March 2013 Bureau of Labor Statistics Jobs Report
Unemployment: (U3) 7.6% (U6) 13.8% Labor Force Participation: 63.3% -496,000 34 yr low "Prime Age" Participation: 81.1% 29 yr low Number of Americans who have given up on finding a job: 90 million Source: US Bureau of Labor Statistics Table A-1 & Table A-15
The administration and its allies blamed not its own failed policies for this poor report, but laid the blame on the American people themselves.
“The labor force participation rate peaked in 2000 because of demographics." ~ Alan Krueger, Forbes
They are saying that unemployment cannot be overcome because we are an aging society. But diving deeper into the data shows:
"Of the nearly 500,000 people dropping out, just 118,000 were aged 55 and older, meaning more than three-quarters of the increase came from below-retirement-age adults." ~Reuters
Some may try to blame the "sequester" but that isn't so:
"March's jobs numbers did not yet reflect much of the "sequester," the across-the-board federal budget cuts that will slowly take effect throughout the year, resulting in less hiring and fewer hours worked by government employees. Nevertheless, austerity is already pinching job growth in other ways. The federal government shed 14,000 jobs in March, almost all of which [12,000] were accounted for by the U.S. Postal Service." ~Huffington Post
Others may have hit on part of the problem, lack of relevant skills on the part of job seekers.
"With more than 3 million open and available jobs on the career website CareerBliss.com alone, why do we keep seeing the labor participation rate dropping?
"The answer is that employers can't find the right workers. Too many unemployed American workers lack the relevant skills needed to fill the millions of jobs available. Unfortunately, this gap between people wanting work and employers wanting workers is poised to grow as some 1.8 college students prepare to graduate in 2013 and enter the job market.
"We are on a dangerous and growing path towards higher unemployment unless we start training workers for the growing sectors -- not the dying ones." ~Huffington Post
Certainly our economy and the skills to participate have changed over the past few decades. No one can deny the impact the technology explosion has had on our lives and in the workplace. Almost any job, beyond manual labor, requires not only knowledge of but expertise in specific technologies.
But young people in school are too often taught that those skills are not so important. It's more important, they’re told, to "feel good" about one’s self. Note the de-emphasis on test scores and academic competition. Some in academia don't want students to "feel bad" about not being “the best” at a particular skill so that goal is simply removed.
I suspect the problem with our economy and more specifically the weak employment statistics is far more fundamental than our politicians will believe, or have us believe. It goes in part, I believe, to the weaknesses and failings of our corporate, monopolistic public school system.
On the local level it has become a system that, despite the best efforts of dedicated and committed educators, is more focused on protecting the jobs of union officials and building the empires of school administrators.
On the secondary level, the large state and private “education” corporations have become indoctrination mills where tolerance is only tolerated to the point where the decidedly left leaning professors can no longer tolerate it. Students are far too often encouraged, even required, to buy into the philosophy of the lecturer or risk a failing grade.
These “student factories” continue to diversify their focus away from teaching professional skills and towards fluff that bloats costs, faculty and staff and tuition. Students leave after 4 or more years unprepared for a career, much less for life, saddled with student loans in some cases equivalent to a nice suburban home mortgage.
But even the education system in the US cannot bear the full blame, it is only a symptom of a far more fundamental problem that goes to the heart of our culture. We, parents and students alike, have become increasingly less focused on the hard currency of developing excellence in core skills and more focused on self gratification.
In the process we have left our children, our economic future and our nation to flounder without direction and focus deeply in debt, cynical of their future and susceptible to every whim, obfuscation and impulse of a power seeking political class.
Perhaps the career politicians of either party have a right to be their megalomanical selves since “we the people” are ourselves becoming disinterested, self-absorbed and shallow. Their interest in the current economic woes of our nation is less about truly “fixing” the problem than glossing it over until the next election. Our interest is on who's going to advance on "the Voice."
I suspect the problem with our economy and more specifically the weak employment statistics is far more fundamental than our politicians will believe, or have us believe. It goes in part, I believe, to the weaknesses and failings of our corporate, monopolistic public school system.
On the local level it has become a system that, despite the best efforts of dedicated and committed educators, is more focused on protecting the jobs of union officials and building the empires of school administrators.
On the secondary level, the large state and private “education” corporations have become indoctrination mills where tolerance is only tolerated to the point where the decidedly left leaning professors can no longer tolerate it. Students are far too often encouraged, even required, to buy into the philosophy of the lecturer or risk a failing grade.
These “student factories” continue to diversify their focus away from teaching professional skills and towards fluff that bloats costs, faculty and staff and tuition. Students leave after 4 or more years unprepared for a career, much less for life, saddled with student loans in some cases equivalent to a nice suburban home mortgage.
But even the education system in the US cannot bear the full blame, it is only a symptom of a far more fundamental problem that goes to the heart of our culture. We, parents and students alike, have become increasingly less focused on the hard currency of developing excellence in core skills and more focused on self gratification.
In the process we have left our children, our economic future and our nation to flounder without direction and focus deeply in debt, cynical of their future and susceptible to every whim, obfuscation and impulse of a power seeking political class.
Perhaps the career politicians of either party have a right to be their megalomanical selves since “we the people” are ourselves becoming disinterested, self-absorbed and shallow. Their interest in the current economic woes of our nation is less about truly “fixing” the problem than glossing it over until the next election. Our interest is on who's going to advance on "the Voice."
Yesterday though, near dusk while I sat on the lanai, he decided to make a rare appearance. Even rarer was that he flew to the ground about 15 yards away and poked around for awhile looking for insects. He was close enough and the available light was still good, but I didn't have my camera. I called to Karen to get it, I'm still pretty much immobile with the broken foot, but by the time she got there he had taken flight.
