The Horror Show

By BOB HERBERT

August 9, 2010, The New York Times

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/10/opinion/10herbert.html

The employment situation in the United States is much worse
than even the dismal numbers from last week's jobless report
would indicate. The nation is facing a full-blown employment
crisis and policy makers are not responding with anything
like the sense of urgency that is needed.

The employment data for July, released by the government on
Friday, showed that private employers added just 71,000 jobs
during the month and that the unemployment rate remained flat
at 9.5 percent. But as bad as those numbers were, if you look
beyond them you'll see a horror show.

Government workers were walking the plank from coast to
coast. About 143,000 temporary Census workers were let go,
and another 48,000 government employees at the budget-
strapped state and local levels lost their jobs. But the
worst news, with the most ominous long-term implications, was
that the reason the unemployment rate was not higher was
because 181,000 workers left the labor force.

To read the rest of this article, go to 

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/10/opinion/10herbert.html

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