Actual U.S. Unemployment: 15.8%

reply to post by Republican08


Yes be afraid of the big evil communist baby eating countries! China is in a resource battle with you...they will win in the end,but they most definetly dont want to see america fall.They like all that faux money,the little ones and zeros on their money computer makes them all warm and fuzzy inside,its so easy!!

reply to post by wonderworld


I'm from MI, and that is exactly what is happening. It isn't just the plants. It's all the surrounding stores, bars, printers, supplies. Case in point. There is this little family bar/restaurant that closes down same as the GM plant shuts down, they say it's a waste to stay open when the GM employees are their main customer. They are closing up shop as well.
It's come to the point at family gatherings and frienship outings, the conversation is who lost a job, who is close to loosing a job, and if you hear of anything let me know.

Im in the same boat. I was working full time and a full time student when I got laid off. I applied for unemployment but was denied because I couldn't work a 9-5 job Mon-Fri. So even though I am unemployed, I don't count in the stats.
Sneaky crap like this and people just giving up looking for work is what makes the numbers lower so everyone feels better.

What really sucks about the so called welfare system is you have to be totally destitute before they will do anything to help. If you own any property other than the primary residence no help. IF you own a car that is worth more than $1500 no help. If you have any trusts, burial insurance, life insurance or anything of value they want you to sell it and come back when you are broke.

I had a friend out of work and needed a bit of help until her new job started which was to be 4 weeks. She had used every bit of cash she could beg, borrow or steal and had no choice. Though she was a renter, and had nothing but a car that was worth $2500 that was needed to get to her new job, they told her that as long as she was unwilling to sell the vehicle to take her kids to the mission for meals and sleep where ever she could when the eviction came.

Nice system eh? I feel so bad for those in the middle. The rich are making it, the poor can get help and have never made it, and the poor guys in the middle get shafted. They have to pay all the taxes the rich get out of with their loopholes and when they do need help they are expected to grovel and give up a life time of help for bare existence. Pitiful.

Originally posted by redhead57
What really sucks about the so called welfare system is you have to be totally destitute before they will do anything to help.

Isn't that how it should be, before you go to this gangsta government and ask them to jack your neighbor so you can pay your cable TV bill? Welfare should be the option of LAST resort. You have nothing left but the cloths on your back and the shoes on your feet before you resort to TAKING money involuntarily from your neighbors as a means to pay for your next cheeseburger. It's just not right that some are able to TAKE resources from another while they still have resources of their own they can sell and live on. Heck, borrow some money to tie you over before involuntarily robbing your neighbor via Uncle Sham. Beg if you have too. Beggars deserve a LOT more respect than welfare recipients, as they are soliciting welfare assistance from you VOLUNTARILY, something that can't be said for welfare recipients who go to this gansta government that will send men with guns to your home if you refuse to fork over money for others to live on.

ya every time those deceptive intellectual prostitutes that call themselves media say ...." well unemployment was still higher in the 70's and early 80's recessions" i just laugh...........and wonder how many other people are calling these people out on this...........they are really trying to manage perception.......just show's that they look at certain study's and think tanks and believe they can effect reality by manipulating the reporting of the current reality to induce more consumption and thus a better future reality than if they just reported how bad things were...........


we are at approx 16 unemployment............higher than in the 70's /80 i believe.........the numbers were politicized by Corporate lobbyists who wanted to reduce public outcry and gov't resistance to the massive loss of jobs due to offshoring of labor.........yes those "official" lies make everything all right.

[edit on 11-5-2009 by cpdaman]

I've felt as others have said here before, that things are really going to get a lot worse come this summer.

With the inevitable collapse of GM this summer, the growing unemployment rate, this summer is a recipe for disaster unless a miracle happens.

I feel lucky to still have a job and to be able to bring home a paycheck. I know so many people that have got laid off, that it is really a humbling experience.

There is no way that the unemployment rate is as low as what is being fed down our throat.

After all, why tell the truth now?

reply to post by redhead57


Actually, most of the poor people get the shaft, as well. Economists who study issues of "poverty, inequality, and discrimination" consistently find that most transfer payments (ie: welfare) just get shuffled back and forth within the middle class. This is because the middle class comprises most of the voting population, so it doesn't make sense -- from a political standpoint -- to help out a lot of poor people at the expense of the middle class. Look at Obama's campaign. Was he promising to help the poor, end poverty, or decrease income inequality? No, he was blabbering on about middle-class tax cuts (I do believe in low taxes, btw).

If welfare for the poor were what some people make it out to be, we wouldn't have such a large homeless population.

Shadowstatistics says unemployment is at 20% now, or about 4% higher than U6.

www.shadowstats.com...

In the 2010 state budgets have been re-adjusting medicaid elgibilities for certain groups of people. I've been surprised there hasn't been more media attention on it but I have to assume it's the less populated states that are re-vamping it or I would assume it would be all over the news.

That being said there will be a group of individuals that are going to be very unhappy when it goes through. If they do make a big stink about it the majority of the population will have no remorse for the majority of them.

You might want to check out your state web sites and read up on their 2010+ budget proposals and what's all getting enacted next year to try and slim down total spending cost. Medicaid in our state is getting hit pretty big with who is eligible to even use it.

They haven't addressed medicare though so not sure if states actually have any control over that or if it is just being saved for the 2011 budget.

34 trillion in the whole??? Thats crazy the GNP of the US total is only 30 trillion annualy. So that menas were 4 trillion in the red. So where did the money go? Gumi worms?...

reply to post by cpdaman


And we are losing jobs at a faster rate that during the 70 and 80s but don't wait for the government and the media to tell you that.

Remember the new phrase to deal with the mess we have right now is to make everything BETTER THAN EXPECTED even if the numbers are the worst they will never be worst than expected.



[edit on 12-5-2009 by marg6043]

reply to post by David9176


That figure also does not represent people who file 1099. Just about everyone I know who files in this way is out of work right now.(construction) I would be curious to see the rate with that figure applied. I would bet it would be staggering.

I always find it so funny when people talk about the debt, then start eyeing everyone around them....

Just funny, the first people accused are fellow Americans, and undocumented workers. Corporate welfare is where our anger should be. We should focus on the biggest cost to our system first
Then weed out the small fish... if that makes sense.

As for working for ones' self, it can be done. And contrary to popular belief it is actually BETTER than working to make someone else rich. Seriously, it might be the closest thing to a modern day barter system we still have.

But, I know it is just more fun to blame the elderly and WIC recipients for the nation's debt, than conglomerates.

btw, David... Ya should get in on that WIC action, unless the wife will be feeding the kid herself.... Any bit helps, when we are talking potential fall of a corrupt system (and any chance to build something better). And once the kid is eating over a can of formula a day anyway... there's at least a $500/month addiction there.

Originally posted by Republican08
I wonder what the welfare statistics are?

To try and grasp the concept, if unemployement is drastically high, i'd assume by now, welfare would be high too?

Edit to add: Welfare is actually at a 40 year low, although California has some 1.3mil people on welfare, and well over 2.0million on food stamps, which dwarfs any other state.

www.nytimes.com...

[edit on 11-5-2009 by Republican08]

that is because the govt refuses to give welfare to most Americans

i have many friends who claimed they were turned down because they "did not live on the street yet"
which is actually retarded because they were facing living on the street without help lol

anyways , if you NEED welfare and are struggling its almost impossible to get

but if your a super lazy bum, its very easy to get

go figure

reply to post by muzzleflash


Somehow, I kinda agree with you. I never once heard of a family that legitimately needs help, getting welfare.

My sister is the only one I have ever known to have it... And they gave it to her right away. Apparently teenage mother/heroin addicts are given priority.

Originally posted by Republican08
reply to post by David9176

 

He hit the nail on the head in that, its about mismanaging your money, the gov't does it, and we're all upheaved about that, but even in american homes their mismanaging their money.

Medicine= Expensive as all hell, but theres little we can do about that, if you've worked long enough and put aside 10 out of your paycheck every two weeks, in about 50 years you'd have 13,000 dollars saved up, and thats just mattres talk, not into a compounding interest account!

That's only ten dollars 260 a year. It adds up.

Are you kidding? Your $13,000 saved up over 50 years will be gone within five minutes here in the US. Health care here is just forbiddingly expensive... we're all being ripped off. A coworker of mine recently had a mountain bike accident and needed knee surgery = ca. $100,000, with, I believe, 2 days in the hospital.

In contrast, I just went looking how much hospital care costs in my native Germany (we usually never find out since everyone's insured and the insurance pays for everything... and I mean, everything!). I found this quote on a German message board:

"I can give you a rough glimpse how much such a hospital stay costs, because I know someone who wasn't insured during his stay, so the hospital sent him the bill directly.

"Stayed for 10 days, got a heart catheter, a CT scan, enjoyed the hospital food, and between treatments just idly lay around. All in all, it should have taken 3 days, but since one has to wait so much, they turned into 10.

"It cost 2,500 euro. However, that was later, when he had insurance again, taken over by the insurance company. He just had to pay the regular premiums."

I think people are having the wool pulled over their eyes here. Or how come that medicine should be 40 times more expensive here than in Germany? Oh, and let me assure you, German medicine is top of the line... mainstream medicine is very progressive, and if you're in one of the higher-end insurances, they even pay for homeopathy and acupuncture, etc. So, WTF?

reply to post by bluwaterman

That figure also does not represent people who file 1099. Just about everyone I know who files in this way is out of work right now.(construction) I would be curious to see the rate with that figure applied. I would bet it would be staggering.

Yes, but these are skilled tradesmen who have the ability to trade work for things...something that banksters,car salesmen,insurance brokers,mortgage brokers,etc dont have.
They're probably just underground now.

What really sucks about the current (false) unemployment rates, is that when you factor in the amount of available jobs per person (called 'prospective full employment figures'), we are still in the red with more people than jobs.
What do all us middle-class people do when laid off? We look for other work in our field first, then when we realise that the savings are running low, we look towards unskilled labour in another field.
Once all the unskilled labour positions are taken up by the desperate middle class, that slowly pushes the unemployment rate down. Full employment is always going to be out of reach, but the real crime against the middle class is the INCORRECT employment of many workers.
How many people here have been forced out of a job that they spent years (and countless thousands of dollars) training for, only to have to resort to taking jobs hauling bricks, or lopping trees, or delivering pizza, or stacking shelves, etc.?

Progression in our society can be defined as the moving UPWARDS (better jobs, more money, more free time) of the middle class; when we see a trend towards moving DOWNWARDS (harder labour, less wages, more hours), yet have the same employment levels, you know things are going to hell in a handbasket soon.

It seems that the only other option available to us now, is to go back to the way things were run in the 1800's, everybody start their own business. Unfortunately, it won't be 'everybody', it'll just be us middle class suckers who are about to be flushed down the toilet by mega-corporations, all over again.

Maybe we're all supposed to break the law, go to prison, and build roads for Obama. Nazi Germany all over again, hooray!

reply to post by nrky

Maybe we're all supposed to break the law

whatever it takes!