Unemployment Figures Made for Populist Rage
Interesting post from Washington’s Blog on Naked Capitalism. I’m torn in my assessment of these figures. A major reason that the poor have a 31% unemployment rate is because they didn’t educate themselves, dropped out of high school, are lazy and can live a subsistence existence in the entitlement State. On the other hand, the trillions that have been thrown at this financial downturn have benefitted Wall Street, mega corporations, unions, and government workers. That is why their unemployment rate is so low. The rich, who control the country, will continue to shovel the entitlements at the poor so they will not rise up in revolt. Of course, they will take that money from the Middle Class Americans.
The average Middle Class American is the one getting screwed. The rich are fat and happy. The poor are fat and sedated. The Middle class is angry. This will not end pretty.
Guest Post: Unemployment for Those Who Earn $150,000 or More is Only 3%, While Unemployment for the Poor is 31%
Boeing CEO Jim McNerney succinctly summarized a recent study by Northwestern University’s Center for Labor Market Studies regarding unemployment rates for different income brackets:
The Center analyzed the labor conditions faced by income-grouped U.S. households during the fourth quarter of 2009.
In the face of one of the worst economic environments in memory, those in the highest income groups had nearly full employment levels, with just a 3.2 percent unemployment rate for households with over $150,000 in income and a 4 percent rate in the next-highest income group of $100,000-plus.
The two lowest-income groups — under $12,500 and under $20,000 annually — faced unemployment rates of 30.8 percent and 19.1 percent, respectively.
The study – published in February – notes that the poor are suffering Depression levels of unemployment:
Workers in the lowest income decile faced a Great Depression type unemployment rate of nearly 31% while those in the second lowest income decile had an unemployment rate slightly below 20% … Unemployment rates fell steadily and steeply across the ten income deciles. Workers in the top two deciles of the income distribution faced unemployment rates of only 4.0 and 3.2 percent respectively, the equivalent of full employment. The relative size of the gap in unemployment rates between workers in the bottom and top income deciles was close to ten to one. Clearly, these two groups of workers occupy radically different types of labor markets in the U.S.
Arianna Huffington, commenting on the study, pointed out that it if were the high-earners suffering 31 percent unemployment, the media would be discussing unemployment non-stop. But because it is the poor who are suffering Depression-level unemployment, they largely ignore it.
As I noted last August:
Chris Tilly – director of the Institute for Research on Labor and Employment at UCLA – points out that some populations, such as African-Americans and high school dropouts, have been hit much harder than other populations, and that these groups are already experiencing depression-level unemployment.
bigmike
david yard
RICHARD RALPH ROEHL
The couple you referred too, most likely are not the norm. I say that with unreliable intimate knowledge. But back to the matter at hand. Peer through your minds’ eye to year 2110. The worlds propagation method most likely will be more carnal but less productive. If Stevens Hawkins future reality hasn’t turned us into planet Telapathtrious’s pets and we’re all walking around with our masters’ thought collars around our necks doing our best to not pee in the wrong place. Well if that doesn’t happen we may have figured out how to get by without working very much or at all. I agree demand is infinite. Time is constraining as we know it now. If distant man can overcome the constrains of time I will agree that there will always be a need for more. We mostly we will be working five hours a month long before we solve the dilemma of time constrains.
The cause of unemployment will eventually come from the fact that we are so efficient that we no longer need the work force that we have come accustom too over the past century. The question is how will we deal with a population that can provide many more hours of labor than work that is needed? The work week has gone through massive changes in the past century. In some cases 14 hours a day, seven days a week. This was changed because of abuse and in the worst case scenario it was child labor. So the real question is how then is wealth distributed? How do we maintain a free market when no market is really needed?
Boddychaw,
Demand is infinite, supply is not. No person, no matter how rich or wealthy he becomes, stops wanting more of some or many things. No one is ever satisfied or satiated. There is always a need for more supply. Why, I know a couple with three cars and 2 homes.
Demand will never dry up. Neither will jobs or markets.