labor

JOLTS - There were 3.4 People Looking for a Job for each Position Available in September 2012

The BLS September JOLTS report, or Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey shows there are 3.4* official unemployed per job opening. Opportunities, actual hires and layoffs were all down, showing a stagnant, dead pool job market. While openings decreased by -2.7%, actual hires declined by -5.7%.

Wisconsin Does the Nasty Against Labor

The Wisconsin GOP did an end game against Democrats and passed a bill which destroys union rights to collective bargain. Milwaukee Biz Times:

Republicans in a hastily called state legislative conference committee approved a resolution Wednesday night to revoke the collective bargaining rights for thousands of public employees in Wisconsin, leaving Democrats and thousands of screaming protesters outside the Capitol to cry foul.
Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald (R-Juneau) and his brother, Jeff Fitzgerald (R-Horicon) led the committee, which met for less than five minutes and then approved the resolution.
Assembly Minority Leader Peter Barca (D-Kenosha) protested that he had not had a chance to even see what was in the resolution before the vote was taken.
“I need to know what was removed. I need to know that,” Barca said.
The public, the media and the Democrats were not allowed to see the resolution before the Republicans voted on it.
“This is clearly a violation of the open meetings law,” Barca yelled, as Scott Fitzgerald called for the vote and struck the gavel to adjourn the meeting.
Barca said state law requires at least 24 hours notice before a conference committee hearing can be convened.
Some Democrats speculated that the committee hearing was a Republican trick to convince at least one of the 14 Democratic Senators into showing up at the Capjtol to protest the conference committee resolution. If one Senator had shown up, the Senate could attain the quorum it would need to approve Gov. Scott Walker’s budget repair bill, and the committee vote would not even be needed.

It's Official, The Great American Dream is No More

The John J. Heldrich Center for Workforce Development at Rutgers, has a new study, The Shattered American Dream: Unemployed Workers Lose Ground, Hope, and Faith in their Futures. The study concludes what we already know, the Great American Dream is long gone, replaced with strife, struggle and financial pain.

A new survey of unemployed American workers documents dramatic erosion in the quality of life for millions of Americans. Their financial reserves are exhausted, their job prospects nil, their family relations stressed, and their belief in government’s ability to help them is negligible. They feel hopeless and powerless, unable to see their way out of the Great Recession that has claimed 8.5 million jobs.

The survey shows that only one-quarter of those first interviewed in August 2009 have found full-time jobs some 15 months later. And most of those who have become reemployed have taken jobs they did not really want for less pay. Moreover, the recession has wreaked havoc on the retirement plans of older workers.

From the survey, of the third who found a job, 61% believe they will never recover financially, 45% had to take a significant pay cut, with 60% of those losing over 20% of their former income.

What’s disturbing is how many have given up at least one essential – 80% of our panel has spent less on either food, housing, or health care. In fact, 51% of our panelists do not have health care benefits; this is true of 60% of the long-term unemployed.

JOLTS for February 2010 - 5.5 people for 1 job

The BLS has released the job openings and labor turnover (JOLTS), for February 2010.

There were 2.7 million job openings on the last business day of February 2010, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. The job openings rate was little changed over the month at 2.1 percent.
The hires rate (3.1 percent) and the separations rate (3.1 percent) were also little changed in February.

Department of Labor gives ripped off employees the brush off, doesn't enforce basic employment law

Do you think we have labor laws and divisions to protect you from outright theft of your wages? Think again.

The GAO investigated the Department of Labor, Wage and Hour division, now under the Obama administration and found the DOL is simply blowing off workers with legitimate complaints on getting ripped off on unpaid wages.

The GAO report, Wage and Hour Division Needs Improved Investigative Processes and Ability to Suspend Statute of Limitations to Better Protect Workers Against Wage Theft, details this investigation.

EPI: 7 million jobs needed just to get back to before economic crisis levels

The Economic Policy Institute just released a detailed report on jobs.

When you look at these numbers, one realizes until all policy is addressed to stop the United States from hemorrhaging jobs, there will be no real economic recovery.

While the labor market has shed 5.1 million jobs since the start of the recession, it is important to keep in mind that in those 15 months, the population has continued to grow. Just to keep up with population growth, the economy must add approximately 127,000 jobs every month, which means 1.9 million jobs, should have been added over this period. In other words, the economy is now 7 million jobs below what is needed to maintain pre-recession employment levels.

That's a lot of jobs folks.

EPI:  job per population

Jobless claims "less bad" at 601,000

The BLS reported this morning that new jobless claims declined to 601,000 in the last week. That is the lowest reading since January. The 4 week moving average also declined to 637,000. According to the research reported by Prof. James Hamilton, this decline means that it is more likely than not that the recession will ultimately be deemed to have ended by the end of June.

Age Discrimination, Brazen, Rampant and Impossible to Fight

Check out this Age Discrimination story:

When Ben Sims, 57, showed up earlier this year for a job interview at a company in Richardson, Tex., he noticed the hiring manager — several decades his junior — falter upon spotting him in the lobby.

“Her face actually dropped,” said Mr. Sims, who was dressed in a business suit befitting his 25-year career in human resources at I.B.M.

Later, in her office, after several perfunctory questions, the woman told Mr. Sims she did not believe the job would be “suitable” for him. And barely 10 minutes later, she stood to signal that the interview was over.

How many know this story? Literally, on the phone, assumptions are made about my age and I hear I should talk to "so and so company" for the workers are "all my age".

The Real Difference Between Europe and the United States - Hint, it is not "Socialism"

Absurd cable TV pundits rant and prattle about on how Obama is socialist. Uh, not so far. What the Obama administration is doing is corporate welfare.

What's the real difference between Europe and the United States?

In a nutshell they have balls and we don't.

In G20 Protests now going on all over Europe are some hints.

Protesters focused the Royal Bank of Scotland because it was bailed out by the British government after a series of disastrous deals brought it to the brink of bankruptcy. Still, its former chief executive Fred Goodwin — aged 50 — managed to walk off with a tidy annual pension of 703,000 pounds ($1.2 million) — just as unemployment in Britain is at 2 million and rising.

Border Hopping Doesn't Pay - Illegal Labor Leaving

It is fairly well understood by anyone living in statistical reality that illegal immigration is fueled by economics. Since the United States does not enforce it's immigration laws, illegal labor could earn more money in the United States and employers loved the cheaper wages, no workman's comp, no unemployment benefits and no taxes.

So, now that the economy is falling apart illegal labor is going home.

Will this help the unemployment statistics and wage levels for U.S. legal unskilled labor? It's yet to be seen but at least the economic realities of what causes massive influxes of illegal workers is being made quite clear for the majority. Of course the multi-billion dollar underground drug economy is a whole other ball game.

Pages