JARED BERNSTEIN, [via Karen Conner]
Jared Bernstein is a senior economist with the Economic Policy Institute and co-author of the report “Missing the moving target: Meager job growth and the poor track record of the administration’s job forecasts.” He said today: “The jobs paradox continues with the March 2004 jobs report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics reporting a whopping 308,000 new jobs, at the same time as the unemployment rose from 5.6 to 5.7 percent. Today’s unemployment numbers show that for the first time since the ‘jobs and growth’ tax cut went into effect in June 2003 the administration met and exceeded its promise of 306,000 per month. However, the administration has a long way to go to make up for the 2,065,000 new jobs the administration projected the economy would generate by February 2004 if the tax cuts passed.”
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WILLIAM GREIDER
William Greider is the author of The Soul of Capitalism: Opening Paths to a Moral Economy and One World, Ready or Not. He said today: “We have reached a rare moment in history when Americans have the opportunity (and obligation) to confront the destructive qualities of the U.S. economic system and reform it in profound ways.”
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WILLIAM GREIDER
William Greider is the author of The Soul of Capitalism: Opening Paths to a Moral Economy and One World, Ready or Not. He said today: “We have reached a rare moment in history when Americans have the opportunity (and obligation) to confront the destructive qualities of the U.S. economic system and reform it in profound ways.”
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HEATHER BOUSHEY
Heather Boushey is an economist with the Center for Economic and Policy Research and co-author of the updated briefing paper released today titled “For Welfare Reform to Work, Jobs Must Be Available.” The report finds that “during the recession and recovery from 2001 to the present, job growth has been slow and wage growth has been negligible in the industries that former welfare recipients predominantly work in.” Boushey said today: “While this is the first month of this recovery that we’ve seen significant job gains, the signs of labor market weakness remain: many are still struggling to find employment and the share of the unemployed who have been out of work and searching for a new job for at least six months increased from 22.9 to 23.9 percent, a level usually only seen in the midst of recessions. Other signs of continued weakness in the labor market are a fall in hours by 0.1 hour to an average of 33.7 hours per week and little wage growth. Over the past four months, the nominal annualized quarterly growth rate was 2.3 percent — since this is below the rate of inflation, workers are seeing real declines in their hourly earnings. The share of Americans who are ‘discouraged workers,’ that is, they would like a job, but gave up looking out of frustration, increased by 8.4 percent over the past year, up to 514,000 individuals.”
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For more information, contact at the Institute for Public Accuracy:
Sam Husseini, (202) 347-0020; or David Zupan, (541) 484-9167
