Category: Jobs

US economy added a whopping 254,000 jobs last month

Good news for Kamala Harris and the Democratic Party.

President Joe Biden touted the better-than-expected jobs data in a post on X Friday morning.

“Great news for American workers and families: Today, we learned our economy gained over 250,000 new jobs in September and unemployment is back down at 4.1%. With today’s report, we’ve created 16 million jobs, unemployment remains low, and wages are growing faster than prices.”

Fed Chair Powell: “There’s really nothing that I can point to in the economy that suggests that a downturn is more likely than it is at any time.” 

The September jobs report also showed an uptick in wage growth, with average hourly earnings growing by 0.4% for the month. That brings the annual rate up to 4% from 3.9% seen in August, according to Friday’s report.

The Grapes of Wrath in 2023

Henry Fonda as Tom Joad in Grapes of Wrath

I just finished watching Grapes of Wrath. It is based on the book by John Steinbeck. It is a tear jerker. The movie does an excellent job of depicting the camps of Dust Bowl migrants coming to California for work. The last chapters of the book are not in the movie. As I watched the movie I could see the relevance to today’s homeless on Skid Row and other homeless encampments around Los Angeles. Police in the movie chasing those Oakies are the same police chasing homeless people today. Steinbeck offered no solution just as today’s Los Angeles mayor has no solution. There is no place to house 40,000 homeless people in 2023.

You may believe the mayor (Bass) and the county supervisors can change the situation but there really is not an idea of how to resolve the issue of 60,000 homeless in Los Angeles County. There is no plan for permanent housing and I doubt we have the money to accomplish that goal.

The real question should be how did we get here? Those people living in motor homes and tents are not all on drugs and mentally ill. The shrinking number of low paying jobs is an ever feed to the homeless population. Many of those people may not be able to handle anything more difficult than janitors and fast food workers.

Homelessness

Homelessness in Los Angeles has reached epidemic proportions. The sad reality is that our politicians refuse to address the issue for fear of not being re-elected. Last year’s homeless count showed a jump of 12% in L.A. County and 16% in the city.

The annual point-in-time count, delivered to the Board of Supervisors, put the number of homeless people just shy of 59,000 countywide. Within the city of Los Angeles, the number soared to more than 36,000, a 16% increase. The survey found 8,000 homeless in San Fernando and Santa Clarita valleys.

The rising impacts of automation and the flood of low cost products from other countries that deny us jobs. Walmart, Target, Costco all buy the cheap products we crave. We are all to blame.

Just keep putting your head in the sand and hope this will all work out. But will it and how?

Something to Celebrate

850,000 new jobs added. 5.9% unemployment rate.

Average pay just topped $15 an hour at U.S. restaurants, one of many sectors forced to raise wages to lure back millions of workers. Now hiring signs are everywhere. My nearby IHOP has signs saying now hiring cooks and servers. But no one wants those jobs because the pay is low and there is limited chances for promotion.

Employees in the hospitality industry are quick to point out that pay is still paltry compared with that in other fields. The work is grueling, including standing all day and dealing with customers who can be unfriendly or outright irate. But workers are noticing — and responding to — the higher pay. More than 40 percent of the better-than-expected hiring in June was in the hospitality sector.

What is clear from the June jobs report is that firms that are raising pay are largely seeing the benefits. Businesses advertising $15 or more an hour are luring more applicants, and the pay hikes in the hospitality sector appear to be forcing other industries to increase wages as well, to stay above retail and restaurants. After companies like Chipotle said they would go to $15 an hour and Bank of America said it would go to $25 an hour by 2025, searches for jobs at those firms jumped, according to Indeed.com.

For a limited time workers taking jobs that are a drudgery are now being called heroes. So let’s celebrate!

‘$4 isn’t much’

The Kroger company is the biggest retail grocery company in the United States. As the largest pure grocer in the United States (trailing only Walmart in overall grocery sales and at approximately double the revenue of number-two Albertsons.

Kroger owns many chains other than Kroger stores. Food 4 Less and Ralphs in metropolitan Los Angeles are two of its chains. When you shop in Ralphs, as I do, you see the Kroger name on many of its private label products.

The company has decided to close its stores in Long Beach (one Ralphs and one Food 4 Less) because the city council has ordered food markets to pay a $4-an-hour increase for grocery workers during the pandemic. The city called it hazards pay. This is not a permanent increase.

Kroger, which has enjoyed a big jump in profits during the pandemic, is pushing back. Customers and workers say that’s unfair. Kroger’s decision is most likely based on the fear that once the pay rate is increased it will never go back to the previous level and it will set precedent for the city and county of Los Angeles. That then could spread across the nation.  

Ronald Fong, president of the California Grocers Association trade group, which filed a lawsuit over the Long Beach ordinance, said the group tried to warn the city about “unintended consequences” of the measure.

This is the best example of workers versus employers that we have seen since the last strike of grocery workers. The 2003-04 Southland grocery strike dragged on for 141 days. That work stoppage was estimated by some analysts to have cost the supermarket chains as much as $2 billion, with locked-out workers losing $300 million in wages.

One shopper at the Ralphs store told an LA Times reporter she supports the hero pay, in part because her son works in the retail grocery business. “It’s hard work for him!” she said. “$4 isn’t much.”

With a 2020 Net Income of $1.64 billion it seems the company needs to become a responsible member of a society that is struggling with a pandemic.

14.7% Unemployment But there are Job Openings

It is the highest unemployment since the Great Depression but the cause of this employment situation is totally different than the 1930s. Many economists are predicting that there will be a quick bounce back once most people return to work.

This situation is dependent on science finding a cure for coronavirus. Despite the opening of businesses many people will not be going out any time soon. Concerts, political rallies, sports events and other large events are not likely to happen for many months.

Meanwhile there are some businesses that are hiring. food and delivery services, security services, and food markets are looking for help. Pizza Hut, 7-Eleven, Papa John’s, GoPuff, FedEx, Dollar General, Dollar Tree, Bytedance, Netflix, General Motors, and Fidelity Investments are in the list of companies that are hiring.

For Donald Trump this will be a very difficult time.  The booming economy was going to be his number one reason for re-election.

US GDP turns negative, worst since 2008

US GDP shrank at a 4.8% annualized rate in Q1 due to the coronavirus pausing the economy.  It is the biggest decline since the Great Recession as depicted in the graph posted here. 

Are we in a recession? Most experts agree that a recession happens when the economy shrinks for at least two fiscal quarters in a row — in other words, six months.  Note that this report is the period ending March 31.  That is a period that does not include all the massive layoffs that has resulted from the coronavirus that started in mid-March.  That leads me to suspect a recession was on the way even before the virus had really impacted the country.  We can all see where this is going.   

Some economists are predicting a rapid turnaround once stay at home orders are lifted.  Personally, I can’t imagine sitting in a restaurant until their is a vaccine for covid 19. I might walk through the mall and I will defintely go places to take picures with my mask in place. The Hollywood Bowl and other theater settings are out of the question.

Source: U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis

An Unmitigated Disaster

The president of the United States takes no responsibility. Those are his words.

While the number of new deaths from the coronavirus has slowed, the number of new cases has continued to climb. The real question should be how many people have the virus that are self-quarantining themselves but are unknown to the data collectors. The number of new cases has exceeded 30k every day, except one, starting April 2.

Meanwhile the total of new unemployment claims in the past three weeks exceeded 16 million people (BLS figures). Bloomberg Economics created a model last year to determine America’s recession odds. The chance of a recession now stands at 100%, confirming an end to the nation’s longest-running expansion.

The “stable genius” did not believe there would be a widespread epidemic in the United States. He fired the entire pandemic response team in 2018. On March 19, 2020, former Vice President and Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden ​called the changes elimination. He tweeted: “The Obama-Biden Administration set up the White House National Security Council Directorate for Global Health Security and Biodefense to prepare for future pandemics like COVID-19. Donald Trump eliminated it — and now we’re paying the price.”

This graph compares unemployment today to the unemployment during the 2008-2009 Great Recession. The United States is already in a recession and will remain that way for the first half of the year, according to a survey of 45 economists. The assumption is that everyone will be going back to work very soon.

In an interview on Fox News on today Friday April 10, Surgeon General Jerome Adams emphasized that “now is the time for us to continue to lean into” the social-distancing recommendations first issued in mid-March and extended last week until the end of April.

“There are places around the country that have seen consistently low levels. And as we ramp up testing and can feel more confident that these places actually can do surveillance and can do public health follow-up, some places will be able to think about opening on May 1,” Adams said.

“Most of the country will not, to be honest with you, but some will,” Adams continued, “And that’s how we’ll reopen the country: place by place, bit by bit, based on the data.”

To Hell with You! Money is More Important than Anything Else!

Sadly it is greed that drives Americans. We want the biggest house. We want the most luxurious cars. We want the most expensive jewelry. Scrooge McDuck simply reflects that attitude.

 In America’s richest town, $500,000 a year is now below average. That is the headline of a bloomberg.com article. Under Politics on the same website is an article titled Soak-the-Rich Tax Plans Take Hold in the Entire Democratic Field.

 USNews.com reports that In the U.S., there are 607 billionaires, up from 586 last year and 404 in 2010, and 14 of the world’s 20 richest are from the U.S. CNN reports that Most U.S. jobs pay under $20 an hour and 18 million jobs pay $10 or less an hour. Fast food workers seem to be the lowest paid group at $8.81 per hour.

The Walton family heirs are billionaires but the average wage for a full-time, hourly worker at Walmart is $14.26 an hour. And while Jeff Bezos just purchased a home in Los Angeles for $165 million (.13% of his total wealth) the typical Amazon Warehouse Worker makes $14 per hour.

Is it any wonder that Bernie Sanders is the front runner in the Democratic Party primaries?

Swapping Michael Bloomberg for Donald Trump won’t change the fact that protection of the rich from taxes is a reality. Income from property owned and interest/dividends received are taxed at lower rates than earned income. We need a new way of enabling all Americans to live comfortably without the fear of loss of their home and accumulated wealth brought on by high medical bills and other unforeseen expenses.

Where are the ideas other than socialism? None of the Democratic Party candidates has an idea other than a wealth tax. Joe Biden’s response to the question at a town hall was we’ll find a way. Debate moderators never ask the difficult questions.

Four more years of Donald Trump seems the likely outcome in November.