Unemployment over 10%

[lib]

Originally Posted by Taymaishu

Wow, 5.8% here in Australia - can't fathom 10% at all.

Hope everyone over in the US is going OK.

Some are doing great, some are completely !@%ed. It depends on where you're located in the country and what kind of work you do.

It ranges from 4.2% in one state to 15.3% a few states away:
http://www.bls.gov/web/laumstrk.htm

[TurboFan]

Originally Posted by lyndon_h

You can't have it both ways...
You can't run in fear that a deep depression is coming and employment will hit 20% if something isn't done, then complain that what was done is now hurting our growth now that things are settling back to normal. What would have happened if we let WellsFargo, BankOfAmerica, CITI, GM, Chrysler, AIG and others fail? I can assure you the recession would not be ending. Also, you could easily add another 5 million to the number of recently unemployed.

Spending will have to be checked, but I don't think that you can efficiently keep spending steady and grow an economy in a recession.

I'm not suggesting both ways. You can spend wisely, with some fiscal restraint, or go on a drunken spending spree as the government did the last 12 months. I advocate for taking a little more time to spend with some diligence. Running out and throwing around money as our government did looked nice in the headlines, but the general consensus among economists from the WSJ to writers at The Economist is tremendous amounts of money were wasted. That is money that will will need to pay back, but we will not see return on that investment.

Add in $1.2T in proposed health care spending, and we are dropping an anchor on our future growth.

[Kroy]

Originally Posted by Zell

With inelastic demand, it'd benefit the crap out of the oil companies. Too bad we import all of our oil. If we could raise prices on our own home-grown stuff that is inelastic then that would be good. Mark up the crap out of cigarettes, alcohol, cigars, and dip.

We already do. I think it's stupid; they should do universal tax that everyone will pay into.

[Heinzftw]

Originally Posted by Zell

With inelastic demand, it'd benefit the crap out of the oil companies. Too bad we import all of our oil. If we could raise prices on our own home-grown stuff that is inelastic then that would be good. Mark up the crap out of cigarettes, alcohol, cigars, and dip.

Did you know in New York cigs are roughly 10$/pack?
In California cigs range from 5-7$
Dip depending on quality anywhere from $3-6.50/can.
And alcohol is already damn expensive, evasive taxing can only go so far. fail

[purespeed]

Interesting chart concerning unemployment for most groups. Drag your cursor over the chart.


http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2...ent-lines.html

[Zell]

Originally Posted by Heinzftw

Did you know in New York cigs are roughly 10$/pack?
In California cigs range from 5-7$
Dip depending on quality anywhere from $3-6.50/can.
And alcohol is already damn expensive

I know. It's great People still buy it regardless. Awesome source of government revenue. They're non-essential items that people just pay out the wazzu for. They complain and moan about how expensive it is, but they'll still buy it. Inelastic demand is a wonderful thing.