get Started

on building my large appliance
cardboard Retirement Condo and
learn to cook cat food.

[inthebrain]

27. The overcooked turkey of capitalism

it's dead.

Just a matter of time before the Working Classes decide they've had enough and toss it overboard.

[Subdivisions]

28. There will be no meaningful recovery without jobs. And, if the jobs do come,

the recovery will be stopped cold by oil depletion.

[inthebrain]

30. The Wealthy got further ahead

This wasn't a natural downturn in the business cycle.

This was a complete and total restructuring. Lots of folks took advantage of the banking crisis to cut earnings by the working class and fatten their own pockets.

The only solution to this mess IS SOCIALISM!!!

[laughingliberal]

47. oil depletion and 'deficit reduction.' I so see 1937 on steroids heading our way.

we are so screwed.

[Subdivisions]

58. Global civilization is sprialing downward toward complete collapse and

the powers that be know it and, instead of mitigating resource depletion, they are looting the coffers of everything that isn't nailed down, including the last of the remaining oil.

[laughingliberal]

59. That has been my impression, as well

The escalation of the looting and the cooperation of our government which they are not even bothering to try and hide is frightening. Unless they know something we don't know, it makes no sense to bring the entire country, let alone the planet to it's knees. The question I fear the answer to is, what do they know that we aren't seeing yet? My usual thoughts run along the lines of knowing we are already a failed state and they are looting everything they can before the population is aware.

[inna]

73. Wow, I was thinking EXACTLY the same thing when I asked this question -

what do they know that we aren't seing yet??

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=7334296&mesg_id=7340730


And guess what, I received an answer... from, much to my amazement.... :bounce: --> http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=7334296&mesg_id=7341355 (Never know who you might run into on the internets! :D )

He actually might be on to something here, me thinks. :)

[Doremus]

82. How cool is that?

And he's spot on as usual.

[inna]

86. Isn't it, though??

And isn't he? :D

Glad you also thought it was pretty cool! :pals:

I thought it was VERY cool, actually. :)


What's really interesting though is that there is definitely this new, recurrent theme almost everywhere on the (progressive) blogosphere, it's almost like a collective shift of conscience. It's hard to verbalize exactly but it's unmistakeable.
It's a positive change though, it's almost like a stage of growth and reaching a new level. (Ok, I'm probably not making any sense, so I'm going to shut up now. :hi: )

[dana_b]

87. he and you are onto something and, I have to say,

that it's f***ing cool that he responded to you! There - enough fangirl stuff.

[slackmaster]

29. The Ice Age is coming

Slowly...






















Very slowly...








To a theater near you.

[ipaint]

35. The comfortable class doesn't get it.

When unemployment ends for my husband in a few months if no jobs are available we will be living in our truck. My tiny internet business won't support us both. We are in our 50's and have never made it out of the working class despite always working since we were teenagers.

We are by no means alone. Not by a long shot. Are people ready for the huge numbers of unemployed living in the street. Families with no place to live. The only thing stopping an explosion of homelessness is unemployment compensation. They going to extend it for as long as it takes for the unemployment rate to drop? years?

We already have a million homeless children. What's it going to take to get some major investment in people instead of a blank mega billions check for bankers?

[laughingliberal]

49. My husband and I are in the same place. Worked our asses off all our lives

Never got out of working/lower middle class. We are facing living in a vehicle if we can keep one running. The comfortable class does not get it now but I believe this jobless hell will, eventually, be quite democratic in the pain it spreads. I don't see this country ever getting back to numbers we considered 'full employment' even last year.

[David Zephyr]

39. War making overseas and building prisons: there's America's "new job opportunities".

Dennis Kucinich has it right. The class war is over and the American people lost.

[earth mom]

42. But Obama just authorized a 1.4 B BAND AID for the homeless! Who the hell needs jobs?!

:sarcasm:

[TexasObserver]

53. An unsigned column with no indication of who wrote it.

This is the kind of column that looks like it was written by someone with a propaganda purpose. It appears to have as its purpose the promotion of an "expert" listed in it, and I'm guessing he's the source of the story. He probably had it written by someone who specializes in planting such stories through media.

I give it no credibility. AP is not a reliable source. Anybody can get something published by AP.

[Better Believe It]

56. So you're a mass media expert? Good for you! Looking forward to reading your AP article.

"Anybody can get something published by AP"

Really? Well, you should write an article for AP pointing out all of the errors in the article, explain how the economy turned around and the recession ended and suggest they only use notarized quotes.

You could caption your article "Happy Days Are Here Again".

Nit picking!

:)

[TexasObserver]

61. The piece was planted by someone ...

... probably the company used as the column's primary source.

[Better Believe It]

64. However, you don't dispute or challenge the articles main points, is that right?

That's what's most important, isn't it?

[TexasObserver]

81. Of course I dispute them.

That's a separate issue.

It's ridiculous. Anyone who thinks we'll have 8 percent unemployment the next ten years is not playing with a full deck, and anyone who believes it is either ignorant or stupid.

[Kalyke]

70. Apparently you don't know how AP works.

I do - I was a reporter for years.

The reporter's byline was nixed when MSNBC used the copy on their website. A quick Google search showed me it was written by Jeannine Aversa, AP's economics writer. http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Even-as-economy-mends-a-apf-2183751783.html?x=0&.v=2

AP most certainly checks out press releases (I'm on that side of the fence, now, and have had reporters call to confirm information or request where they can find more), but, as it turns out, this was NOT a press release.

That said - you can choose to find AP a less-than reliable source all you want. You're entitled to your opinion, but you're not entitled to your own facts.

[Better Believe It]

71. Thanks for the info. I didn't think the article was some huge AP conspiracy

[TexasObserver]

79. You're very naive.

As I said, planting a story with one of the many "reporters" who supply copy to AP is easy. That's what publicists do. That's what political operatives do. That's what marketing departments do.

AP is not a reliable source, particularly unsigned pieces that were obviously written by someone's marketing agent, as this one was.

That this is all over your head does not surprise me. Please spare me your cub reporter testimonials.

[Orsino]

57. So pardon my lack of enthusiasm...

...for the Obama Administration's demonstrated ability to be a better steward of a system wholly rigged for inequity.

Imagine what relative competence could do if teamed with courage and vision.

[xchrom]

60. If unemployment hovers around 8%

For a decade -- this will be a very changed
country indeed.

[Greyhound]

65. "Jobless recovery" is an oxymoron. n/t

[RedEarth]

68. We need to create in the neighborhood of 120,000 jobs a month to

just absorb the new workers coming into the market. An economist on NPR the other day if we create 150,000 jobs/month it will take 48 months to get unemployment down to 9%.

[inna]

72. Say hello to Neo-Feudalism?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=7338574&mesg_id=7343008

[Nikki Stone1]

83. What this means is that there is no real recovery.

There is just a transfer of wealth to Wall Street.

[Better Believe It]

89. It's a recovery for Wall Street and that's all that matters.