Obama, Can't you Take an Hour for Your Jobs Council?

[waltky]

Permanent job losers on brink of homelessness...

4.4 Million ‘Permanent Job Losers’ in July
August 3, 2012 - In a sign that the employment picture remains weak, 4.4 million people reported being permanently out of work in July, according to government figures. That number has remained abnormally high since the recession ended three years ago.

While the total number of unemployed persons increased by 45,000 in July to 12.8 million, that figure masks the true causes of unemployment, which can range from retirement to temporary layoffs to being fired. This is because the government calculates unemployment by asking people if they have jobs and, if not, if they have looked for work in the past month. If they don’t have jobs but have looked for work, the government classifies them as unemployed – and only then does it ask why they are unemployed.

Those who say they were fired are designated as permanent job losers by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. While this figure has declined since its recession-era peak of 6.8 million in November 2009, it remains well above the pre-recession level of around 1.6 million. What this means is that slightly more than one-third of the unemployed – the 4.4 million -- are unemployed because they have permanently lost their jobs, not due to other factors such as retirement or temporary layoffs. Adding in those who had completed temporary work and the numbers of those who are permanently out of work rises to 5.7 million.

In fact, 7.1 million total people were reported as “job losers” by the BLS in July, meaning that they were unemployed because they had lost their job for one reason or another. Only 848,000 people reported being unemployed because they had quit their jobs. All told, a majority of people – 56.1 percent – are unemployed because they have lost their jobs, not because they have recently quit or entered the labor force. New entrants – college or high school graduates – who cannot find jobs are also classified as unemployed. This group accounts for 10.3 percent of the 12.8 million unemployed Americans in July.

A third group is those who have re-entered the labor force after dropping out. BLS considers people who haven’t looked for work in a month to have dropped out of the labor force. Once they resume looking for work, BLS counts them as unemployed. These formerly discouraged people account for 26.6 percent of the unemployed. All told, 93 percent of the unemployed did not have jobs because the economy was too weak to create work for them, resulting in their having been laid off, unsuccessfully looking for work, or graduating with no prospects.

4.4 Million

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What do jobless do when unemployment checks run out?
1 Aug.`12 - Since abruptly losing her $312 weekly unemployment check in June, Laurie Cullinan has depleted her savings, sought food from the Salvation Army and lit candles to save electricity.

If she can't find a job this month, the Royal Oak, Mich., resident worries she'll be evicted from her apartment, an unthinkable prospect for the 52-year-old, who enjoyed a solidly middle-class lifestyle until she lost her office-manager job two years ago. "What am I going to do if I'm homeless?" says Cullinan, who collected unemployment for 1½ years. "My mind won't let me comprehend that." Cullinan is among about 1 million long-term unemployed Americans whose jobless benefits are phasing out this year as the federal government reels in Great Recession lifelines that provided unemployment checks for as long as 99 weeks in many states. By year's end, another 2 million will see their checks cut off sooner than Cullinan's were, because extended unemployment benefits will end beyond the standard 26 weeks that states pay for. Congress could renew the program, but many economists say that's unlikely.

The cutbacks, required by a federal law passed in February, are already taking a toll. They are nudging some Americans into poverty, straining social services just as states and localities face their own budget woes and further crimping weak economic growth as those who lose benefits spend less. The number of jobless workers has fallen from over 15 million in early 2010 to about 13 million now, but the share of unemployed workers collecting jobless benefits has dropped more sharply. It was about two out of three in 2010, but it's less than one in two now. Next year only about one in four will receive payments, according to the National Employment Law Project (NELP).

"There's going to be lots of people without any income still unable to find a job," says George Wentworth, a senior staff attorney for NELP. "You're going to see these people not be able to feed their families and not able to pay their mortgages. It will have a devastating impact on a lot of local economies." Wentworth, like other advocates for the unemployed, says Congress was largely settled on some scaling back of benefits. The federal government spent $59 billion on extended unemployment benefits last year and the up-to-99-week periods of subsidies are unprecedented in any economic downturn.

The February legislation was seen as a compromise that kept payments flowing but phases them out as state unemployment rates fall from near-record levels. Yet the cutoffs are coming as job growth has slowed to an average monthly pace of 75,000 in the second quarter from 225,000 in the first quarter. Unemployment rates rose in 27 states in June. The government is expected to report today that the U.S. gained 100,000 jobs in July and the unemployment rate stayed at 8.2%, according to a consensus forecast of economists.

States eye ways to save