YESTERDAY OBAMA ANNOUNCED HIS APPOINTMENT OF DAILY FOR HIS CHIEF OF STAFF. THIS IS BECAUSE DAILY IS PART OF J.P. MORGAN BANKSTERS, ONE OF OBAMA’S BIGGEST BANKSTER DONORS AND RECIPIENTS OF OBAMA BANKSTER WELFARE. DAILY IS ALSO AN ADVOCATE FOR OPEN BORDERS FOR HORDES OF ILLEGALS TO CLIMB OUR BORDERS AND JOBS TO KEEP WAGES DEPRESSED!
OBAMA’S OWN MAN, BERNANKE SAYS THERE WILL BE NO JOBS FOR 5 YEARS, AND YET OBAMA, AND THE LA RAZA DEMS CONTINUE TO PUSH FOR AMNESTY, or at least continued NON-ENFORCEMENT OF LAWS PROHIBITING THE EMPLOYMENT OF ILLEGALS, no I.C.E., NO WALL, NO E-VERIFY, NO PROBLEM WITH ILLEGALS VOTING, and his ongoing assault on legals in ARIZONA!
US jobs report for December: No relief from mass unemployment
By Kate Randall
8 January 2011
The US unemployment rate fell to 9.4 percent in December from 9.8 percent in November, the Labor Department reported Friday. But while some government officials and financial analysts tried to put a positive spin on the numbers, the real news was the dismal number of jobs created and the decline in the workforce, as discouraged workers dropped out of the labor market.
The private sector added only 113,000 jobs to payrolls in December, while the government continued to shed staff, cutting 10,000 workers. The numbers came as somewhat of a shock, as just two days earlier the payroll processing firm ADP had indicated in its monthly survey that December private employment had risen by 297,000.
The number of so-called discouraged workers rose to 1.3 million in December, with about 260,000 adults dropping out of the labor market, bringing the overall participation rate in the US labor force to a new recession low of 64.3 percent. Of the 14.5 million people counted as unemployed in December by the Labor Department, 44.3 percent had been without work for 27 weeks or more.
The Labor Department’s jobless rate comes from a household survey and includes only those workers actively seeking employment, not workers who have given up their job searches. It is estimated that about half of the decrease in December unemployment figures came from people dropping out of the labor force.
The alternative U6 jobless count, also compiled by the Labor Department’s Bureau of Labor Statistics, includes discouraged workers as well as those forced to accept part-time employment. This measurement fell to 16.7 percent last month from 17 percent in December.
CNNMoney.com quoted John Silva, chief economist at Wells Fargo, as saying, “A lower unemployment rate is a mixed blessing. Yes, we are getting more people employed, but we appear to be losing people into the woodwork―not a good sign long-term.”
Some 8.5 million jobs have been lost since the beginning of the recession. The economy needs to create 125,000 to 150,000 jobs a month just to keep up with the natural growth in the working population, so the net total of 113,000 jobs added in December indicates continuing levels of unemployment at rates not seen since the 1930s. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the economy gained back only 700,000 jobs in 2010 after not adding any in 2009.
In a statement on the December jobless report, the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities estimated that the rate of job growth “would have to roughly triple between now and the end of 2015 just to restore labor market conditions―five years from now―to what they were at the start of the recession (roughly a 5 percent unemployment rate and higher labor force participation).”
Businesses that laid off workers in the course of the recession are doing very little new hiring. Wells Fargo’s Silva said, “It’s not like the 1960s and 1970s, when there were temporary layoffs and the workers were called back. These are not temporary layoffs. We have permanent layoffs, and that makes the job situation far more difficult.”
Austan Goolsbee, who chairs President Obama’s Council of Economic Advisers, called the December figures “encouraging,” adding that the administration would “continue to focus on actions that the president has recommended to increase growth and job-creation, such as providing incentives to encourage businesses to invest here at home, investing in education and infrastructure, and promoting exports abroad.”
Touring the Creek Manufacturing Company in Landover, Maryland on Friday, Obama said, “We know these numbers can bounce around month to month, but the trend is clear: We saw 12 straight months of private-sector job growth. That’s the first time that’s been true since 2006.”
The truth is that the Obama administration has provided no serious help to the millions of US jobless, rejecting out of hand any significant public works program or other form of government hiring. This contrasts sharply with his efforts to protect he wealth of the financial elite, including using trillions of tax dollars to bail out the banks and cutting a deal with the Republicans to extend the Bush-era tax cuts for the rich. Meanwhile, the minimal stimulus funds, including subsidies to deficit-ridden state and local governments, are drying up.
Federal Reserve Board Chairman Ben Bernanke offered a more sober assessment of the economic situation in an appearance Friday before the Senate Budget Committee. Questioned about the 103,000 net jobs gained in December, he said that if the pace of hiring did not increase “we’re not going to see sustained declines in the unemployment rate.”
The Fed chairman added that the jobless rate is likely to stand at around 8 percent two years from now. He also said that spending cuts would mean more layoffs by state and local governments, and warned that a growth in foreclosures in a depressed housing market could further depress home prices.
A report issued by the Labor Department earlier in the week showed that the unemployment rate rose in November in two-thirds of the largest US metropolitan areas. The jobless rate rose in 258 of the 372 largest cities, while falling in 88 and remaining the same in 26.
The report showed that the weak housing market was leading to increased job losses in states such as California, Nevada, Florida and Georgia. Las Vegas, Atlanta, San Francisco and Miami all have seen a rise in their jobless rates as construction jobs dry up and real estate and mortgage broker positions disappear.
The state of Michigan had a seasonally adjusted jobless rate for November of 12.4 percent, tied for second-highest with California, behind first-place Nevada. However, Tuesday’s Labor Department report showed that 14 metropolitan areas in the state reported lower unemployment rates in November, mainly due to people abandoning their job searches.
Of these 14 Michigan metropolitan areas, 13 had fewer people employed or looking for work. While the Detroit area saw its official jobless rate fall from 13.3 percent in October to 12 percent in November, its workforce dropped by 36,500, or 1.7 percent. Sophie Koropeckyj of Moody’s Analytics told the Associated Press, “That is not a good sign. It means that people are giving up and could be leaving the state.”
Despite the slight dip in Michigan’s official jobless rate, the state’s unemployment offices have been overwhelmed in recent weeks. The Daily Tribune of Southeastern Oakland County reported the case of a West Bloomfield man, Thomas Topper, 74, who receives $213 in jobless benefits every two weeks after being laid off a year ago from his school custodian job, which he took after working 43 years in the food industry business.
When Topper did not receive his second December check, he called Michigan’s Automated Response Voice Interactive Network (MARVIN) for four days last week and three days this week before he was able to get through to a human being and straighten out the problem.
The new year has already seen a steady stream of job-cut announcements across the country. The following is just a sampling:
• Fluor, a maintenance contractor for AK Steel in Rockport, Indiana, announced Friday that it was laying off 132 workers.
• 350 AT&T workers in Michigan, including 110 in the Grand Rapids area, were told their jobs were in danger due to automation and technological changes at the telecom giant.
• Fairchild Semiconductor in South Portland, Maine, which produces silicon chips for cell phones and other electronic devices, will be cutting 120 jobs over the next nine months.
• The Faurecia plant in Dexter, Missouri will be cutting its 1,042 workers down to about 500 by September. The French-based company makes exhaust systems for the auto industry.
• Space shuttle contractor United Space Alliance laid off about 150 employees at the Kennedy Space Center, effective Friday. The layoffs are the first of potentially thousands as the Houston-based company prepares for the end of the shuttle missions.
• Waltham, Mass.-based NeuroMetrix, maker of equipment to measure nerve conduction, is disbanding its direct sales operation and laying off 27 percent of its workforce.
• Effective January 14, Detroit Public Schools plans to lay off 88 of 175 bus attendants who assist special education and disabled students. Of the 15,000 special education students enrolled in Detroit schools, half of them are transported by bus. The layoffs will leave about 27 of 114 bus routes without an attendant.
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Michelle Malkin
The U.S. Department of Illegal Alien Labor
President Obama's Labor Secretary Hilda Solis is supposed to represent American workers. What you need to know is that this longtime open–borders sympathizer has always had a rather radical definition of "American." At a Latino voter registration project conference in Los Angeles many years ago, Solis asserted to thunderous applause, "We are all Americans, whether you are legalized or not."
That's right. The woman in charge of enforcing our employment laws doesn't give a hoot about our immigration laws –– or about the fundamental distinction between those who followed the rules in pursuit of the American dream and those who didn't.
While in Congress, she opposed strengthening the border fence, supported expansion of illegal alien benefits (including driver's licenses and in–state tuition discounts), embraced sanctuary cities that refused to cooperate with federal homeland security officials to enforce immigration laws, and aggressively championed a mass amnesty. Solis was steeped in the pro–illegal alien worker organizing movement in Southern California and was buoyed by amnesty–supporting Big Labor groups led by the Service Employees International Union. She has now caused a Capitol Hill firestorm over her new taxpayer–funded advertising and outreach campaign to illegal aliens regarding fair wages:
"I'm here to tell you that your president, your secretary of labor and this department will not allow anyone to be denied his or her rightful pay –– especially when so many in our nation are working long, hard and often dangerous hours," Solis says in the video pitch. "We can help, and we will help. If you work in this country, you are protected by our laws. And you can count on the U.S. Department of Labor to see to it that those protections work for you."
To be sure, no one should be scammed out of "fair wages." Employers that hire and exploit illegal immigrant workers deserve full sanctions and punishment. But it's the timing, tone–deafness and underlying blanket amnesty agenda of Solis' illegal alien outreach that has so many American workers and their representatives on Capitol Hill rightly upset.
With double–digit unemployment and a growing nationwide revolt over Washington's border security failures, why has Solis chosen now to hire 250 new government field investigators to bolster her illegal alien workers' rights campaign? (Hint: Leftists unhappy with Obama's lack of progress on "comprehensive immigration reform" need appeasing. This is a quick bone to distract them.)
Unfortunately, the federal government is not alone in lavishing attention and resources on workers who shouldn't be here in the first place. As of 2008, California, Florida, Nevada, New York, Texas and Utah all expressly included illegal aliens in their state workers' compensation plans –– and more than a dozen other states implicitly cover them.
Solis' public service announcement comes on the heels of little–noticed but far more troubling comments encouraging illegal alien workers in the Gulf Coast. Earlier this month, in the aftermath of the BP oil spill, according to Spanish language publication El Diario La Prensa, Solis signaled that her department was going out of its way to shield illegal immigrant laborers involved in cleanup efforts. "My purpose is to assist the workers with respect to safety and protection," she said. "We're protecting all workers regardless of migration status because that's the federal law." She told reporters that her department was in talks with local Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials who had visited coastal worksites to try to verify that workers were legal.
No word yet on whether she gave ICE her "we are all Americans, whether you are legalized or not" lecture. But it's a safe bet.
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MEXICANOCCUPATION.blogspot.com
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FAIRUS.org
The Administration's Phantom Immigration Enforcement Policy
According to DHS’s own reports, very little of our nation’s borders (Southwestern or otherwise) are secure, and gaining control is not even a goal of the department.
By Ira Mehlman
Published on 12/07/2009
Townhall.com
The setting was not quite the flight deck of the U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln with a “Mission Accomplished” banner as the backdrop, but it was the next best thing. Speaking at the Center for American Progress (CAP) on Nov. 13, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano declared victory over illegal immigration and announced that the Obama administration is ready to move forward with a mass amnesty for the millions of illegal aliens already living in the United States.
Arguing the Obama administration’s case for amnesty, Napolitano laid out what she described as the “three-legged stool” for immigration reform. As the administration views it, immigration reform must include “a commitment to serious and effective enforcement, improved legal flows for families and workers, and a firm but fair way to deal with those who are already here.”
Acknowledging that a lack of confidence in the government’s ability and commitment to effectively enforce the immigration laws it passes proved to be the Waterloo of previous efforts to gain amnesty for illegal aliens, Napolitano was quick to reassure the American public that those concerns could be put to rest.
“For starters, the security of the Southwest border has been transformed from where it was in 2007,” stated the secretary. Not only is the border locked up tight, she continued, but the situation is well in-hand in the interior of the country as well. “We’ve also shown that the government is serious and strategic in its approach to enforcement by making changes in how we enforce the law in the interior of the country and at worksites…Furthermore, we’ve transformed worksite enforcement to truly address the demand side of illegal immigration.”
If Rep. Joe Wilson had been in attendance to hear Secretary Napolitano’s CAP speech he might well have had a few choice comments to offer. But since he wasn’t, we will have to rely on the Department of Homeland Security’s own data to assess the veracity of Napolitano’s claims.
According to DHS’s own reports, very little of our nation’s borders (Southwestern or otherwise) are secure, and gaining control is not even a goal of the department. DHS claims to have “effective control” over just 894 miles of border. That’s 894 out of 8,607 miles they are charged with protecting. As for the other 7,713 miles? DHS’s stated border security goal for FY 2010 is the same 894 miles.
The administration’s strategic approach to interior and worksite enforcement is just as chimerical as its strategy at the border, unless one considers shuffling paper to be a strategy. DHS data, released November 18, show that administrative arrests of immigration law violators fell by 68 percent between 2008 and 2009. The department also carried out 60 percent fewer arrests for criminal violations of immigration laws, 58 percent fewer criminal indictments, and won 63 percent fewer convictions.
While the official unemployment rate has climbed from 7.6 percent when President Obama took office in January to 10 percent today, the administration’s worksite enforcement strategy has amounted to a bureaucratic game of musical chairs. The administration has all but ended worksite enforcement actions and replaced them with paperwork audits. When the audits determine that illegal aliens are on the payroll, employers are given the opportunity to fire them with little or no adverse consequence to the company, while no action is taken to remove the illegal workers from the country. The illegal workers simply acquire a new set of fraudulent documents and move on to the next employer seeking workers willing to accept substandard wages.
In Janet Napolitano’s alternative reality a mere 10 percent of our borders under “effective control” and sharp declines in arrests and prosecutions of immigration lawbreakers may be construed as confidence builders, but it is hard to imagine that the American public is going to see it that way. If anything, the administration’s record has left the public less confident that promises of future immigration enforcement would be worth the government paper they’re printed on.
As Americans scrutinize the administration’s plans to overhaul immigration policy, they are likely to find little in the “three-legged stool” being offered that they like or trust. The first leg – enforcement – the administration has all but sawed off. The second – increased admissions of extended family members and workers – makes little sense with some 25 million Americans either unemployed or relegated to part-time work. And the third – amnesty for millions of illegal aliens – is anathema to their sense of justice and fair play.
As Americans well know, declaring “Mission Accomplished” and actually accomplishing a mission are two completely different things. When it comes to enforcing immigration laws, the only message the public is receiving from this administration is “Mission Aborted.”
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