Theoretical Jobs

Federal Reserve Chair Ben Bernanke testified before Congress yesterday. During questioning, Bernanke implied QE2 created 600,000 jobs and simulations show 3 million jobs will be created from the Federal Reserve's actions. Below is Bernanke's prepared testimony.

Defunct DLC

That great corporate driven lobbyist think tank, the Democratic Leadership Council or DLC, is disbanding. Yes, that lovely organization which brought you financial deregulation, NAFTA, the China PNTR, more income inequality, and Democrats jumping into bed with multinational corporate agendas is officially D.O.A.

Time:

The DLC also had two severe deficiencies. The first was its relationship to the business community, which was driven--in large part--by the organization's corporate sponsors. Wall Street had too much sway in the DLC; the Wall Street Democrats--people like Bob Rubin, Larry Summers, Steve Rattner, Roger Altman--tilted the policy focus away from productive corporate investment and toward financial speculation fueled by deregulation. This was not merely a policy mistake, it was a moral failure. The DLC's support for free trade--at the expense of fair trade (demanding equal access for our products from our trading partners)--seems downright foolish in retrospect.

And then there was the war in Iraq, which the DLC supported reflexively, as a way of seeming "strong", without ever really analyzing the intellectual weaknesses of the casus belli--which, combined with the exposure of the financial community's depredations in 2008, provided a final crushing coda for the DLC . In a way, the difference between the DLC in the 1990s and the 2000s was the difference between Bill Clinton and Joe Lieberman

Initial weekly unemployment claims for February 5, 2011

Initial weekly unemployment claims decreased to 383,000 this week. The last time initial weekly claims dropped below 400,000 was December 30th.

Yuan Rises a Tad

The Yuan traded at a new high, because China raised their interest rates again.

China’s yuan traded near its highest level in 17 years after the central bank raised interest rates for the third time since mid-October, spurring speculation policy makers will permit more gains to counter inflation.

The benchmark one-year lending rate was raised to 6.06 percent from 5.81 percent from today, the People’s Bank of China said yesterday. The one-year deposit rate was increased to 3 percent from 2.75 percent. The monetary authority set the reference rate for yuan trading at 6.5850 per dollar, the strongest level since a dollar peg was ended in July 2005.

Bloomberg's claim the dollar peg ended is pretty much a joke. China is not floating their currency, that's just a re-peg, allowed to fluctuate within a small limit.

From Xinhuanet:

On China's foreign exchange spot market, the yuan can rise or fall 0.5 percent from the central parity rate each trading day.

The central parity rate of the RMB against the U.S. dollar is based on a weighted average of prices before the opening of the market each business day.

This will help reduce imports from China, Asia a tad, but every bit helps.

Amazingly enough, many in the press do not realize other countries are pegged to the Yuan. Economist Dean Baker:

There Goes Another Populist - Senator Jim Webb, Virginia, Not Running in 2012

There goes another vote for the U.S. middle class. Senator Jim Webb won't run for the Senate in 2012. The press is prattling on, claiming the reason Webb isn't running is because he might lose the 2012 election. I don't think so. I suspect he's just tired of the Washington B.S. Here is Webb's statement:

Five years ago this week, on February 8, 2006, I announced my intention to run for the United States Senate. We had neither campaign funds nor a staff. We were challenged in a primary, and trailed the incumbent in the general election by more than 30 points in the polls.

Over the next nine months we focused relentlessly on the need to reorient our national security policy, to restore economic fairness and social justice, and to bring greater accountability in our government. I will always be grateful for the spirit and energy that was brought into this campaign by thousands of loyal and committed volunteers. Their enthusiasm and sheer numbers were truly the difference in that election.

75 Sq. Ft.

75 Square Feet. That's the size of the average space the American worker gets these days. That's right, you're packed in like sardines. From the incredible shrinking cubicle:

Jobs JOLTS for December 2010

JOLTS stands for Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey. The December report shows there were 4.73 official unemployed people hunting for a job to every position available. If one takes the official broader definition of unemployment, or U6, the ratio becomes even worse, 8.40.

Chalk One Up For Labor - Employers Better Not Fire You for What You Say Online About Them

Score one for the people. The National Labor board won a case for a worker fired because she slammed her boss on Facebook.

Employers should think twice before trying to restrict workers from talking about their jobs on Facebook or other social media.

That's the message the government sent on Monday as it settled a closely watched lawsuit against a Connecticut ambulance company that fired an employee after she went on Facebook to criticize her boss.

The National Labor Relations Board sued the company last year, arguing the worker's negative comments were protected speech under federal labor laws. The company claimed it fired the emergency medical technician because of complaints about her work.

Under the settlement with the labor board, American Medical Response of Connecticut Inc. agreed to change its blogging and Internet policy that barred workers from disparaging the company or its supervisors. The company also will revise another policy that prohibited employees from depicting the company in any way over the Internet without permission.

Both policies interfered with longstanding legal protections that allow workers to discuss wages, hours and working conditions with co-workers, the board said.

How about doing something about all of the contract workers getting stiffed, who are officially counted as small businesses, thus do not have any labor protections.

Obama Comes Bearing Gifts, But They Ain't No Fruitcake

President Obama gave a speech today to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, a conciliatory message, why he even offered up a symbolic fruit cake. But the gifts Obama is bearing ain't no house warmers, they are more offshore outsourcing, bad trade deals, corporate tax reduction wish lists and key multinational corporate players in the White House.

Would the U.S. Chamber of Commerce suddenly wake up and consider being interested in the nation that bears their name? Not from history. Remember when the U.S. Chamber of Commerce demanded Stimulus funds not be used to hire Americans or buy American? Or how foreign companies and nations are trying to buy our elections through them? Their list of egregious horrors against the American workforce is as long as their forked tongues.

Imagine this was 1904 and Teddy Roosevelt was in Office. There is no doubt instead of promising more bad trade deals and to rewrite the corporate tax code per lobbyists' demands, we would see some sort of requirement these companies hire Americans and contribute to America. Unfortunately, this is not 1904 it's 2011 and Obama sir, is no Teddy Roosevelt.

Income Taxes Lowest Take Since 1950?

Income taxes are at their lowest since 1950, their share of the total economy that is, according to AP article.

As a share of the nation's economy, Uncle Sam's take this year will be the lowest since 1950, when the Korean War was just getting under way.

And for the third straight year, American families and businesses will pay less in federal taxes than they did under former President George W. Bush, thanks to a weak economy and a growing number of tax breaks for the wealthy and poor alike.

Yet, is it fair to compare tax revenues from before the great job slaughter of the last three years? Isn't it even less fair to compare tax revenues to percentage of GDP, when more and more Americans are not sharing in the booty?

From the CBO director's blog, we can see that personal income tax revenues increased 10% from this time last year.

Receipts for the first four months of fiscal year 2011 were about $64 billion (or 9 percent) higher than receipts during the comparable period last year, CBO estimates. Nearly all of that increase was from individual income and social insurance taxes, which together rose by $60 billion (or 10 percent).

Withholding from employees’ paychecks for income and payroll taxes increased by $45 billion (or 8 percent), at least partly reflecting higher wages and salaries; the increase would have been slightly larger but for the Making Work Pay tax credit, which was in effect in 2010, and the temporary payroll tax reduction, which started in January 2011.

February 2011