Educated, experienced, and out of work

iVillage Member
Registered: 04-16-2003
Educated, experienced, and out of work
2
Thu, 03-04-2004 - 12:00pm
Long-term joblessness continues to plague the unemployed

by Sylvia Allegretto (EPI) and Andy Stettner (National Employment Law Project)

Long-term unemployment—when unemployed workers have been seeking work for six months or more—is the most severe form of joblessness. The consequences of extended periods of joblessness are significant: the long-term unemployed often face financial, personal, and health care hardships as well as the loss of their unemployment insurance benefits. An analysis of long-term unemployment from 2000 to 2003 (a period spanning the recession that occurred between March and November 2001) shows that the number of people without work for six months or more has risen at the extraordinarily high rate of 198.2% over this period.1 Job seekers with college degrees and those age 45 and older have had an especially difficult time finding work, with long-term unemployment for those groups rising by 299.4% and 217.6%, respectively.

Since the recession ended in November 2001, elevated rates of long-term joblessness among the unemployed have persisted longer than during any similar period in the past 30 years. The long-term unemployment situation continued to worsen between 2001 and 2003 as job creation lagged. A number of important trends emerge from the data on long-term unemployment across this time period:


• In 2003, 22.1% of all unemployed workers had been out of work for more than six months, an increase from 18.3% in 2002. This proportion is higher than at comparable points in the recovery periods of the four most recent recessions, and it is the highest annual rate of long-term unemployment since 1983. Despite the continued need for help beyond the regular six months of state unemployment insurance, Congress cut off federal jobless benefits in December 2003, leaving the long-term unemployed without a safety net at a time when prolonged joblessness is at its highest rate in 20 years (see Table 1).

• College graduates represent 15.3% of total unemployment, but 19.1% of long-term unemployment. Long-term unemployment among college-educated workers increased by 299.4% between 2000 and 2003, a much faster rate than the increase of 156.1% for workers with a high school degree or less.


• While long-term unemployment hit all age and occupational groups, more experienced jobless workers had a disproportionately difficult time getting back to work in 2003. Although job seekers age 45 and older made up 25.7% of the total unemployed population, the rate of long-term unemployment for this group was 35.4%.


• Workers in the manufacturing industry are the largest share of the long-term unemployed (19%). In comparison, they represent 13% of total unemployment. The ranks of long-term unemployed manufacturing workers grew by 259% from 2000 to 2003. Workers laid-off from the well-paid professional and business services sector suffered along with those in manufacturing, posting the second highest long-term unemployment share, at 14% (see Table 2).

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Highly educated and experienced workers are increasingly the victims of unemployment

Perhaps the most striking conclusion shown in Table 2 is that the most educated, well-paid, and experienced workers are not insulated from the consequences of this prolonged weak labor market. These data illuminate the nature of the current economic situation—sluggish job creation is keeping workers of all ages, education levels, and occupations from contributing to the U.S. economy.

Full article at

http://www.epinet.org/content.cfm/issuebriefs_ib198


iVillage Member
Registered: 04-16-2003
Thu, 03-04-2004 - 12:10pm
Bush Administration's tax cuts falling short in job creation

The Bush Administration called the tax cut package, which was passed in May 2003 and took effect in July 2003, its "Jobs and Growth Plan." The president's economics staff, the Council of Economic Advisers (see background documents), projected that the plan would result in the creation of 5.5 million jobs by the end of 2004—306,000 new jobs each month, starting in July 2003. Although jobs increased by 112,000 in the month of January 2004, the "Jobs and Growth Plan" still fell 194,000 jobs short of the administration's projection. (Actually, job gains in the month of January were less than 30,000 once seasonal adjustment problems for retail hiring and strike effects are removed.) The administration projected that a total of 2,142,000 jobs would be created in the first seven months after the tax cuts took effect. In fact, only 296,000 jobs were created over that period for a cumulative shortfall of 1,846,000 jobs.

Greatest sustained job loss since the Great Depression

Since the recession began 34 months ago in March 2001, 2.4 million jobs have disappeared, a 1.8% contraction. The Bureau of Labor Statistics began collecting monthly jobs data in 1939 (at the end of the Great Depression). In every previous episode of recession and job decline since 1939, the number of jobs had fully recovered to above the pre-recession peak within 31 months of the start of the recession. Today's labor market would have an additional 3.88 million jobs if jobs had grown by the 0.7% rate that occurred in the early 1990s recession and so-called "jobless recovery," the worst record prior to this current period. The picture is bleaker for private-sector jobs, which have dropped by 2.9 million since March 2001, a 2.5% contraction. (See state data and organizations for more information on your state.)

http://jobwatch.org/




iVillage Member
Registered: 03-18-2000
Fri, 03-05-2004 - 8:52am

Job Growth in February Is Surprisingly Weak.


http://www.nytimes.com/2004/03/05/business/05WIRE-JOBS.html?hp


U.S. employers added a paltry 21,000 workers to their payrolls last month, far fewer than expected, according to a government report on Friday that was likely to weigh on President Bush as he seeks re-election.


In its report, the Labor Department said private-sector employment was unchanged in February, while the government added 21,000 workers.


The report also showed job creation in November and December was weaker than previously thought, adding to the weak tone of the report. The department revised lower its count of jobs gains in December to 97,000 from 112,000 and for November to just 8,000 from 16,000.


February's unemployment rate held steady at 5.6 percent.


Economists at top Wall Street firms had forecast a February payrolls gain of 125,000 new jobs.


Over the last three months, employment has risen an average of just 42,000 per month, down from the 79,000 average of the prior three months and far short of the 150,000 or so jobs needed each month just to keep pace with growth in the labor force.


Employment in construction tumbled by 24,000, while the factory sector shed 3,000 workers, the 43rd consecutive monthly drop.


The service sector also proved surprisingly weak, creating only 46,000 new positions.


Democrats have hit Bush hard for presiding over the weakest period of jobs creation for any president since Herbert Hoover during the Great Depression.

cl-Libraone~

 


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