US recovery 'not helping workers'
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The benefits of the US recovery are not trickling through to many working families, a report from an American think tank claims.
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WASHINGTON -- The number of US workers filing for first-time jobless benefits fell sharply last week, government data showed yesterday, but the decline was smaller than expected, and economists say layoffs remained elevated because of winter storms.
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AFP/File - A weaker-than-anticipated report on the US labor market, showing just 112,000 jobs added in November, cast fresh doubts over the pace of growth of the world's largest economy.
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There was a time when adding slightly fewer than 150,000 jobs a month in the United States, three years into an economic recovery, would have been considered a disaster.
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A report showing modest gains in US jobs provided ammunition to backers of President George W. Bush touting an expanding economy, but also to his rival, John Kerry, and those claiming a weak, uneven recovery.
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Issuing an economic report that could have a strong political impact, the Labor Department said Friday that US employers created 96,000 jobs in September, far fewer than most economists had expected.
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KANSAS CITY, Mo. -- President Bush pressed Congress to pass an economic rescue package, saying Friday's labor report marking the end of a 52-month streak of national job growth was another "troubling" sign that the economy is sputtering.
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WASHINGTON -- A hiring revival pulled the nation's unemployment rate down to 4.7 percent in August sending a Labor Day weekend message that the slowing economy isn't in danger of fizzling out. The latest snapshot, released by the Labor Department yesterday, was a bit brighter than expected and eased some fears that the economy -- weighed down by a housing ...
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The US economy created a disappointing 96,000 new jobs last month, raising questions about the economic recovery and ensuring that the job market will be a hotly debated topic
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The US jobless rate dropped in November, but analysts are surprise and disappointed by the weak job creation numbers reported by the US Labour Department.
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The number of Americans lining up to  claim an initial week of jobless aid rose less than expected  last week, according to a report on Thursday that the Labor  Department said was unaffected by recent hurricanes.
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The number of Americans filing first claims for jobless pay fell 3,000 last week, the Labor Department said on Thursday in a report showing no impact from Hurricane Charley which struck Florida last Friday.
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NEW YORK - Factory activity in the US Mid-Atlantic region slumped in September, a survey showed Thursday, spurring fears that the economy&#39;s soft patch over the summer could extend into the fall.
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&#39;We really need in this country a more flexible, just-in-time labor system. I really think not enough attention is being paid by both candidates to the re-skilling of America.
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(InfoWorld) - The U.S. government needs to do a better job of supporting and training IT and other workers who have lost jobs to offshore outsourcing, two economists on the opposite side of the offshoring debate said Tuesday. Many other countries have better benefits and retraining programs, Alan Blinder, an economist from Princeton University, told the U.S. House of Representatives Science and Technology Committee. "The U.S. government now offers disgracefully little help for workers who are displaced from their jobs," he said. "I'm talking about stingy unemployment insurance ... the prospect of losing your health insurance, your pension rights, and so on. I can't believe our country can't do better than that." Blinder, who has suggested that 30 million to 40 million U.S. jobs could potentially be replaced by offshoring, found support for stronger worker benefits from Martin Baily, senior academic advisor at the McKinsey Global Institute and a defender of global outsourcing. "We do very little with the training of workers," he said. But the witnesses at the hearing on the impact of offshoring U.S. research and development found little other common ground. Baily suggested the benefits of a global economy to the U.S. far outweigh the downsides. About 80 percent of the available investments in the global economy is coming into the U.S., instead of it flowing outside the country, he said. Globalization has "brought tremendous benefits to the United States," said Baily, chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers during President Bill Clinton's administration. "It's made the U.S. much more competitive. We've had access to better technology." More than a quarter of the people with doctorate degrees in the U.S. are foreign born, he added. "We're actually benefiting from the education that's being provided to people overseas," he said. The U.S. also benefits from computer hardware and software made overseas, he added. "At some level, we have to embrace the fact that science and technology is a global endeavor," he said. But Blinder and Ralph Gomory, president of the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, suggested there are significant downsides to offshore outsources. Under current U.S. policies, there's a "large-scale occupational migration" on the way, and the U.S. government needs to prepare for it, Blinder said. While many U.S. lawmakers support free trade, globalization is different, added Gomory, former senior vice president for science and technology at IBM Corp. Typically, free trade involves countries migrating to create the goods they are most efficient at producing, then trade with other countries that produce other goods, he said. But in globalization, the U.S. is moving much of its important production capability overseas, he added. "When the U.S. trades semiconductors for Asian sneakers ... that is trade," he said. "This type of exchange clearly benefits both countries." But U.S. companies build semiconductor plants in other countries instead of the U.S., that's not free trade, he said. "Neither economic theory nor common sense asserts that shift is automatically good for the United States," Gomory added. Lawmakers said they will consider the testimony as they look at ways to address offshoring. "What we want to do is make sure that companies find that U.S. scientists, engineers and students are the best in the world," said Representative Bart Gordon, a Tennessee Democrat and chairman of the committee. "We want to make sure we enact policies that keep us from having to offshore our future."
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US industrial output growth nearly stalled last month as production cuts at mines and utilities nearly swamped a strong performance at factories, a report from the Federal Reserve showed on Wednesday.
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Factory activity in the US Mid-Atlantic region slumped in September to its lowest level in more than a year, a survey showed on Thursday, spurring fears the economy&#39;s