Yellen: ‘I Don’t Think the Addition to Unemployment Compensation Is Really a Factor That’s Making a Difference’ in Unemployment Numbers
(CNSNews.com) – Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said Friday that the extra unemployment compensation funds were not a factor that made a difference in last month’s jobs numbers.
As CNSNews.com reported, the economy added 266,000 jobs in April, far fewer than the 770,000 (revised) added in March and the 536,000 added in February.
The secretary cited lack of child care and full-time in-person schooling as well as concern about the health consequences of the pandemic.
So first of all, I would note that the jobs report is a little bit stronger than the headline numbers might suggest on the hiring front. The number of people working part-time for economic reasons, namely involuntary part-time work, that number declined by 600,000, and hours- average hours of work ticked up by a 10th, so that means an extra margin in which employers are able to boost their labor is by adding to hours of existing employees, and that those employees want that extra work. They were involuntarily working part-time.
The labor market is volatile from month to month, and I think the best thing is to average through and say we’ve been creating over 500,000 jobs a month on average over the last three months. It’s clear that there are people who are not ready and able to go back into the labor force. Many children are back in school but not on a regular schedule.
It’s a challenge for parents to manage schedules where one child is in school a couple days a week and another child is in school some different days during the week, so caregiving responsibilities in absence of childcare are still important reasons why people are unable to return to work. You know concern about the pandemic and the health consequences I think remains a factor for many.
You know, I don’t think that the additional, the addition to unemployment compensation is really a factor that’s making a difference. There’s no question we’re hearing from businesses that they are having difficulty hiring workers, although over 300,000 workers I’d point out were added this last month in leisure and hospitality, which is the most badly affected sector, but when we look across states or across sectors or across workers, and if that were really the extra benefits that were holding back hiring, you’d see that even in states or for workers or in sectors where the replacement rate due to UI is very high.
You would expect to see lower job finding rates, and in fact, what you see is the exact opposite. You know, we have had a very unusual hit to our economy and the road back is going to be somewhat bumpy. We have to expect there are a variety of bottlenecks that are also relevant. So we’ve seen motor vehicle production shutdown in some places because of a shortage of semiconductors. There was a loss of jobs there this month.
They were setbacks in the lumber industry because of shortages there. Starting up an economy again trying to get it back on track after a pandemic in which there are a lot of supply bottlenecks is going to be I think a bumpy process, but I really don’t think the major factor is the extra unemployment.
Yellen said that April’s jobs represented “continued progress.”
"We have added an average of over half a million jobs during the past three months, and we saw promising growth with 331,000 jobs in leisure and hospitality, which includes the restaurants and bars that have been so badly battered by this pandemic," she said.
"We should also be encouraged by the ongoing expansion of the labor force. It’s a promising sign of our economy winning out over the pandemic. Last month, the labor market expanded as more people reported they are looking for work. Hours are increasing, and the share of workers forced into part-time jobs is declining. Indeed, we have made remarkable progress. After all, one year ago, we learned we’d lost over 20 million jobs in one single month," Yellen added.
The secretary said that when she first came to Washington in the early ‘90s, “a higher percentage of American women worked than almost any other developed nation.”
Out of the 22 wealthiest countries, we ranked 6th in the labor force participation. By 2010, America fell to 17th. By the eve of the pandemic, women’s labor force participation was hovering somewhere near where it had been in the late ‘80s and early ‘90s.
Male labor force participation has fared even worse. A smaller percentage of men are working now than at any point in the last 70 years. There are many drivers to these trends, but as my colleagues at the Council of Economic Advisers have pointed out, an undeniable one is the lack of support for people as they raise children and care for older relatives.
Our policymaking has not accounted for the fact that people’s work lives and their personal lives are inextricably linked, and if one suffers, so does the other. The pandemic has made this very clear. Between February and April of 2020, 4.2 million women dropped out of the labor force in large part due to an unexpected caregiving burden. Nearly 2 million have not yet returned.
The challenge before us is to help these 2 million women to return to the labor market, but to help the millions of other workers who left prior to the pandemic to do the same. It’s a core reason that last week President Biden proposed the American Families Plan. The plan offers up to $8000 to pay for child care and make sure kids from low-income families can attend for free.
It offers universal pre-K to three- and four-year-olds, and it provides up to 12 weeks unpaid family and medical leave. With today’s jobs numbers, I am confident we will have a strong, prosperous economy this year and in 2022, but what about the rest of the decade in the years beyond? Our country’s long-term economic health depends on whether we invest in American families and workers, and I’m very hopeful we will.
More Americans Working in April, But the Unemployment Rate Rises to 6.1%
(CNSNews.com) - Friday's jobs report reflects a reopening economy that still has a long way to go to match its Trump-era strength.
Contrary to bullish expectations, the unemployment rate actually ticked up a tenth of a point to 6.1 percent in April, and the economy added 266,000 jobs, far fewer than the 770,000 (revised) added in March and the 536,000 added in February.
Notably, the number of employed Americans increased in April for the 12th consecutive month since the economy tanked under COVID pressure in April 2020. Last month, BLS said 151,176,000 Americans were employed. That is 318,000 more than in March, and 1,145,000 more than when Joe Biden took office in January.
But the number of unemployed American also increased (+102,000) to 9,812,000 last month, boosting the unemployment rate slightly.
In April, the civilian non-institutional population in the United States was 261,103,000. That included all people 16 and older who did not live in an institution, such as a prison, nursing home or long-term care facility.
Of that civilian non-institutional population, 160,988,000 were participating in the labor force, meaning they either had a job or were actively seeking one during the last month. This resulted in a labor force participation rate of 61.7 percent in April, an improvement from the 61.5 percent rate in March.
The number of Americans counted as not in the labor force, meaning they didn't have a job and were not looking for one -- dipped again in April to 100,115,000 compared with 100,445,000 in March. Of those 100,115,000 counted as not in the labor force, BLS said 2.8 million were prevented from looking for work in April because of the pandemic. That number is down from 3.7 million in March.
BLS also notes that 9.4 million people said they were unable to work in April because their employer closed or lost business due to the pandemic--that is, they did not work at all or worked fewer hours at some point in the last 4 weeks due to the pandemic. This measure is down from 11.4 million in the previous month.
Among those who reported in April that they were unable to work because of pandemic-related closures or lost business, 9.3 percent received at least some pay from their employer for the hours not worked, little changed from the previous month.
Among the major worker groups, the unemployment rates for adult men (6.1 percent), adult women (5.6 percent), teenagers (12.3 percent), Whites (5.3 percent), Blacks (9.7 percent), Asians (5.7 percent), and Hispanics (7.9 percent) showed little or no change in April.
The Labor Department's Bureau of Labor Statistics said notable job gains occurred in leisure and hospitality, increasing by 331,000, as pandemic-related restrictions eased in many parts of the country.
More than half of the increase was in food services and drinking places (+187,000). Job gains also occurred in amusements, gambling, and recreation (+73,000) and in accommodation (+54,000). Although leisure and hospitality has added 5.4 million jobs over the year, employment in the industry is down by 2.8 million, or 16.8 percent, since February 2020.
BLS said notable employment declines occurred in temporary help services, in couriers and messengers, in manufacturing and in retailing.
Sen. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.) told Fox News on Friday he thinks a "combination of factors" accounts for Friday's lackluster jobs report:
"Some people are reluctant to go back to the (work) environment -- they're still concerned about COVID," Toomey said. "Other people have problems that their kids aren't back in school so they're at home. And another factor in all of this is systematically paying unemployment benefits that are more than a person makes working doesn't create an environment that's particularly conducive for going back to work."
President Joe Biden will speak about today's jobs report later on this Friday, no doubt taking another opportunity to promote his American Jobs Plan.
George W. Bush Lobbies Republicans to Work with Joe Biden on Amnesty for Illegal Aliens
Former President George W. Bush is lobbying House and Senate Republicans to work with President Joe Biden on amnesty for illegal aliens.
In an interview with the Dispatch Podcast, Bush said Biden and Republicans ought to strike a deal to provide amnesty, at the least, to illegal aliens enrolled in or eligible for former President Obama’s Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program.
“I think piecemeal probably makes sense and I think the president, if I could be so bold, is calling Republicans like-minded and saying ‘Let’s see if we can get something done,'” Bush said.
“Comprehensive may be too big of a reach right now,” Bush continued. “Like if they can get DACA done with some kind of border enhancement, you know plans to give Republicans comfort in voting for the bill, then all of the sudden there’s confidence to be gained.”
The statements come as Bush helps lead a charge among a Democrat-Republican coalition, big business interests, and the open borders lobby to provide amnesty to potentially millions of illegal aliens — a plan to which Biden gave a resounding endorsement in his first address to Congress last week.
In the address, Biden touted his amnesty for 11 to 22 million illegal aliens living in the United States while also urging Congress to pass two other amnesties: One for potentially 4.4 million illegal aliens and another for 2.1 million illegal aliens working on farms.
Bush, in recent weeks, revealed he is working the Koch network — run by the billionaire Koch brothers estate — to help Biden pass amnesty for illegal aliens. Not passing amnesty, Bush previously said, was his biggest disappointment as president.
The push comes as a survey from the pro-migration, Koch-funded Cato Institute reveals the extent to which Bush is out of step with Republican and conservative voters, as well as the majority of Americans.
The survey found 6-in-10 Americans want less overall immigration to the U.S., including 75 percent of Republicans and 76 percent of conservatives. Similarly, the survey showed 72 percent of Americans would prefer less immigration to the U.S. and more public benefits over more immigration and less public benefits.
Likewise, the survey confirmed opposing birthright citizenship is a mainstream Republican-held position.
In exclusive statements to Breitbart News, Republican staffers on Capitol Hill described Bush as an irrelevant globalist who does not represent the GOP’s base of voters or the majority of those in elected office.
“Republicans are well aware that his presidency was a national disaster on this issue as he failed to act when needed. Bush immigration policy has no impact today other than a reference on what not to do,” one House GOP aide said.
John Binder is a reporter for Breitbart News. Email him at jbinder@breitbart.com. Follow him on Twitter here.
150 Migrants Apprehended, Armed Smuggler Arrested in Failed Smuggling Attempts near Border in Texas
Del Rio Sector Border Patrol agents apprehended more than 150 migrants and an armed human smuggler in multiple failed human smuggling attempts over the weekend. The arrests took place as smugglers packed migrants into a variety of vehicles, including a stolen vehicle.
Del Rio Sector Chief Patrol Agent Austin Skero tweeted photos of multiple failed smuggling attempts where human smugglers packed migrants into vehicles. The interdictions led to the arrest of more than 150 migrants and at least one armed smuggler during vehicle stops by Border Patrol agents and other law enforcement partners.
Skero reported at least one of the human smugglers arrested had a gun in their possession. In another smuggling incident, agents recovered a stolen vehicle.
Skero also tweeted the punishment handed down to a U.S. citizen teenager who was recruited into the human smuggling business with promises of “easy money.” The 19-year-old convicted human smuggler now faces a sentence of 24 months in prison and three years of probation, Skero stated.
Bob Price serves as associate editor and senior news contributor for the Breitbart Texas-Border team. He is an original member of the Breitbart Texas team. Price is a regular panelist on Fox 26 Houston’s What’s Your Point? Sunday-morning talk show. Follow him on Twitter @BobPriceBBTX and Face
Migrant Charged with Threatening Fellow Traveler with Knife to Avoid Arrest
A Laredo Sector Border Patrol agent successfully arrested a Mexican migrant who allegedly threatened a fellow migrant. The migrant reportedly put a knife to the other migrant’s neck in an attempt to avoid apprehension.
A Laredo South Station Border Patrol agent apprehended a group of three migrants on Thursday, according to a tweet from Chief Border Patrol Agent Matthew Hudak. As the agent attempted to take the three migrants into custody, one of the migrants pulled a knife and held it to the neck of a fellow traveler.
The agent said the Mexican migrant, later identified as Eduardo Segovia-Luna, tried to use the other migrant as a human shield and demanded to be released. The agent ordered Segovia-Luna to drop his weapon.
A standoff ensued as the agent awaited backup. Once other agents arrived, Segovia-Luna dropped the knife and surrendered, Hudak said in his tweet.
The three migrants reportedly entered the United States illegally.
Segovia-Luna now faces criminal charges connected to the assault on the second migrant, Hudak reported.
Bob Price serves as associate editor and senior news contributor for the Breitbart Texas-Border team. He is an original member of the Breitbart Texas team. Price is a regular panelist on Fox 26 Houston’s Sunday-morning talk show, What’s Your Point? Follow him on Twitter @BobPriceBBTX, Parler @BobPrice, and Facebook.
Bob Price serves as associate editor and senior news contributor for the Breitbart Texas-Border team. He is an original member of the Breitbart Texas team. Price is a regular panelist on Fox 26 Houston’s What’s Your Point? Sunday-morning talk show. Follow him on Twitter @BobPriceBBTX and Face
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