Geography of 'Recession'

[Interested Reader]

Hi itulipers,

I've been reading here for a couple of years. This is my first post.

Thought the following would appeal to some: an animated map of US employment. I can't vouch for the source, but if they are representing their data accurately, it's a stark moving picture:

http://cohort11.americanobserver.net...ediafinal.html

[Rajiv]

Re: Geography of 'Recession'

I am embedding the web page

The original article written by LaToya Egwuekwe

[don]

Re: Geography of 'Recession'

An effective choice of colors- as darkness falls across the land....

[ThePythonicCow]

Re: Geography of 'Recession'

Thought the following would appeal to some: an animated map of US employment. I can't vouch for the source, but if they are representing their data accurately.

Nice map - thanks!

[LargoWinch]

Hi itulipers,

I've been reading here for a couple of years. This is my first post.

Thought the following would appeal to some: an animated map of US employment. I can't vouch for the source, but if they are representing their data accurately, it's a stark moving picture:

http://cohort11.americanobserver.net...ediafinal.html

I wish my first post was as clever...thanks.

What was my first post anyway? Seems like a long time ago... :p

[Rajiv]

Re: Geography of 'Recession'

More from LaToya Egwuekwe

‘Learn to fly with what is’

As a journalist, I’ve covered my share of uncomfortable stories. I’ve interviewed families of murder victims, rape victims, human trafficking victims, recovering drug addicts, gang members, etc. The look of despair and hopelessness in their eyes was always unsettling. Oftentimes, I carried their stories home. Many of them remain with me today. Stories like that are pretty hard to let go.

So, when my boss asked me back in April to fly to Wichita, KS, to cover a story about some 2,000 (yes, 2,000!) people being laid off from a local aerospace company, I thought I was more than prepared for what I was about to see and hear. Turns out, I wasn’t.

The tears. The long, empty stares. The questions of “what am I going to do now?” The stories of having just had a brand new baby. A brand new mortgage. Having to deal with a chronic illness with no health insurance. Though – at the individual level – no where near as tragic as death or being the victim of a heinous crime. Those are permanent. I have to say, however, collectively, for me, the overall sense of despair and widespread feeling of hopelessness was almost just as unsettling.

“Wichita is to aerospace what Flint, MI, is to the auto industry,” said one of my co-workers. When nearly the entire city either works in or is dependant upon a single industry, mass layoffs have the potential of decimating the entire community. Parents don’t know how they’re going to feed their children. Local businesses have fewer customers. And, with a smaller tax base communities begin to cripple.
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In this article, she refers to an article by Dr. Judith Rich

Dr. Judith Rich, a teacher in the field of transformation and consciousness, put it best in her article “When the Shift Hits the Fan,” when she quoted author Marilyn Ferguson:

It’s not so much that we’re afraid of change or so in love with the old ways, but it’s that place in between that we fear…It’s like being between trapezes. It’s Linus when his blanket is in the dryer. There’s nothing to hold on to.

In her own words, Rich goes on to say, “Talk about being in between trapezes! We can’t even see if there’s another one coming our way. You know that feeling when your stomach suddenly takes up residency in your throat? I think the term for this sensation is ‘free fall’. We’re there.” (NOTE: This is an awesome article! Please read it, and pass it along to your friends and loved ones.)

The article by Judith Rich - When The Shift Hits The Fan

Shift Happens!

Change, it turns out, is not a tidy process. Anyone who's ever been through a divorce or quit their job or perhaps more commonly now, lost their job, knows that endings are often very messy and starting over can be even more difficult.
Or as Marilyn Ferguson, author of The Aquarian Conspiracy put it:

It's not so much that we're afraid of change or so in love with the old ways, but it's that place in between that we fear . . . . It's like being between trapezes. It's Linus when his blanket is in the dryer. There's nothing to hold on to.

Feeling a little lost, like Linus these days? No wonder! Look where we are! Talk about being in between trapezes! We can't even see if there's another one coming our way. You know that feeling when your stomach suddenly takes up residency in your throat? I think the term for this sensation is "free fall". We're there.

Imagine you've just jumped out of an airplane with no parachute. All you have is a good sized piece of fabric, a needle and some thread. Your task is to make a parachute on the way down and have it completed and opened before you hit the ground.

Sound a bit daunting? OK, this may be a bit too dramatic of an example, but you get the picture. We're in that gap, the void, the great unknown, the space between trapezes. And it's being in this gap that's so challenging to negotiate. Stomach and throat, contact!

The change process, while sounding good on paper or in political speeches, is actually quite confounding. Navigating change is like trying to walk through quicksand without being sucked under. Each step needs to be taken mindfully, yet with a sense of urgency.

The trick is in knowing just where to place your foot and exactly how fast to move, for the sands are always shifting and every step carries with it the possibility of either triumph or tragedy. You could step into the abyss and disappear, or you could come down on solid ground and live to take another step.

Change doesn't come with an instruction manual. When the rubber meets the road, all bets are off. We can work hard, plan and prepare and then Life happens. We either end up where we thought we were going or we end up somewhere else. In case of the latter, we get to "pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off", take responsibility and choose again.

Assume Responsibility And Move On
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[Jay]

Re: Geography of 'Recession'

"Assume Responsibility And Move On," and don't look behind the curtain.

[aaron]

Re: Geography of 'Recession'

I would love to see the same movie depicting China over the same time period. I suspect we would see the opposite color scheme.

[Rajiv]

Re: Geography of 'Recession'

"Assume Responsibility and Move On" at least I took to mean -- to take responsibility for your life, and to do what it takes to get it back on track. This to me actually means -- to examine all fundamental assumptions, and " To look behind the curtain" and to organize to rectify the situation.

It is obvious from the article that she sees that a fundamental paradigm shift is taking place and that things will not "continue as usual."

Also from Washington's blog - Is America Finally Starting to Stand Up To Wall Street?

Are the American people finally starting to stand up to Wall Street?

Shareholder Revolt

Some of Goldman Sach's biggest shareholders are demanding that executive compensation be reduced. As the Wall Street Journal notes:

Their complaints in private conversations with the company and at analyst meetings show how anger over its big-money culture is spilling into the ranks of investors who typically shy away from debates over Wall Street pay.

Protests

There were the protests outside of the Bankers Association meeting in Chicago. See this, this, this, this, this and this.

If you don't think that more - bigger - protests are coming, you haven't been paying attention.

Debtor's Revolt

Debtors are revolting against exorbitant interest rates and fees and other aggressive tactics by the too big to fail banks. See this, this, and this.

Congresswoman Kaptur advises her constituents facing foreclosure to demand that the original mortgage papers be produced. She says that - if the bank can't produce the mortgage papers - then the homeowner can stay in the house.

Portfolio manager and investment advisor Marshall Auerback argues that a debtor's revolt would be a good thing.

And even popular personal finance advisor Suze Orman is highlighting the debtors revolt phenomenon on her national tv show.

Congress Is Starting to Get the Message

The American people are shouting so loud at their congress members and Senators, that even some of the most pro-Wall Street congressman are starting to get it.

For example, the Congressional Black Caucus has been hearing so much about how congress is failing to address the crisis of unemployment from their constituents, that the CBC delayed Barney Frank's proposed financial reform.

The House Financial Services Committee received so many phone calls from constituents that it approved the Ron Paul/Alan Grayson bill to audit the Fed and defeated the trojan horse alternate bill written by Mel Watt. Indeed, I have heard from congressional sources that the only calls to support the Watt alternate bill were from the Fed itself. And see this.

The Committee also approved Congressman Grayson's bill to rein in foreign currency swaps.


Both Geithner and Summers are coming under increasing pressure to resign due to their being in bed with Wall Street.

Even Bernanke's re-appointment is no longer certain.

And Obama's approval ratings have now dipped below 50%, largely due to his mishandling of the economic crisis.

As Congressman Peter DeFazio notes:

There were a lot of Democrats who were "upset and nervous with" the handling of the economy by the administration.

"It is pretty embarrassing for a Democratic administration and a Democratic Congress to be identified with total attention to Wall Street and nothing for Main Street and jobs," he said. "There are a lot of Democrats who... want to see something more effective done to create employment."

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Anger is a great force. If you control it, it can be transmuted into a power which can move the whole world.
- Sivananda

[GRG55]

Re: Geography of 'Recession'

I would love to see the same movie depicting China over the same time period. I suspect we would see the opposite color scheme.

If the data was accurate...I seriously doubt it.

[Rajiv]

Re: Geography of 'Recession'

From the WSJ - Q: How many unemployed workers does China have?

A: No one really knows.

The most readily available and most official statistic on unemployment in China is the one that just about everybody – including government officials – agrees tells you the least. The registered urban unemployment rate was 4.2% at the end of 2008, according to the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security (in Chinese). But that only means 8.86 million urban residents were registered to receive unemployment benefits; the statistic doesn’t even attempt to count the actual number of people without work. Nor do the figures include migrant workers, a major component of China’s labor force.

Since the onset of the current crisis, the government has tried to get a better grasp of the situation, sending officials fanning out across the country to try to count the number of migrant workers without jobs. Results varied, but a survey by the Ministry of Agriculture got the most attention. It put the number of lost jobs at roughly 20 million, out of a total migrant population of about 130 million, by early 2008.

Last week, the National Bureau of Statistics reported the results of its latest survey of 68,000 rural households. It raised the estimate of the current number of rural migrant workers to 140 million, and said about 23 million were looking for new work either in cities or in their home region. So there seems to be a rough agreement on at least the order of magnitude of recent job losses.
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Also from a year ago - China on the verge of unemployment explosion

(WSWS) -- Four years ago, the former World Bank President James Wolfensohn warned Chinese leaders that they had to address the widening social gulf between rich and poor. "That way," he said, "unlike the French [aristocrats], you will not be taken to the guillotine on July 14." The idea that the French Revolution could occur in contemporary China may have seemed farfetched at the time when the economy was experiencing an unprecedented boom—expanding at more than 10 percent each year.

Wolfensohn's warning can no longer be considered an exaggeration. After 30 years as a giant cheap labour platform for the world's major corporations, China cannot avoid being dragged into the greatest financial crisis since the 1930s. With the economy slowing rapidly, unemployment is set to skyrocket and social discontent will explode.

Zhou Tianyong, a researcher at the Central Party School in Beijing, warned of the consequences of growing job losses in an article in the official China Economic Times on December 4: "The redistribution of wealth through theft and robbery could dramatically increase and menaces to social stability will grow. This is extremely likely to create a reaction of mass-scale social turmoil".

Significantly, Zhou dismissed the current official urban unemployment rate of 4 percent, insisting the real figure was 12 percent this year and would rise to 14 percent in 2009. These forecasts, he said, were conservative, based on evidence that one third of small and medium firms have gone bankrupt and that large enterprises are cutting costs by displacing workers with machinery.

Zhou estimated that in China's labour intensive economy, every 1 percent fall in growth translated into the loss of 8 million jobs. GDP growth rate in the last third quarter was 9 percent, down from 11.9 percent last year. That is equivalent to the loss of 24 million jobs.

Zhou estimated that the decline of exports alone would cost about 12-20 million jobs. He pointed out that global demand for Chinese goods was unlikely to increase for a protracted period. He warned that the US could be entering a decade-long slump and that Europe and Japan were unlikely to recover before America.
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