The job market and the 2004 election

[Alex Moon]

Steve Antler has a new post up at his blog about the state of the job market, and why the news looks good.

Here

Which brings us to the point: it looks like all net job losses of the recession will zero out some time in the first two quarters of 2004, with the net job gain picture rapidly reversing itself thereafter.

[Tsyroc]

Steve Antler has a new post up at his blog about the state of the job market, and why the news looks good.

Here

Which brings us to the point: it looks like all net job losses of the recession will zero out some time in the first two quarters of 2004, with the net job gain picture rapidly reversing itself thereafter.

Does it count if the previous job losses are covered by people taking much lower paying jobs, ie "Welcome to Taco Bell may I take your order?".

[Alex Moon]

Steve Antler has a new post up at his blog about the state of the job market, and why the news looks good.

Here

Which brings us to the point: it looks like all net job losses of the recession will zero out some time in the first two quarters of 2004, with the net job gain picture rapidly reversing itself thereafter.

Does it count if the previous job losses are covered by people taking much lower paying jobs, ie "Welcome to Taco Bell may I take your order?".

Hey, it's still work. Personally, I'd take the job if I need the money.

[Sea Skimmer]

Does it count if the previous job losses are covered by people taking much lower paying jobs, ie "Welcome to Taco Bell may I take your order?".

These stats just cover the total number of jobs, not how much there paying. Though I'm sure someone has statistics for that and I'd bet that the total will be much less.

[Tsyroc]

Hey, it's still work. Personally, I'd take the job if I need the money.

I agree. I would also take the job if necessary. I was just trying to point out that often politicians like to look at the total job picture which doesn't exactly take into consideration underemployment or people working in jobs that pay them fractions of what they were previously making. Since that stuff is difficult to gauge and doesn't help their case the politicians just put the blinders on and take credit for the "good news".

[TrailerParkJawa]

I dont see any reason why there should be significant hiring by early 2004. Thats only 5 months away. Unemployment took a dip recently but its not cause anyone is hiring, increasing numbers of people are running out of benefits, which removes them from the tracking.

Ive been able to extend my benefits out longer than some cause I keep getting odd jobs here and there. But until we get real hiring of jobs that pay 20 dollars and hour or more, there isnt gonna be much improvement. Not at least from the consumer side.

my 2 cents..

[EmperorMing]

...

Ive been able to extend my benefits out longer than some cause I keep getting odd jobs here and there. But until we get real hiring of jobs that pay 20 dollars and hour or more, there isnt gonna be much improvement. Not at least from the consumer side.

my 2 cents..

Damn straight. Get some real jobs with some real wages and then the economy should start to turn around the way it should...

[MKSheppard]

Damn straight. Get some real jobs with some real wages and then the economy should start to turn around the way it should...

Repeal NAFTA selectively. Nuke the Mexican free trade part, but keep
the Canadian part, impose tariffs on all non american made manufactured
goods, and agitate companies to build manufacturing plants here in the
US...

Oh how I was laughing when those stupid mexicans at some factory in
Mexico that took jobs directly away from a US Plant by that same company
were put out of their (relatively) high paying jobs, when that same company
decided that mexico was too expensive and moved it overseas to Indonesia

[MKSheppard]

Scary thought:

America's Job market is starting to resemble eerily the job market
of the British empire as it started to decline just after World War I...
jobs were moved overwhelmingly into the service sector, and manufacturing
went dead as cheap foreign imports flooded into Britain...I think we all
know how this cycle ended; with britain as a second-rate continental
power, not a global power

[The Yosemite Bear]

Or how few of them will be able to offord luxuries like Medicals and retiring eventually...

[Sea Skimmer]

Oh how I was laughing when those stupid mexicans at some factory in
Mexico that took jobs directly away from a US Plant by that same company
were put out of their (relatively) high paying jobs, when that same company
decided that mexico was too expensive and moved it overseas to Indonesia

Why would you want to make say T-shirts in Mexico for a buck each when you can make the same shirt in South East Asia for 20 cents and spend a couple more to ship them over to the US? On the world stage Mexico is actually fairly expensive and the container ship has made distance from the production center to the consumer basically irrelevant.

[TrailerParkJawa]

For the most part, manufacturing (sp?) is gone for good in the USA. You can add tariffs but it will only hurt in the long run. The scary part I wonder about, is now lots of "white-collar" jobs are going overseas. I wonder if we've priced ourselves out of the market. A victim of our own sucsess if you will.

[Hamel]

Damn straight. Get some real jobs with some real wages and then the economy should start to turn around the way it should...

Repeal NAFTA selectively. Nuke the Mexican free trade part, but keep
the Canadian part, impose tariffs on all non american made manufactured
goods, and agitate companies to build manufacturing plants here in the
US...

Oh how I was laughing when those stupid mexicans at some factory in
Mexico that took jobs directly away from a US Plant by that same company
were put out of their (relatively) high paying jobs, when that same company
decided that mexico was too expensive and moved it overseas to Indonesia

End all the h1b visa nonsense too.

You cant compete with the 3rd world unless you become the 3rd world.

[Coyote]

Hell, in Boise, even the Whopper-flopper jobs aren't hiring. It sucks here and I am desperately looking for other areas to work/live. I look at the stock market and realize that were are pretty much back to where we were when this whole mess started-- but where are all the jobs?

[Alex Moon]

Hell, in Boise, even the Whopper-flopper jobs aren't hiring. It sucks here and I am desperately looking for other areas to work/live. I look at the stock market and realize that were are pretty much back to where we were when this whole mess started-- but where are all the jobs?

They'll return in time. Recent trends show that unemployment lags behind the end of a recession. The site I linked to above shows an estimate of 1.7 million new jobs by Q4 of 2004.

[Joe]

Repeal NAFTA selectively. Nuke the Mexican free trade part, but keep
the Canadian part, impose tariffs on all non american made manufactured
goods, and agitate companies to build manufacturing plants here in the
US...

Tariffs? Like those ones Shrubby put on American steel? The ones causing American steel to have excess capacity?

In other words, divert resources and investment from productive sectors of the economy to ones that can barely stay in business on their own merits. Sounds like a winning policy to me. And the hypocrisy, good lord, we've been selling free trade to the world for years now.

But indeed it is very important that we encourage manufacturers to build in the United States. Otherwise, goonion members who haven't bothered to increase their job skills for the current economy won't be able to make $25 an hour screwing metal bolts into plates.

America's Job market is starting to resemble eerily the job market
of the British empire as it started to decline just after World War I...
jobs were moved overwhelmingly into the service sector, and manufacturing
went dead as cheap foreign imports flooded into Britain...I think we all
know how this cycle ended; with britain as a second-rate continental
power, not a global power

Did the British economy at any point have roughly 85 percent of its non-agricultural laborers working in non-import sensitive sectors of the economy like we do now?