Prez Obama says uncertainty over the debt ceiling has hindered hiring

PressDemocrat.com The Press-Democrat Santa Rosa, CA:
"Obama: Still differences on debt, new talks Sunday
By JIM KUHNHENN
Associated Press
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Beset by a weak jobs report, President Barack Obama on Friday called for swift action by Congress to raise the nation's borrowing limit, saying the uncertainty over the debt ceiling has hindered hiring in the private sector."

So now the blame for a failed economy and loss of jobs is ... because we are not in more debt???

Here's a tip for Congress and the Prez, add it to the book Letters to President Obama: Americans Share Their Hopes and Dreams with the First African-American President

Borrowing money does NOT create jobs. There is no such thing as an "entitlement", every American is "entitled" to work to earn what they want/deserve. Expecting the Government to hand you everything, from food to mortgage subsidies to medical care is as un-American as things can get. This country was built on hard work - blood, sweat and tears; to wax philosophically.

Instead of increasing the benefits to encourage unemployment - a more useful approach would be to help small businesses survive. The bulk of hiring is done by small business - not the mega corporations or government agencies. This is a fact, look it up. Small businesses should receive INCENTIVES to hire, not receive PENALTIES when they create jobs. Currently, the byzantine tax laws make it extremely difficult to manage a large payroll without having to hire an outside (expensive) accounting firm. Beside the direct tax LIABILITY of EVERY employee in a company, the new penalties include mandatory medical insurance when 50 or more employees are hired. It makes no sense for a small firm that has just under 50 employees to even consider expanding and hiring more workers - since they will be severely penalized if they try to create more jobs.

Providing SMALL businesses with tax breaks IF THEY CREATE NEW JOBS will solve most, if not all, the current problems. Stop: read that again. SMALL business, not mega WAL-corporations. Tax breaks = sensible taxation; currently small companies are taxed TWICE, the business entity pays income tax and the owners pay tax again when they draw any income from their own company, where many owners put in upto 80 work-hours a week. A disincentive to even operate a business, yet many do, and even after being hammered with ridiculous regulations and absurd taxes; some small businesses may even prosper. The current logic originating from the White House is to tax small business out of business. Putting them out of business will REDUCE tax revenue, the killing of the proverbial golden goose. Reducing the tax burden of small companies will NOT reduce any tax income for Uncle Sam - they are HIRING workers, workers who will get paychecks and generate payroll taxes. The newly hired will stop draining the social programs, thereby REDUCING the deficit. Yes, reducing taxes WILL reduce the deficit. It is as simple as that.

Put America to work, don't worry so much about the loss of entitlements. Social programs may take a hit today, but putting the effort and tax breaks into CREATING JOBS will bring those benefits back tomorrow, and we won't even have to borrow $14 Trillion to pay for them.

And for those who have not already read it, Animal Farm is a must read:

Q1 GDP report: Economic growth slows

Q1 GDP report: Economic growth slows - Apr. 28, 2011:
"NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- Economic growth slowed to a crawl in the first three months of the year as a spike in gasoline, higher overall inflation and continued weakness in the housing market all took a toll on the recovery.
Gross domestic product, the broadest measure of the nation's economic health, rose at an annual rate of 1.8%, the Commerce Department reported Thursday. That's a significant slowdown from the 3.1% growth rate in the final quarter of 2010.
[...]
``Undoubtedly, consumers are cutting discretionary spending to compensate for rising food and energy prices,`` said Jim Baird, chief investment strategist for Plante Moran Financial Advisors. ``The risk of recession in the near-term remains slim, but an extended period of slow growth isn't likely to encourage an enthusiastic mood any time soon.``"

What an astute observation from Jim who has such an important sounding title. Obviously, food is more important than a new pair of shoes. I doesn't take a Moran'ic genius to spell it out for us common folks.

Ironically, the article also mentions that Government spending is down which is contributing to the drop in GDP. Trimming the Federal deficit is well and good, but the idea is trim and reduce WASTE first. Not reduce spending that boosts domestic industry and creates (or in this day and age, maintains) jobs in the US.

Wastage as in all the time and money to look at Obama's birth certificate. No matter that it is, and has always been, public record - and was always available to anyone (ergo the term, public record) to see, and most of the press already had already seen it. Yet all it takes is one rich and noisy twit with a weird hairdo to make it into a national debate. If Uncle Sam wants to raise some quick cash, come up with a "publicity hound tax", and Trump'et-ing buffoons can have all the press air-time they want.

January jobs report: Payrolls up, unemployment fell to 9.0%

January jobs report: Payrolls up, unemployment fell to 9.0% - Feb. 4, 2011:
"NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- Winter weather kept job seekers home and offices closed in January, getting the year off to a disappointing start, while the unemployment rate took a surprising tumble.
The economy added just 36,000 jobs in January, falling far short of expectations. Meanwhile, the unemployment rate unexpectedly sunk to 9%, down from 9.4% the month before."

Here is a real conundrum. How can less jobs being added give us a lower unemployment rate? Oh, here is how Uncle Sam does some fuzzy math.

"About 504,000 adults dropped out of the labor force in January for various reasons, bringing the unemployment rate down because they were no longer counted as unemployed.
Adding to economists' confusion, the Labor Department readjusted their calculations in January to reflect the latest Census data. So some of January's drop in the unemployment rate was due to "annual tweaking of the population data," Ian Shepherdson, chief U.S. economist with High Frequency Economics, said in a research note."

Thats convenient. Just stop counting the half million people who stop looking for jobs, each month. Soon, the unemployment numbers will drop to zero, maybe even into negative percentages. Then "tweak" the numbers a wee bit this way and that, and viola. The people nod and ooh and ahh and vote for the same clowns for another term.

Yeah, that sounds like something to expect from D.C.

Job market looks stronger, maybe

ADP, Challenger data: Signs of strength in January - Feb. 2, 2011:
"Job market looks stronger ahead of Friday report
NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- The job market started 2011 on solid footing, according to two separate reports released Wednesday.

Payrolls among private employers rose by 187,000 in January, payroll processor ADP said. Analysts polled by Briefing.com were predicting 145,000 jobs added for the month."

A whisper of good news after a year in the economic doldrums and a hideous winter season for the northern States.

On the other side of the coin (which, in this economy, can best be described as haypenny), the article goes on to drop the disclaimer:

"Economists are also cautious about completely trusting the ADP and Challenger reports. For the last six months, the ADP figure has missed the government's reading on private payrolls by an average of 96,000 jobs, said Jennifer Lee, an economist with BMO Capital Markets.


Ahead of the Friday jobs report, economists surveyed by CNNMoney are predicting the economy added 149,000 jobs and the unemployment rate ticked up to 9.5% in January."

So we wait for the "report" (drum-roll) due out on Friday. That is, if we don't get hit by an iceberg till then.

Survey of business economists shows improved jobs outlook

Survey of business economists shows improved jobs outlook - Jan. 24, 2011:
"Economists see more hiring on the way
By Charles Riley, staff reporter
January 24, 2011: 11:16 AM ET


NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- In another sign of a strengthening economy, U.S. companies say they are planning to hire more workers, and expect economic growth to pick up in the first months of 2011, according to a survey released Monday.
The National Association for Business Economics said the hiring outlook for the next six months is at a 12-year high."

How about that! Will the sun peep out over the job market horizon, at long last? With a new Congress in D.C. and the promises of supporting small businesses in the coming year(s), is this really a turning point for the jobs market in the US?

Were there 445,000 layoffs around Christmas 2010?

Initial claims jump 35,000 to 445,000 in latest week - Jan. 13, 2011:
"Jobless claims climb by 35,000
By Blake Ellis
NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- The number of Americans filing for their first week of unemployment benefits jumped sharply last week, two weeks after hitting a 2-1/2 year low below 400,000.
There were 445,000 initial jobless claims filed in the week ended Jan. 8, the Labor Department said in a weekly report Thursday.
That's up 35,000 from a revised 410,000 the previous week -- when jobless claims climbed back above 400,000 after falling below that mark for the first time in more than two years."

Misleading title on the original article. If I'm reading this correctly, in the first week of January '11, nearly a half million workers filed their INITIAL (as in, just fired) jobless claims. A half million pink slips over the Christmas/Hanukkah/Kwanza season? Corporate grinches, with bells on!

This is just more terrible news, not the ideal way to ring in the New Year. Apparently some didn't have much of a problem over the holidays ...

Wealthy treated themselves during the holidays

"By MAE ANDERSON and ANNE D'INNOCENZIO

NEW YORK (AP) -- The rich treated themselves like royalty this holiday season. That spun the holidays into gold for Tiffany & Co. and other high-end retailers.
Wealthier shoppers traded up to more expensive gold and diamond jewelry from silver charms. Designer clothing and purses were back.


The splurges are good news for the economy, because the richest 5 percent of Americans, those making at least $207,000 annually, account for about 14 percent of all spending. And consumer spending makes up about 70 percent of the economy." 

Does that mean the top 5% wealthiest individuals or is that a joint or family income qualifier? Because $207K a year for a well educated and professionally employed Mr & Mrs is pretty common these days, and still falls into "middle class" status (ain't much left after taxes). If such a low income makes up the richest 5% of our economy, I'm terrified. It just means things are worse than I imagined (and if you've read these postings, I have imagined pretty bad numbers).

December 2010 jobs report: Payrolls up, unemployment rates falls

December jobs report: Payrolls up, unemployment rates falls - Jan. 7, 2011:
"NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- High hopes for December's employment numbers were dashed Friday, when the Labor Department reported disappointing job gains for the month. But the unemployment rate took a surprising dive.

The economy added 103,000 jobs in December -- falling short of most expectations. Meanwhile, the unemployment rate sunk to 9.4%, its lowest level since May 2009, confusing some economists. While a sharply lower unemployment rate was a welcome surprise, some experts said that drop was mostly due to a shrinking workforce."

and

"About 260,000 adults dropped out of the labor force for various reasons, and were no longer counted as unemployed by the government. The overall participation rate in the U.S. labor force fell to a new recession low of 64.3%. "Incredibly, the U.S. labor force is now smaller than it was before the recession started, though it should have grown by over 4 million workers to keep up with working-age population growth over this period," said economist Heidi Shierholz of the Economic Policy Institute."

The news just gets worse and worse. As small businesses collapse, with literally hundreds shutting down daily, the job market is rapidly shrinking. The last 2 years have taken a toll on the backbone of our economy, the small business, with the Federal, State and City Governments taxing or regulating most out of business in such a short time.

With a new Congress seated in D.C. to greet a New Year, one can only hope this new batch has a better understanding of what is wrong with our economy, and that taxing businesses out of business results in collection of NO tax once they shut down.

Stimulus price tag: $2.8 trillion

Stimulus price tag: $2.8 trillion - Dec. 20, 2010:
"NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Since the recession began three years ago, Congress has poured a total of $2.8 trillion into the economy in an effort to spur hiring, get people spending again and prop up industries struggling to stay afloat.

While the $858 billion package of tax cuts passed last week was the biggest slice of stimulus yet, it accounts for less than a third of all the money spent since the start of 2008, according to multiple cost estimates prepared by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office over the last three years."
 ...
"Public works projects like road and school repair or efforts to develop clean energy and high speed rail, along with help for state and local governments, was a relatively small part of the total stimulus -- just over $250 billion, or about 9% of the spending, most of it found in the stimulus act passed at the start of the Obama administration."


All right, this year is just about over. Lets face facts, this nearly 3 trillion dollars was wasted. The economy still isn't "fixed", jobs are still not being created, small businesses are still crashing and burning. Bankers and automakers are snickering all the way to the proverbial bank, everyone else (and their children) are and will be paying for this debacle for decades to come.

Come January a new Congress will have to figure out a way, not just to fix the economy, but also to undo the ravages of "bailouts" that have made things worse. Lets wish them luck, common sense, and basic math skills. And remind them of the next Congressional elections in 2012, aka the Mayan calendar's final year.

If only we had all the gold those Mayans had back then!

Job openings rise?

Job openings rise to highest level in 16 months - Yahoo! News: "WASHINGTON – Job openings jumped in April to the highest level in 16 months, a sign that hiring by private employers is healthy despite last week's disappointing jobs report.
The number of jobs advertised at the end of April rose to 3.1 million from 2.8 million in March, the Labor Department said Tuesday. That's the most openings since December 2008.
Private employers accounted for the entire net gain. The government's advertising for jobs decreased, despite the hiring of hundreds of thousands of census workers in May.
Job openings have risen by about 740,000 since bottoming out at 2.3 million in July. But they remain far below pre-recession levels of about 4.5 million openings per month.
...
The report comes after the Labor Department said Friday that the economy generated 431,000 jobs in May. But almost all were census hires. Only 41,000 of the new jobs were in the private sector."

I guess the May jobs report was a classic case of putting the cart before the horse. If the April job situation was good, but the May report was bad - which one are we supposed to believe in?

Financial Times article on unemployment

"American monumental job losses
By Clive Crook
Published: May 24 2010 03:00
Last updated: May 24 2010 03:00
Unemployment in the US is high not just by its own past standards but by international standards, too, which is doubly strange. Figures also show a startling rise in long-term unemployment, to levels previously associated with Europe's broken labour markets.


In April the number of Americans looking for work for more than six months rose to 6.7m, roughly half of all those unemployed. Such a high proportion is unprecedented: the long-term share has previously reached a quarter at most. Terms for the stickiness of high unemployment such as hysteresis and sclerosis have preoccupied students of Europe's economies. They have not come up so much in discussions of US joblessness, but this may change.

Are these just signs that this recession has been exceptionally severe, or is something even worse going on? Can the US expect the rapid recovery in employment it has experienced coming out of previous recessions? On closer examination, US labour-market exceptionalism has not disappeared - but it is not what it used to be."

Comparing ourselves to Europe is hardly a valid yardstick to measure results by. Europeans don't buy overpriced SUVs and truck-like vehicles - US consumers do. The economy in the US is largely driven by the consumer, producing the product keeps the money "in the family". Importing Chinese made junk and Mexican automobiles is contrary to common sense, since you're paying someone else to do it - and they are NOT buying your products.

The Associated Press: Jobless claims rise by largest amount in 3 months

The Associated Press: Jobless claims rise by largest amount in 3 months:
"Jobless claims rise by largest amount in 3 months
By MARTIN CRUTSINGER (AP) – 18 hours ago
WASHINGTON — The number of people filing new claims for unemployment benefits unexpectedly rose last week by the largest amount in three months. The surge is evidence of how volatile the job market remains, even as the economy grows.
Applications for unemployment benefits rose to 471,000 last week, up by 25,000 from the previous week, the Labor Department said Thursday. It was the first increase in five weeks and the biggest jump since a gain of 40,000 in February.
The total was the highest since new claims reached 480,000 on April 10. It also pushed the average for the last four weeks to 453,500."

Unemployment benefits rose "unexpectedly"? What was the DoL expecting, flying pigs?