Economics Thread

57Brave said:
EJ Dionne
@EJDionne
·
9m
“The economy lost 140,000 jobs in December....The report showed the havoc that the pandemic continues to wreak on the economy.”
⁦
@emrosenberg
⁩ ⁦
In the midst of Trumpian chaos, new jobs report shows the urgency of further stimulus, economic relief.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/01/08/jobs-report-unemployment-december-2020/
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That puts his final record right at 4 million jobs lost in only 4 years. By far the worst economic record of any US President. By compairson GWB added 1 million new jobs in his 8 years. Obama added 12 million new jobs in 8 years.
 
It's going to be tough for a few months, but there is the potential for a strong rebound once most people have been vaccinated.
 
cajunrevenge said:
That puts his final record right at 4 million jobs lost in only 4 years. By far the worst economic record of any US President. By compairson GWB added 1 million new jobs in his 8 years. Obama added 12 million new jobs in 8 years.
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While perhaps correct (didn't check), this is a bogus take. Pretty much the whole world is being pummeled.
 
Canada reported their December employment data today too.

Unemployment rate up 3.0% in the past year to 8.6%

Number of jobs down 3.0% in the past year

Labor force participation rate down 0.6% in the past year

U.S. in comparison:

Unemployment rate up 3.1% to 6.7%

Number of jobs down 6.2%

Labor force participation down 1.8%

I don't think the comparison is as unfavorable as that. Canada has opted to support people through pre-existing payrolls (basically paying payrolls for the companies) and we have opted to help people via the unemployment insurance program.

But my sense is we have spent a huge amount of money (as a percentage of GDP) compared to other countries on various programs to support the economy. And the results are disappointing given the scale of spending. We've kind of depended on the doctrine of overwhelming firepower and have been profligate about how well we are aiming that firepower.

I haven't seen much detail from Biden's team, except they want to do more. So we may continue along the same lines. Overwhelming firepower but not very efficient in terms of targeting.

The one change I am looking forward to is the federal government helping out state and local. State and local have cut over 1.3 million jobs this year. And that is one area where federal help would be fairly efficient in terms of preserving jobs and services.

Additional $2,000 checks to every household is a bad idea. It is a lot of money directed to people who have not been hurt financially by the pandemic.
 
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Its the same context every other President is held to. The economic meltdown in 2008 had nothing to do with Obama but we dont excuse that from his record when talking about economic success. If we did then his record would actually be 16 million new jobs added. Protecting the country from all threats is the President's job. We can debate till the end of time what would have happened if anyone other than Trump was President regarding Coronavirus but what I think is undeniable is that Republicans wouldnt be excusing the virus as an unpreventable catastrophe if it happened under a Democrat. Just the constant conspiracy theories and partisan attacks by Trump relating to the virus did immense damage to the countries ability to protect from the virus. He has as much control over his side as any politician I can remember. If he used that to unify the country during the national crisis caused by the virus we would be in much better shape right now and he would probably be gloating on twatter about his historic re-election right now.
 
cajunrevenge said:
Its the same context every other President is held to. The economic meltdown in 2008 had nothing to do with Obama but we dont excuse that from his record when talking about economic success. If we did then his record would actually be 16 million new jobs added. Protecting the country from all threats is the President's job. We can debate till the end of time what would have happened if anyone other than Trump was President regarding Coronavirus but what I think is undeniable is that Republicans wouldnt be excusing the virus as an unpreventable catastrophe if it happened under a Democrat. Just the constant conspiracy theories and partisan attacks by Trump relating to the virus did immense damage to the countries ability to protect from the virus. He has as much control over his side as any politician I can remember. If he used that to unify the country during the national crisis caused by the virus we would be in much better shape right now and he would probably be gloating on twatter about his historic re-election right now.
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a very tough problem landed on an incompetent president's desk...the results were not surprising
 
Jaw said:
The numbers I have seen look pretty middle of the road compared to everywhere else.
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i think we have thrown a lot more money at the problem (as a % of GDP) than other countries...i'll have to look at that a bit more carefully
 
cajunrevenge said:
https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2021/01/08/economy/women-job-losses-pandemic/index.html



Somehow all the job losses in December were women. Women lost 156k jobs and men gained 16k. How the **** does that happen?
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Did construction jobs gain? I would guess construction jobs are male dominant. No idea, but I could see it going something like this...

Restaurants/retail lost jobs with the majority in this group being women. At the same time construction gained with the overwhelming majority being men.

And I could be way off too.
 
i don't think the establishment survey (which is the survey that produces the non-farm payrolls data) breaks thinks down by sex

there is a second survey (the household survey) which is used to calculate the unemployment rate...that one has women employed down 192,000 in December and men up 214,000...those numbers do bounce around month to month because any survey will have some volatility from sampling error

For the year as a whole, the household survey shows jobs held by men down 4,514,000 and jobs held by women down 4,390,000.
 
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Time to turn cash into assets.

$15 minimum wage. That's the Capitol ****ting on rural America.
 
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