True Unemployment Numbers
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If you read my previous article, you will see how I arrived at this number.
I now believe that by taking the IRS Data Book and the BLS unemployment report that the ACCURATE unemployment number is 15,754,000 people.
Not quite the 20 million that I originally believed, but damn close.
So now lets take an average salary of 52,000 figured at 1,000 per week.
Some will make more and some will make less but this should be close
As a reader pointed out below in the comments, I have egg on my face on this one as the real numbers are 819 BILLION 208 Million dollars. Really no excuse for it, just too much that I’m trying to accomplish on this site with only one person and I’m working to fix that (see the help wanted section)
This will take 8 TRILLION 192 BILLION 80 MILLION dollars out of our economy.
Whats worse is that this will take 2 TRILLION 457 BILLION 624 MILLION dollars out of the budgets of our towns, counties, states and federal budgets.
And since we all know that Americans don’t save, this will take 5 TRILLION 734 BILLION 456 MILLION out of the earnings of our retailers, manufacturers and raw material producers.
Now do you see why our retailers, manufacturers and raw material producers are coming to us with their hat in their hand wanting a handout.
Whats worse is the same damn government that is giving them these bailouts is fixing to need a bailout themselves, or substantially cut all of their services which will mean laying many more millions off which will just make the situation worse.
All of this because the same retailers, manufacturers and raw material producers are sending our jobs AND THEIR FUTURE INCOME offshore just to make a dollar now and to hell with the long term view.
Sure they’re sticking it to us now, but what’s going to save them when we can no longer buy their products.
Yep BUSTED…!
Posted on January 9th, 2009 by vjb
Filed under: Uncategorized
There is no question that off shoring, the “Wal Mart” effect, is killing our economy. Too many “cheap” products are being dumped on our shores. A good example of a typical American product that was destroyed is Schwinn bicycle. When they were union made in Chicago Illinois, you had one of the finest products made. The bicycles weren’t cheap but certainly not out of reach either because almost every kid had one. The factory made “good money”, the union workers made good money, the dealers made good money and you had a bicycle that would last two life times.
Today, the bikes are Chinese made and sold at Wal-Mart and Target, some as low as $50.00. Unless the Chinese manufacturer sells a ship full, maybe 250,000 units, they can’t make any money. Wal-Mart probably doesn’t pay $25 for a bike and unless they sell 250,000 of them, they don’t make much either.
So now if we look at the larger picture, we’ve lost most of our jobs overseas that’s killing our economy. The fella in China making the products is probably working for little more than food. The Chinese factory owner is being strangled by Wal-Mart and their predatory practices and more and more Americans are being laid off as each day goes by.
Is this system better? A hand full of people are becoming billionaires, here and abroad and our own nation is headed for a depression that might make the one in 30′ look timid in comparison.
I think a fairly stiff import tax on imported goods would level the playing field. It’s far too easy to off shore with little or no consequences to big business. It’s also too easy to “lay off” at the drop of a hat.
You’ll like this — http://www.shadowstats.com/ . Using historical methods, unmodified by recent revisions, he calculates the current unemployment at 16%, not the official 7.2%.
Regarding Jim Hermann’s comments, I agree that one of the problems causing unemployment is the influx of cheap goods, but that is also what’s keeping us from rampant inflation. We can have $99 DVD players because we import them from China. I, personally, am prepared to pay $400 for a DVD player, but BestBuy will sell less than 1/4 as many as of the $99 player. The Chinese Government is buying up US treasury bills and artificially keeping their currency cheap compared to ours. If not for China, we’d have at least 10% inflation right now.
It’s a global economy and we have to admit that fact. If we cannot compete in manufacturing, we either have to get more efficient so that we can or we have to *not* compete in manufacturing. We should do what we do best: design, innovate, provide services,…
One of my old employers (before they laid me off), used to try to build things, in-house, but it was too expensive, because we weren’t that efficient at it. I was a designer. I wrote requirements and designed the product, along with a bunch of other engineers. My employer stopped building our devices in the US and contracted with a US company that was expert at building devices like ours. We designed them, they built them. All in the US. We could afford to do this because these are expensive medical devices and all steps of the design and manufacture need to be documented for FDA approval. Manufacturers in the US that build devices like DVD players need to get competative with foreign manufacturers. Have you considered that perhaps unskilled labor in the US is maybe getting paid too much? Maybe designers like me are getting paid too much, also? Maybe the US standard of living has been too high for too long?
Now, regarding your final paragraph, import taxes are called “tariffs.” You need to read some history before you post such suggestions. I urge you to read the following article from 2005:
http://www.mackinac.org/archives/1998/sp1998-01.pdf
and if you find that educational, you might like the book “The Forgotten Man” by Amity Shlaes. Just the introduction to that book, you can learn more than you can from most of the biased, partisan blogs on the Web. It is written from such a balanced perspective that I’m halfway through it and I still can’t figure out whether the author is a conservative or a liberal. She documents the things that Coolidge, Hoover, and Roosevelt (and their administrations) did, leading up to and during the 1929-1940 Great Depression, both what helped and what hurt the economy.
One of the things that hurt the US economy most was the Smoot-Hawley Act, which raised tariffs, with the misguided intention of increasing demand for US-made goods. What the high tariffs actually did was to cause all the other nations to put similarly high tariffs on our goods, thus cutting off foreign markets for US-made goods and agricultural products.
I’ve heard many plans, such as raising tariffs, from both sides of the aisle that have already proven to be failures. Another one of them was the raising of capital gains taxes. Jimmy Carter tried that and the recession that his policies caused was worse than what we have now (double-digit inflation and double-digit unemployment). Ronald Reagan got us out of that recession and many of the things that President-elect Obama is proposing are just the opposite.
I’ll end with a quote:
“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” — George Santayana
I will be the first person to admit that we cannot allow protectionism to stop the importing and exporting of Goods and Products.
I am in the process of writing a book documenting how entertwined the Worlds economy is and why this Global financial crisis is the direct result of putting American workers either out of work or reducing their wages substantially.
I believe you will be surprised at how much damage can be done to the Worlds economy if we just put 20 million people out of work.
However all that said, there are two things that this site is primarily about and that is the offshoring of our jobs which puts our people out of work or substantially lowers their purchasing abilities and the production of our defense capabilities.
All of my research so far shows me that the Worlds economy would come to a screeching halt (like it is) if our people no longer are capable of purchasing in quantities like they have in the past and I see no provisions for the defense of our country should the unthinkable happen and our foreign suppliers were to cut off our supplies.
One thing interesting that I can find is the rumor that China holds the majority of our debt because so far, after reviewing thousands of documents, I see no proof of this yet.
Doesnt mean its not there, just means I havent found it yet if it exists.
I wish I could point you to proof, but I’m only going by what my Dad tells me regarding what China is doing with the excess dollars they have. Neither he nor I are economists. He’s a retired engineer and I’m an engineer recently involuntarily separated from employement (because my employer could not raise working capital and his company went bankrupt Dec 30, two years before our new digital microscopy cancer detection system was ready for market).
Can’t we calculate what the imbalance of trade is with China? The difference between what we send them in dollars and what they buy from us (wheat and corn, I believe), should be what they have in cash and bonds. I don’t think it really matters (given how little treasury bills pay now) whether they have cash or bonds, does it?
Again, I’m not an economist, so I’m just speculating here. Pardon my naivete.
Have American workers’ wages really been reduced? That’s not what I’ve read. I read that while unemployment in 2008 rose sharply, US wages rose also, by 3.7%, in 2008.
I have also read where thousands of Chinese factories are closing and hundreds of thousands of workers are being laid off.
If you are an economist, perhaps you can explain someting to me. It seems that in addition to spending all of their earnings on cars and TV’s and vacations, many Americans also have maxed out their credit cards. Now, I hear that the credit card companies are going to start increasing minimums, lowering credit limits, etc. Isn’t that going to further decrease consumer spending and thus drive us further into a recession (and I agree, it’s going to be a global recession)?
If that’s the case, what we need is more foreign consumers, right? I have a novel idea… if you put this in your book then I want credit for it. What if we send all our union leaders and organizers off to China and Indonesia to drum up unions there? The Asian workers will start to make more money, the cost of US labor will carry less of a premium, and we’ll have millions of new consumers for our US-made goods and agricultural products… no?
Do please read Amity Shlaes book… she points out that Hoover and Roosevelt legislated wages high (minimum wage and the NRA), when market pressures really needed them to fall. Even though I know very little about economics, it stands to reason that when a company’s sales fall by 20%, they either have to cut staff by 20% or cut salaries by 20%, right?
Which is worse? It seems to me that for the economy, the higher unemployment is worse than lower wages, because consumer confidence affects MOST of the consumers, whereas decreased wages in some sectors will decrease buying power of a smaller subset of consumers. Even if I find a job, I will be gun shy for quite a while, but if I knew my job was secure, I’d find a way to scrape together some disposable income and dispose of it at BestBuy or Southwest Airlines.
Take a look at the “My Analysis” tab at the top of the page.
Click on the one with IRS charts and go to the bottom chart.
Do you see the sharp drop off in Individual Tax receipts for 2007?
Now go back a page and click on the GDP charts and you will see how much we import from china and how much we export to them, but I do not believe you can use that as a basis as you have to consider their cash on hand as they could be purchasing bonds without using the cash generated by the import/export gap.
As a kind of toungue in cheek, knee jerk reaction out of the same frustration you probably feel, I created the U.W.W.U page at the top of the page a while back stating that perhaps we need to form a union of workers the world wide to fight what is happening here.
I will try and add another chart today or tomorrow that will show you that wages are actually decreasing in the higher paid position, but you don’t see that because its hidden amongst the rest of the data.
For instance, my research yesterday disclosed to me that we have lost over 1 million management jobs since 2001 with an average salary of 96,000 each at todays wages which totals up to somewhere around 70 Billion dollars less for management jobs then we were paying in 2001.
The question that is not asked enough regarding outsourcing, slave labor, artificial monetary rates etc, is
Who benefits from the policies over the last couple of decades? It is no surprise the world’s wealthiest are getting richer and richer while the rest of the world falls behind. The policy makers have passed laws that benefit those who provide them the billions of dollars to get them elected.
Until the American people stand up and kick out all the bribed, corrupt congressmen, nothing will change except the rich will get richer.
I hear you.
From Glenn Beck’s website:
Liberals say: “Nancy Pelosi has done NOTHING but fight for the average, hard-working families in this country!’ She just fought hard to raise the minimum wage from $5.15-$7.25 an hour”
Glen Beck’s rebuttal: “She sure did. In fact, not only did Congress raise the minimum wage in all 50 states (or is it 57?), but in all U.S. territories as well, including for the first time ever the Northern Mariana Islands. Oh, the ONE exception to the minimum wage was American Samoa. Apparently 75% of the workforce is employed by two packing plants. One is Starkist, whose parent company, Del Monte was one of the biggest OPPONENTS to the wage increase and is headquartered in San Francisco, and represented in Congress by…Nancy Pelosi. Somehow, Nancy got Starkist the exemption they fought for in Samoa. The other plant is Chicken of the Sea…also headquartered in California. ‘Ask any Mermaid you happen to see…who’s the biggest phony…Nancy Pe Lo Si.’”
YOUR MATH IS WRONG BY ONE DECIMAL PLACE. 15,754,000 X 52,000 = 819,208,000,000. KNOW WHY YOU AND MOST AMERICANS BELIEVE WHAT THE GOVERNMENT TELLS YOU? NOBODY HERE BOTHERED TO DO SIMPLE MATH TO CHECK OUT THE INFORMATION GIVEN. WONDER WHY PEOPLE ARE SCREWED WITH THEIR MORTGAGES? SAME REASON. SIMPLETONS CAN’T FIGURE OUT THAT THE HOUSE THEY PAID THROUGH THE NOSE FOR WASN’T WORTH WHAT THEY PAID. THE BANKS, APPRAISERS AND FUTURE HOME OWNERS ARE ALL TO BLAME FOR BELIEVING THE LIE. JUST WHAT DOES THE CURRENT VALUE OF YOUR HOME HAVE TO DO WITH ANYTHING? DO THE IDIOTS IN THIS COUNTRY THINK THAT OVER A PERIOD OF 30 YEARS OR SO THAT THEIR PRECIOUS HOUSE’S VALUE WOULD NOT FLUCTUATE? MY PERSONAL EVALUATION OF AMERICANS OVER THE PAST SEVERAL YEARS IS THAT 90 PERCENT ARE STUPID. ESPECIALLY AFTER THEY GO TO COLLEGE. I’M NOT TALKING ABOUT IGNORANCE. I’M TALKING ABOUT TRUE STUPIDITY. GO AHEAD AND PAY THAT 5 GRAND FOR TELEVISION ETC. BEING THAT NONE OF YOU CAUGHT THE ERROR, GUESS WHAT CATEGORY I’VE PLACED YOU INTO AS I WAS READING. DON’T APPLY FOR A JOB FROM ME. NONE OF YOU ARE SMART ENOUGH.
Thanks for the comment.
One difference between us is that I too see that Americans in general need an education and I’m working to help give them that.
Why don’t you help me to do so instead of cutting them down ?
Believe it or not, but the survival of the fittest does depend on the survival of the weakest when you are talking about the demise of a whole country.
Thanks,
Virgil Bierschwale
Contrary to popular thinking, the demise of the United States is not ever going to happen. What should happen is our witnessing the demise of the financial system including the stock and commodity markets. The system is flawed. The system’s existence is dependent upon people slapping each other on the back and congratulating each other on their good fortune. The supposed representatives in congress and the senate are not looking out for your best interests. You should not be looking for these supposed representatives to help you. Power over you is increased by your dependence upon “the government”. Just what is “the government” everyone keeps complaining about? The answer is simple. It’s YOU. You America have forgotten what “the government” is supposed to be doing. What it supposed to be doing is spelled out in the Constitution of the United States. Read it. They are not doing what the Constitution specifies. Think they are looking out for your best interests? Take a look at the last amendment to the Constitution. They took the time to amend YOUR Constitution to protect THEIR best interests. They make covert deals over the weekends while America amuses itself with football and reality shows. All for YOU?
My comment about the facts presented was intended to illustrate what is wrong with YOU America! You have been this blind for so many years I have given up on you. I’ve lived within my means my entire life. My son and his family have done the same. I watched you ALL falling into this financial quagmire for years. It didn’t matter what education level you people have achieved. You all fell into the same trap. You falling into this mess and pointing your fingers at everyone else as the cause for you problems is endangering even my cautious existence. You have created a financial mess to be inherited by my son, his wife and my GRANDCHILDREN. I don’t make believe that I care about what is happening to you. I don’t know you. It is better for this financial monster to die rather than feed it for generations to come.
You made no mention about the mathematical errors. From the outset of the first error all of the information which followed was flawed. That is not the way to educate. It’s the same type of baloney spewed out by the liars in Washington. They keep you focused on a phony bailout bill only to sneak out trillions without you even knowing about it through the “Federal” Reserve. The same liars tell you the “government” made money on their “investment” in the banks. Do your own homework and VERIFY what you are reading is truth or lie. Everything these liars have told you is a gigantic lie.
Bottom line: YOU are lost and scared. I’m pissed off and ready to fight. I will not be depending upon people who don’t own up to their mistakes/greed and now have their hands out looking for help from BIG BROTHER.
Interesting comment Woody.
Guess you didnt bother to look to see if I had fixed the problem because your superior intellect had taught you that everybody is incompetent but you.
I agree that we have problems and that we need to address them and I’m all for working towards that goal.
As for the demise of America, let’s hope that it never happens, but when foreign nations own your property and your debt, you are setting yourself up, which I’m sure that even you will agree with that.
I understand your being mad at the world, but I also believe in that old saying where if you’re not part of the solution, then you are part of the problem.
Hopefully you will find it within you to be part of the solution and to educate others on what life has taught you and how we can make America a better place.
What exactly did you fix? You simply made a statement about the 8+ trillion mistake. All of your reasoning following that mistake makes no sense. Instead of taking the time attempting to reign me in you should totally revise all of your points.
Don’t bother trying to analyze me. I’m not MAD at the WORLD. I’m pissed off at the system. I’ve been this way since the 1970’s.
Back then I attempted to pay my family’s share of the national debt. I also included the stipulation that I would no longer accept any more debt. They “the government” would not take my money. Take a look at the national debt record. I had no problem recognizing the pattern of spending. Senseless spending I should add. Do you understand your RIGHT to NOT go into debt?
People turned a deaf ear to my comments about the pattern I saw evolving. It sometimes caused me to have doubts about the system’s flaws. Hell, as long as the rest of you agreed that the system was just fine, I was just some “nut” shooting his mouth off. Oh and by the way this was pre internet time. Pre windows time. Pre personal computer times. Now that people have access to so much information, they still refuse to acknowledge the mistakes being made by themselves and those to which they have given carte blache control. America is replete with stupid people. Look at what you watch on TV! You actually believe the “news”. You, America, believe any cock and bull story thrown at you.
Just as you believe the little propaganda “statistics” without question. The readers here are just a microcosm of the America who believes the “EXPERTS”.
So far, what I see here is your reluctance to accept my force feeding of the readers. Even you haven’t learned anything from what I’m saying here. Proof is in your comments.
You are not “educating” the readers here by reinforcing their flawed assumptions. They need their cages rattled.
Really “fix” your original errors so that your comment makes sense instead of attempting to prove me wrong.
Hell, government welfare is being promoted at the top of this very page!! FREE!!??? “government” money? Just take the money out of your right pants pocket and put it in your left pants pocket. Same thing! Wake up!
You definitely have an interesting perspective and whats funny is we are both advocating the same things.
But first you need to understand something.
This is not a government sponsored anything.
This is one guy’s attempt to do what you tried in the 70’s
Everything that is here is done by me and nobody else except for some articles that other writers that agree with the purpose of this site have submitted.
As for fixing the problem, I did so by publicly putting out that I made a mistake because I am not going to change the article because people need to see that I too make mistakes and they need to learn how to analyze anything that they see or hear.
On the other hand, because of your finding my mistake, I will double check all of my math because it needs to be done.
As for the ad’s on here, I have no control over that. If you would go back and review every article on this site, you would find that this site cost’s 6.99 per month to keep running and being unemployed, sometimes that is more then I can come up with.
Also, I need money to get this message out in front of people, so I have put ad’s on here from Google.com
When I did that, I almost took them off because they were all about offshoring our jobs.
But then I got to thinking, I need money to keep this site running and make it better and the people need to understand why companies are offshoring their jobs, so I made the decision to keep them on here.
Do I regret that decision ?
Sometimes, but on the other hand, like you, I believe the people need to know.
Do they listen ?
Probably not.
Will I keep trying to be part of the solution instead of part of the problem ?
Yes
Like you have stated here, I am trying to decipher all of the government reports that affect our economy and I try and post the results on the My Analysis page and like you, I’m beginning more and more to question everything that I see.
However, the problem is, we need to find a way to get people to understand that their one vote does make a difference and pissing them off is not going to do that.
It will take a constant barrage in the only form that they understand and that is tv, on their favorite shows and this takes money, lots of it that I don’t have, nor do the other readers of this site.
Does it need to be done ?
Definitely
But we can go on and on with this little exchange, but I won’t do it as I’m trying to finish the data on the people whose jobs are being sent offshore only to be replaced with jobs that pay a third or less of what they used to make, because my gut tells me that when our heartless, shameless corporations are finished with the higher paying jobs, they will proceed to destroy the lower paying jobs in their quest to be a global economy and I think the only thing that will stop them if I can’t unite the shareholders of their companies is when WW III breaks out and then perhaps they will realize how stupid they have been.
Unfortunately that will be too late for us, so I would rather try and stop them now.