"The number of new jobless claims in the United States rose by 1.2 percent to 652,000 during the week ending March 21 as the country reeled from recession, the Labor Department said Thursday.The initial claims for unemployment benefits was roughly in line with the 650,000 figure forecast by analysts and marked an increase of 8,000 from the previous week's revised figure of 644,000.The claims peaked two weeks ago at 657,000, a 26-year high.The four-week moving average of initial claims, a more reliable indicator of unemployment trends, was 649,000, down by 1,000 from the previous week's revised average of 650,000, the department said.It said that the number of people receiving unemployment benefits for the week ending March 14 increased to a new record high of 5.56 million, an increase of 122,000 from the preceding week's revised level of 5.43 million."
Raw Story Snippet , do link to title for more....
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Do read the Comments on this post:::
Fran brought up a really Important Point below, for each of those laid off there is Now More People without Health Care and Health Insurance, it is really true...I am working on a post right now that I am actually trying to revise the Un-Insured Numbers and Under-Insured Numbers, it should be up this weekend.
Also Walking Man who lives in Michigan makes a point about Un Employment and in Michigan it is 22%....he is right that we NEED the Infrastructure Projects to start NOW...I agree we need WPA projects....and they need to start SOON...otherwise we are in for a long hot devastating summer....
6 comments:
Detroit proper has now hit 22% unemployment which is just slightly shy of the 25-50% of 1933. I do believe that we need to quit calling this a recession now. I also believe it is time to re-enact WPA not dole money out to states, especially MI which has no true vision, but rather start massive federally controlled employment programs to move heavily into urban areas and do the work necessary to either tear down, rehab or renovate the existing infrastructure.
That's what the president was saying in his virtual town hall, that the numbers were going to get worse before they got better.. I am afraid he is right. I wish it could be different, but with school soon getting out, the military soon coming home, the numbers will go up. But, the money should soon start really going out and that will start helping, once the weather really breaks and construction can start everywhere, we should really see some positive signs.
Problem there are just more & more waves of big layoffs- even GM is letting go white collar workers... the execs!!! I just worry about so many on unemployment. It's very concerning.... and I put no blame on Obama for the creation of this mess. For SURE he inherited it & never have the financial cards been stacked in this way before.
I'll give a little window into one segment-- the STIM has been a lifeline to the unemployed-- the weekly amount of the unemployment check was raised a bit about $5 bucks a week-- $20 bucks a month. Anything helps.
Thye also came up with an assist of 65% payment of COBRA continued health insurance coverage.
That is a real lifeline-- but from what I understand- the employer is supposed tp pay the difference... not sure if they are to be repaid in tax cuts later or how it works-- it is a very new program.
But what happens if the company files for bankruptcy & all assets are frozen?
In our case the employer sent a letter saying never mind that COBRA to follow letter, we just realized we were self employed & therefore COBRA does not kick in. So long suckers! Not only is there not future insurance forthcoming, but when they terminated employees, & 3 days later filed for bankruptcy, they pulled the plug on the health insurance... without giving notice to the employees.
Once you have the "lapse of coverage", getting insurance becomes very difficult, and insurance companies can penalize you with non coverage of "pre existing conditions".
My point is you don't just lose your job & wage, but health care insurance too.
Here is a kicker-- the local paper ran a story of a guy who lost his construction job. He was making about $500 a week on unemployment. He was called up to do a temporary job- which lasted 2 weeks. That caused unemployment to reconfigure his unemployment benefits-- for the rest of the year he got $200 a week. That put his family into poverty level & they then qualified for food stamps.
Just taking "any work"- he probably hoped the temporary position would turn permanent or lead to more work... he would have been better off NOT working the 2 weeks. He tried to appeal but appeals were denied. His family had never before been on public assistance.
The job loss creates waves of other problems....
and the lack of medical coverage is going to have a huge impact on the health care system.
It will also strain local food banks, and food stamp monies, plus so man have already lost their homes.
Job loss creates a domino effect.
Unfortunately, the world wide population of people available to do labor intensive, low education jobs is mushrooming while the number of available jobs decreases.
Unless we engage in massive infrastructure investment, there is no way to employ those people and the situation will get worse not better.
again --- the focus remains on "Saving" the banks - and the financial firms -
again with the voodoo economics (to quote David Stockman) - this saving private bank doesnt trickle down.
it is almost as if we really need a total collapse to make the point
Dcap..
I know..
I don't get it...at all..
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