10/23/09 The Atlanta Fed’s macroblog has compiled a roundup of evidence showing that the economy is in a jobless recovery. It shows that jobs are scarce, that a higher than average number of jobs have been lost in small businesses (which is a bad sign), and that many workers have been forced into part time status.
However, the data point that really jumps out is this one — the dominant reason for unemployment in the current economy is permanent separation. Permanent separation is when a job is cut and it’s never coming back…versus temporary layoffs, quitting, and other types of job losses.
It’s a unique point because the percent of permanent job losses haven’t been this high in over 30 years, and as the article goes on to say, “Never, in the six recessions preceding the latest one, did permanent separations account for more than 45 percent of the unemployed. The current percentage stands at 56 percent as of September and appears to be still climbing.”
The post came to our attention via CalculatedRisk which, in looking at the finding commented, “So far the current recovery is even worse than “jobless”; it is a “job-loss” recovery.”
This data provides more proof that the economy isn’t really recovering. It’s important to look at the numbers behind the headline statistics to understand how this depression really is different from other, previous times of economic turmoil. The post from CalculatedRisk highlights permanent separations and macroblog has more details about a variety of joblessness stats.
Rocky Vega
Rocky Vega is publisher of The Daily Reckoning. Previously, he was founding publisher of UrbanTurf and RFID Update, which he operated from Brazil, Chile, and Puerto Rico, and associate publisher of FierceFinance. He specialized in direct marketing at MBI, facilitated MIT Sloan School of Management programs, and has been featured on CBS. Vega graduated with honors from Harvard University, where he was on the board of Let’s Go Publications and directed business programs involving McKinsey, Goldman Sachs, and Harvard Business School faculty. He is also enrolled at the Stockholm School of Economics.
The Daily Reckoning is your premier source for making sense of the news Washington and Wall Street generate. Each business day, The Daily Reckoning calls on its stable of world-class writers and thinkers to show you how to get ahead.
Start your 100% FREE subscription to The Daily Reckoning today and you’ll get a free research report, “How to Survive the Fall of Social Security.” Simply enter your email address below to get your free report and join over 495,000 worldwide Daily Reckoning subscribers!
We Respect Your Privacy and We will
Never Share or Sell Your Email Address
there is no such thing as a jobless recovery….that crock term was invented by the voodoo economists in the government trying to fool morons that the economy was growing while everyone knew it was shrinking….
the only people for whom the economy has recovered are the vampire squid banksters who have received trillions of taxpayer aid….
on the other hand no one will care that the economy is jobless because those losing their jobs are in the lower income quintiles whose economic impact is de minimus shall we say….
one inflationary increase of gdp does not a recovery make….
I seem to be missing the recovery part all I see is the market going up because companies have slashed and continue to slash jobs in order to stay above water (minus a very few exceptions). 70% of our economy is domestic consumer based….that market is being permanently removed from the ability to purchase.
“Jobless recovery”? Would that be true if all the unemployed just died? Look at the quotes from the talking heads(and fed) around 1929-1937. Same BS, different crew. We’ve been hosed..by design. This is the end game of the “Federal Reserve”..transfer the nation’s wealth into the hands of greedy international banksters