Jobless Claims For Americans Hit Record

Nearly 6.5 Million Drawing Unemployment Benefits As Corporate Layoffs Continue

(AP)  The number of people receiving unemployment benefits has reached an all-time record, the government said Thursday, as layoffs spread throughout the economy.

The Labor Department reported that the number of Americans continuing to claim unemployment insurance for the week ending Jan. 17 was a seasonally adjusted 4.78 million, the highest on records dating back to 1967.

A department analyst said that as a proportion of the work force, the tally of unemployment recipients is the highest since August 1983.

The total released by the department doesn't include about 1.7 million people receiving benefits under an extended unemployment compensation program authorized by Congress last summer. That means the total number of recipients is actually closer to 6.5 million people.

Meanwhile, the tally of Americans filing new jobless benefit claims rose slightly to a seasonally adjusted 588,000 last week, from a downwardly revised figure of 585,000 the previous week.

That's close to the 26-year high of 589,000 reached in late December, though the labor force has grown by about half since then.

The Labor Department's report comes as large corporations from virtually all sectors of the economy are announcing massive layoffs.

Starbucks Corp. on Wednesday said it would cut 6,700 jobs. The coffee company also said it would close 300 underperforming stores, on top of 600 it already planned to shut down.

Time Warner Inc.'s AOL division is cutting up to 700 jobs, or about 10 percent of the online unit's work force. And IBM Corp. has cut thousands of jobs in its sales, software and hardware divisions in the past week, without announcing specific numbers.

Boeing Co., Pfizer Inc., Home Depot Inc. and other U.S. corporate titans also have announced tens of thousands of job cuts this week alone.

Companies have announced more than 125,000 layoffs in January, according to an Associated Press tally.

[wardoglrs]

%u201CWe are opposed...by a ruthless conspiracy that relies primarily on covert means for expanding its sphere of influence--on infiltration instead of invasion, on subversion instead of elections, on intimidation instead of free choice, on guerrillas by night instead of armies by day. It is a system which has conscripted vast human and material resources into the building of a tightly knit, highly efficient machine that combines military, diplomatic, intelligence, economic, scientific and political operations.

Its preparations are concealed, not published. Its mistakes are buried, not headlined. Its dissenters are silenced, not praised. No expenditure is questioned, no rumor is printed, no secret is revealed. It conducts the [war] with a war-time discipline no democracy would ever hope or wish to match...%u201D John F Kennedy, 1961.

Paper is poverty, it is only the ghost of money, and not money itself." Thomas Jefferson to Edward Carrington, 1788

[tincup356]

40 years of lobby dollar tainted legislation by BOTH parties have led to where we are,,,,, Neither party will ever admit to any wrong doing,,,but then again,,,,,lies are all that any of them will tell you. The truth of the matter is ..so much corruption on wall street and in the banks,,,,combined with the aftermath of 911 with oil going through the roof,,,,,and massive corporate greed,,,,they simple broke the people they need to depend on to keep the economy rolling.....and now they are all trying to grab as much as they can before people wake up and realize we have been had.

[tincup356]

How many more million before the ? millions march on Washington? I bet those greedy white collar, suit and tie terrorists on capitol hill would mess in their pants.

[caldwellptr]

As Phil Grahamn said, "It is only a mental recession." Now everyone quit their whining!

[simplemind2]

"That%u2019s the wonderful thing about computers; you can now do IT jobs from anywhere,
(%u201CAnywhere%u201D being India)
Posted by Lost_America at 05:05 PM : Jan 29, 2009"

Lost_America,
My better-half and I ate out as usual tonight.
Her cell-phone rang and one of her office manager called her for IT support.
I advised her to have the caller contact their Regional Support first - which the office manager obliged.
Thirty minutes after we finished our meal, I accompanied my better-half to the office since it''s in the neighborhood.
Guess what?
The Regional Support being remote was not much help.
So my better-half being in the office herself - she fixed the problem.
Later the Regional Support thanked her and registered the original problem resolved by her.
Any CEOs thought they can count IT jobs 100% handled by anywhere (%u201CAnywhere%u201D being India or China or Brazil) without retaining some LOCAL talent is gonna have a heart-attack later on.
Mark my words!

[strangeworld]

When you get your pink slip, be sure to call a republican representative and thank him/her for supporting economic policies that funneled all the country''s money to the wealthy while forgetting about the other 95% of us.

[lisarzep]

Well let''s see...Nafta sent jobs out of the US, million of illegals who have NO right to one job here, "programs" that have conditioned people to become dependent, unskilled and lazy...I could go on and on....no wonder this country is in the state it''s in.

[misands]

The Republican-Bush Depression rolls on. Somebody rid America of these "traitors-within-the-gates."
-Posted by Johnpatrick9
__________________________________________________
I think most Republicans are more loyal to and care more about the GOP than they do the USA. That''s why they refuse to put partisanship aside to focus on the common good. They are vile scum.

[stinginrich]

The Planned Destruction of our once Vibrant Manufacturing Economy is right on track......
Next Stop: FEMA Camps and "Showers"......

[geneonlbk]

Only in America will the sheeple stand for Wall Street losers receiving 16 billion of the taxpayer''s own money. And Obama says "tisk tisk".

[lost_america]

If you can%u2019t bring in slave labor with the H1B program, just send the jobs over there.

If I%u2019m a CEO I still get my 30% increase this year

That%u2019s the wonderful thing about computers; you can now do IT jobs from anywhere,

(%u201CAnywhere%u201D being India)

[mirthiam]

Job loss statistics like these are disturbing. Last month alone while over 500,000 people in the U. S. filed claims for unemployment, this country legally allowed over 125,000 new workers to enter the country from abroad as temporary employees using H-1B visas to fill job vacancies in a variety of fields. Most other nations do not permit foreign nationals to work when domestic unemployment is so high; paid positions are reserved for their own citizens. In my opinion, given the high unemployment rate, it is time to change our immigration laws to end the H-1B visa program with few, if any, exceptions. This change would help reduce unemployment in the United States by creating roughly 1,000,000 a year for unemployed citizens (assuming citizens are interested in filling the technical vacancies now given to H-1B temporary visa workers by companies within the United States).

[johnpatrick9]

The Republican-Bush Depression rolls on. Somebody rid America of these "traitors-within-the-gates."

[b4ucmyi]

I''''m still tryig to figure out WHY boosh and cheney wanted to destroy the US?
Posted by stevex47 at 01:39 PM : Jan 29, 2009

Because David Rockefeller wants it destroyed. Gotta destroy people''s lives completely so they''ll work for slave-wages. Then all the manufacturing jobs will come pouring back into the country, minus the unions. In the meantime, the government will continue stealing from the middle-class and handing out trillions to David''s banks. Got it now?

[shimano35]

Alot of you still havnt noticed----Bush is not president!! Watch the news!!

[docpeter1953]

I am curious, does anyone know what percentage of those being terminated, laid-off, or in general losing their jobs are hourly laborers vs. company execs. and/or salaried. Is it just or mostly middle income blue collar jobs being lost or are the suits having to go out and find a new job. It was/is the suits that got/get the ''retention payments'', not the factory floor worker. Are the job cuts spread evenly across the board, or are they mostly in the blue collar crowd? Aren''t there more workers than execs? It is the middle class worker, that are losing their jobs, that will buy more product than the execs.

I am just wondering. Does anyone know where this information can be found.

[centerfall94]

It sounds like it is time to slash military spending.

Posted by patrik1974 at 02:47 PM : Jan 29, 2009

And while we''re at it, eliminating tax breaks for three or more kids is a good idea too. If you want to have a whole herd, then you better be prepared to pay for them.

[patrik1974]

It sounds like it is time to slash military spending.

[cbscrash072]

No unemployment percentage rate? why not? Because it would be to easy to compare our bad times to Europes good times. Our bad times unemployment number is still better the the best numbers out of Europe during the boom. I think the economic crisis can be laid at the feet of the media. They have done nothing but report gloom and doom. It is becoming a self full filing prophecy. You tell me things are bad. I prepare for things to be bad and that makes things bad. This will be the first recession caused by to much info. The best way to fix this is to take those trillions and give it to the people. We will bail out the industries important to us. O''well at least when things get really bad we can lynch the law makers. That''s worth something. Its not everyday you get to string up some politicians.

[penniemumm]

Father, in Jesus'' Name we ask you to FIX THIS MESS! And all God''s people said AMEN!