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Chart Of The Day: America's Geriatric Work F(a)rce
The traditional excuse apologists for America's collapsing labor force participation rate use every month is that due to "demographics" and retiring baby boomers, increasingly more old workers are no longer counted by the BLS and as a result, are skewing the labor force. That's where they leave it because digging into details is not really anyone's forte anymore. This would be great if it was true. It isn't.
A month ago in "55 And Under? No Job For You" we presented visually and quite simply that of the 3.3 million jobs "created" (updated for October's data), a gasp-inducing 3.8 million has gone to workers aged 55 and over, or the one cohort that according to conventional wisdom is retiring, and actively leaving the workforce. How can America's elderly workers account for more than the total? Simple: workers in the young (16-19) and prime (25-54) cohorts have cumulatively lost a whopping 1.3 million, with just the 25-54 age group losing 842,000 jobs (don't believe us: spot check it right here courtesy of the Fed).
In other words, America's edlerly are not only not in a rush to retire, they are reentering the workforce (thanks to the Chairman's genocidal savings policy which has just rendered the value of all future deposits worthless thanks to ZIRP), and in doing so preventing younger workers, in their prime years, from generating incremental jobs.
And nowhere is this more visible than in today's jobs report. On the surface, the US generated a whopping 413,000 jobs (after generating a massive 873,000 last month) according to the Household Survey in October. That's great, unfortunately breaking down this cumulative addition by age cohort confirms precisely what we have said: all the jobs are going to old workers, who have zero wage bargaining leverage (as they just want to have a day to day paycheck). To wit: when broken down by age group, the total October increase shows that of the new jobs, 10.7% went to those aged 16-19 (source), 11.6% went to those aged 20-24 (source), a tiny 9.8% went to the prime agr group: 25-54 (source), and a massive 67.8% went to America's baby boomers: those aged 55 and over (source), and who refuse to leave the workforce and make way for others.
Visually, this is as follows:
But the most eye-opening chart is this one showing jobs in the 25-54 and 55 and over categories:
And one wonders why America's labor force has no bargaining power, and why average hourly wages are imploding, and why nobody can afford anything anymore...
Finally, all of the above excludes previous disclosures that the bulk of jobs created in the past 4 years is in the part-time job catergory.
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Is this the part where we all turn on each other in angry outbursts of stress driven madness because we are too cowardly to force justice upon the actual perpetrators?
The part where we fight to the death for just one more meal?
Is it here yet?
This article looks like a test of a provocative trigger. Some of the comments and reactions tell me it is fairly effective. The level of pain and frustration is rising.
Surprise surprise.
Senseless, selfish, cowardly war here we come.
No thanks, but it's like trying to live through a real estate boom, there really are not a lot of other real options than to keep going and do your best or quit breathing.
All the efforts of politicians, government, central banks etc are focused on saving banks instead of targeting job creation which is the only way economy can recover.
Jobs can be created by initiating the following :
Replace the top management of the too big to fail banks, put the existing ones in prison and charge them with fraud and misrepresentation. Break the banks into smaller ones so that they are no longer a risk to the whole financial system. Implement the Glass Stegall Act.
Use the reclaimed billions of dollars from the arrested bankers and use them to improve the infrastructure of the country. This would create jobs instantly and the improved infrastructure would give the confidence to the small businessman to hire more people.
Tax the richest 5% of the population heavily as they no longer create jobs in the country but outsource the jobs to the low cost developing nations. Stop completely the funding of election candidates by corporates and rich individuals so that their influence on politicians to make rules beneficial to themselves is clipped.
Stopping speculation and derivatives in commodity markets would reduce their prices substantially which would be beneficial to the majority of the population. This would lead to a better standard of living for the middle class families and they would go out and spend helping the revival of the economy.
But in the real world we can keep on dreaming.
http://www.marketoracle.co.uk/Article35345.html
www.letstalkmoney2012.in
More important than any of those things is preventing those with major Market interests from owning and operating major financial media outlets.
Someday, someone other than me and Tiny Terror - who also comes from a strong Media background - is going to understand fully and truly that the Financial part of this is secondary. Media moves Finance, not the other way around.
I would add to your list: Stop completely the funding of election candidates by unions. I don't understand your opposition to stop the investment (you call it speculation) in commodity markets. Derivatives should be completely outlawed. Also high frequency trading should be outlawed.
This bullshit has to stop:
a massive 67.8% went to America's baby boomers: those aged 55 and over (source), and who refuse to leave the workforce and make way for others.
This version of TD gives us this Boomer Bullshit each time. Refuses to leave the workforce? How about can't afford to leave the workforce? It's strange when an opinion column mixes facts, statistics, charts and metaphors to reach a meme that would leave readers under the impression that a bunch of old farts are sitting around gleefully holding the doors to the jobs shut against an onslaught of eager workers that are anywhere from a year younger to 29 years younger than us old farts. Yeah, that is so totally true. Let me tell you, holding hordes back on minimum wage jobs with lousy hours, no benefits and little Nazi bosses is really fucking hard. It doesn't occur to this version of the angry and outraged TD that people don't want those fucking jobs. They can't afford to take them. What 20+ something who has a $400-$600 dollar a month student loan payment can afford to take a job which nets them $900 a month. How about a middle class middle age worker who has mortgage payments?
This is nothing new. Fast Food Franchises, Wal-Mart, Amazon (The RV Crowd) and any other crap job out there have used the aged and burned workforce ever since they started cutting pills in half that keep them alive because pension plan raids have become a source for outstanding profit raids for the great deities called the douchebags of Wall Street for the last 20 years.
Hell, some of actaully enjoy getting out and standing on our worn out feet for 8 fucking hours wiping the grease from the food dispenser in the back from our faces, just for the company of some 350 pound Flesh mamas, don't ya know or hey having a 30 something walk beside us when carrying a 50+ pound box telling us that we are 6 boxes behind and plenty of other people want these jobs, so pick it up gramps.
Save the Bullshit anger TD. Instead go work in one of those "jobs" and send pictures of the evil 55-64 workers who refuse to die off, holding the doors closed on younger people so they can't get their chance to use their 100G education to work the counters of America's Obesity and Coronary houses . Hell we can't even eat the food. It's a fucking work hazard.
Also, Weren't you the asshole who was writing about the evils of extended UI benefits that were keeping young workers from taking these $7.25- $10.00 /hour Jobs? When it costs more to go to work than stay home, you should spend your "journalistic " time investigating the whys and wherefores of that seemingly impossible contortion of the concept of work rather than using the BLS statistics that are constantly ridiculed by other versions of TD , which may include yourself, but now that you have those lying stats in your hands, they are dead on accurate, especially when making your stupid demeaning argument that us old fucks, in refusing to die , are keeping the eager beavers from working. What's the matter with you anyway?Did you lose some money on a bad trade? Looking at the help wanted ads?
Finally why not look at the "Job Creators" who are so unimaginative that all they can do is build business models around abuse of the labor force. Try it douchebag. Get off the "leave the workforce and die motherfuckers" meme, that way you won't die a premature death from high BP so you too can one day wake up and find yourself at age 55 thinking "WTF?" and finding out that you are no longer relevant. Oh yeah, there is no time at all between your age and mine in case your laughing, like I did , when some 55 year old told me to watch myself 20 years ago. "Hell, I'm a small Businessman, a fucking entreprenuer. That shit ain't gonna happen to me".
Like at Denny's: they go into get the senior's discount and end up applying for a job. Makes them feel young again.
Now do you understand the mindset of those folks in the old photos of lynch mobs? As Uncle Georgie used to say, if honesty is the best policy, then dishonesty is (by default) the second best policy.
I'm one of the old farts in this category. Have worked hard for over 45 years, owned my own businesses, had employees, lost everything four times, to the point all I had left was the shirt on my back. The last time I hit bottom was a year ago.
Don't get me wrong, I accomplished a lot and did things I am proud of too.
My son tells me I am not employable. He is right. No one wants to hire anyone my age who has been self employed most of his adult life.
Somehow I am surviving without government aid and I don't have a pension to count on.
But I ain't one of those described in the story above. I know how it is to look for work as an employee. When I started looking this year and sending out resumes, they don't even have enough courtesy to acknowledge they received it.
Fuck em, I'll do it myself, and if I can't, my time here on this planet will be done.
By the way. I used to have respect for this blog but it is starting to sound more and more like a tabloid.
Don't forget, for all of our faults, we produced a lot of young people, looked after them, educated them and tried to give them the best life has to offer. Unfortunately those who educated many of them and those in power made our children sit in school till they were almost 24 years of age with a degree which meant nothing before they could go out and earn for themselves.
When I was young I knew people who were on their own at 18, half the time raising a child and they did all right.
Don't blame us because of the propaganda.
We are mothers and fathers and deserve a little respect.
I am tired of all the self pity I hear out there.
If you want freedom and income, you'll do what it takes to get it.
I'm one of those boomer non-quitters.
http://www.ecnmag.com/tags/Blogs/M-Simon/
You can't write about experience you haven't had.
Jobs in STEM are going begging. Math too hard? Take a gut class. The payoff? Well you are living it.
The easy way out is never easy. Like any deal with the devil what kills you is the final balloon payment.
Enjoy bitchez. And BTFD unless you are the dip.
Are they REALLY going begging? Or are they just going begging for more imported cheap H1-B labor? Remove the worthless demographc from the current crop of students and we test as well as or better than te other developed countries. I personally know more than a few laid-off engineers in the US who could not get arrested because the corporations want (above all) cheap labor from places like India and China.
Rant over.
Oh, and BTFD!
I've been thinking about the generational war going on in these postings, and I see a few recurring themes which have gotten me to do some self-examination. I'm not sure how much of the economic boom part of the business cycle has been financed on easy credit, but I suspect it's alot. I don't know how much money that has been paid into the SS system has been spent on people who have paid but little or nothing into it, and I don't know how much of the Federal debt is due to the care and feeding of parasites, but I figure it's in the trillions. And on SS, as it is really a ponzi scheme where todays retirees are supported by tomorrow's taxpayers, (and I'm just thinking out loud here) if baby boomers decided to produce fewer children, then I can't see how the system would not go broke, especially since a great percentage of those cheap laborers we've imported to replace them are net liabilities to the system. And, I suppose none of this would be a real problem had we not allowed the globalists to export so many high-paying jobs, and to import so many cheap workers.
I'm over 55, and am still quite productive in a tech field (though I had to leave the US to find work), and intend to work at it until I can no longer. It isn't as if I could just quit and have one of my sons take my place. So I work, and work, and work, and continue to stack, hoping that the legacy I build up for my children will be enough to help them get through the massive contraction we are beginning. I do not take vacations, drive a 12-year-old car, pay all of my own medical expenses, and help support my in-laws. Were I to quit and make way for a younger worker, there are too many people who would suffer, but I guess it would be nice to finally be able to take it easy. BTW, I also don't expect to see much from SS, and I won't have enough years in the system of the country where I live to collect, so I have no great hopes about that.
But the last thing I am going to do is blame the younger generation for being bitter. I'M BITTER, mostly because of government policies that have robbed me and mine of our future, and made my country a place where I can no longer earn a decent living. I'm BITTER at the banksters who have robbed us, and then been bailed out. I'm bitter at the globalist elites who used cheap labor to dismantle the ladders of upward mobility for the next generations.
I have no more patience for seniors who would vote for whoever would give them the most free stuff than I do for worthless minorities who vote > 95% for a candidate just because of the color of his skin, and promises to steal from whitey to support them.
Anyone who actually gave a damn about the US would have voted for Ron Paul in the primaries, as he was the ONLY candidate who MIGHT have done something to right the sinking ship of state.
Bitter? Hell yes.
I agree, I'm in tech too.
I also agree about Ron Paul.
He used to be a doctor, not a "lawyer" or "CEO"or "politician"
This country needs to "heal".
I live in Illinois - I'm voting Johnson.
Re:H1B - I will work cheaper than they do and work my way up. Value added.
I wouldn't mind working with some sweet young thangs as new hires at work, but statistically, I'm going to end up with old ass grannies.
Do I look like I dig grannies? Fuck you Bubble Ben.
All job is moving to China. http://www.freefdawatchlist.com/2012/11/weekly-outlook-for-nov-5th-9th-dow.html?utm_source=BP_recent
check your numbers, i went through the numbers myself, here is the real breakdown:
3.12% 16 to 19 years 9.44% 20 to 24 years 65.86% 25 to 54 years 21.58% 55 years and over