JACKED UP JOBS MARKET

Every month the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics publishes a snap shot of what's going on with the U.S. economy. Popularly known as the Jobs Report, this monthly pub contains some key metrics related to the overall health of the economy. Each report, by the way, refers to the state of the economy in the previous month; hence, the data in December's report actually refers to what jumped off--or didn't-- in the labor market during the month of November. December's report is the last official 2020 glimpse we'll get before rolling over into a new year.

Here's a number from the report that I'm sure many of y'all done heard: 245,000. That's the number of jobs that were added to the economy in November. Almost a quarter of a million. Sounds big time, right? A quarter of a million of most things sounds pretty damn good, doesn't it? Actually, it's not all that great once you put it into context.

Context: That quarter of a million is less than half of the number of gigs that were added in October. In fact, the pace of hiring has been dropping for five straight months.

Context: We got clobbered by COVID. Between March and April, the economy shed an eye-popping 22 million jobs, and we're still ten million jobs short of where we were in February. At the current rate of recovery, we're years away from just regaining the lost ground.

What we've got is an ailing economy. A jacked up jobs market. An engine that's sputtering. A car that's going still going forward increasingly at a decreasing rate. Just imagine that you're running a long distance race. You start out killing it. Moving along at a steady and clipped pace. Smoking. No doubt that, at this pace, you're going to cross that finish line in nice time. Sweet.

But, say, you develop cramps. Or you just get tired. Whatever the case, your body says, "slow down, buddy, or we gonna have a problem." Heeding your body, you slow down. You keep adding distance. You keep making progress toward the finish line. Nothing like before your body starting acting up. The ground you're covering is increasing--but at a decreasing rate. Your stuff is sluggish.

And that what this job reports is telling us. It's telling us that the economy is sluggish. It's telling us that stuff is still jacked. Sure, it's adding some jobs each month but it's doing that at a decreasing rate.

The job market's got cramps.

The job market is jacked.

But wait a minute. That same Jobs Report notes that between October and November the nation's unemployment rate declined from 6.9% to 6.7%. How does that square with a labor market supposedly suffering from cramps? You'd think, wouldn't you, that a cramped labor market would exhibit an increasing rather decreasing unemployment rate?

Here's how it squares. To be counted amongst the unemployed an individual must both jobless and looking for a job. If you get frustrated and, say, stop looking, then you're not included in the stats. You don't count as being unemployed. The government statisticians consider you "out of the labor force" and you don't show up in the nation's tally of persons without a gig. About 400,000 individuals dropped out of the labor force in November and that's the primary reason the jobless rate declined. Had those people been counted, we'd be talking about an unemployment rate higher than 6.7%.

LONG-TERM UNEMPLOYMENT

What's more, long-term unemployment continues to increase. How long is long? Well, the Feds figure that you've been unemployed a "long-time" if you've been jobless and actively seeking a gig for at least 27 weeks. The "long-term" unemployed, then, are those jobless folk who've spent at least the last six months trying to score a paid stint. Despite the obstacles, they keep on pushing. Despite the failure to bag a paid post, they keep at it. They're the embodiment of persistence. And yet they keep coming up empty. Between October and November, the number of these people-- jobless persons who had spent at least the last six months trying to score employment-- increased by almost 400,000, from about 3.5 million to 3.9 million. Yeah, you heard that right: There's almost 4 million unemployed persons who've been unemployed for at least six months. According to the Jobs report, 37% of the unemployed have been jobless for at least six months. That's a huge problem, and further evidence of the presence of suffering in the labor market.

And it's a problem that's not only perilous for the long-term unemployed but also for the wider social networks within which they are embedded. Here's how a report by the Urban Institute put it a few years back:

"Being out of work for six months or more is associated with lower well-being among the long-term unemployed, their families, and their communities. Each week out of work means more lost income. The long-term unemployed also tend to earn less once they find new jobs. They tend to be in poorer health and have children with worse academic performance than similar workers who avoided unemployment. Communities with a higher share of long-term unemployed also tend to have higher rates of crime and violence."

Mutual interdependence operates that way. This is how it shows up in our economic lives. Suffering is never solely an individual problem. A stalled economy, joblessness, and long-term unemployment are never completely privatized. It is public affair and demands a public response.

And let's not forget that all of this is taking place against a funky background. A background where, unless something is done, millions are at risk of losing unemployment benefits and a host of social services by the end of the year. Right now, about 2/3 of people receiving unemployment insurance are in temporary programs created by the CARES that expire after Christmas.

STUFF IS JACKED

So, yeah, the November Jobs Report makes it clear that stuff is still jacked up. Millions of people still jobless, people just giving up and dropping out of the job market, and those dropped in the pit of joblessness finding it harder and harder to dig out of the quagmire.

All of which underscores, among other things, the urgent need for a massive stimulus program. A program that provides jobs, incomes, and hope to those getting pounded by the pandemic and punched by economic precarity. All of which underscores the need to envision and enact an economics that chooses life over death; that promotes and protects the right of all to live a life consistent with human dignity.

All of which underscores the imperative to see beyond that which is and to imagine that which could be.

Catch you on the flip side,

Doc Greene