Four More Days

In the latest jobs report, American unemployment rose to 7.9 percent. The unemployed number increased by 170,000, to 12.3 million.

That rate is higher than the day Barack Obama took office.

Were workers unemployed long enough to have been dropped from Labor Department statistics added back in, the rate of unemployment would be closer to 14 percent.

According to Keith Hall, former Bureau of Labor Statistics chief: “We’re still talking nine or ten years” before the economy gets back to normal.

In a statement made after the numbers were announced, Mitt Romney said: “Today’s increase in the unemployment rate is a sad reminder that the economy is at a virtual standstill. The jobless rate is higher than it was when President Obama took office, and there are still 23 million Americans struggling for work. … When I’m president, I’m going to make real changes that lead to a real recovery, so that the next four years are better than the last.”

Additionally, incomes for working Americans continue to decline. According to the latest Labor Department report, average hourly earnings dropped another cent to $23.58.

Meanwhile, the rise in food stamp usage is astonishing.

According to statistics compiled by the Senate Budget Committee, for every person added to the job rolls since January 2009, 75 people have been added to the food stamp rolls.  Since January 2009, 194,000 new jobs have been created. In that same amount of time, 14.7 million have been begun receiving food stamps.

“Simply put, the President’s policies have not produced jobs. During his time in office, 14.7 million people were added to the food stamp rolls. Over that same time, only 194,000 jobs were created—thus 76 people went on food stamps for every one that found a job. This is a product of low growth. Post-recession economic growth in 2010 was 2.4 percent, and dropped in 2011 to 1.8 percent. This year it has dropped again to 1.77 percent. Few, if any, net jobs will be created with growth of less than 2 percent” said Senator Jeff Sessions, a ranking member of the Senate Budget Committee.

America deserves better.

Four more days.

https://mjfellright.wordpress.com/2012/11/02/four-more-days/