EconomicCrisis.US

With the holiday season just around the corner, the ranks of America’s jobless are only getting larger.

The nation’s unemployment rate ticked up from 9.6% to 9.8% — a seven-month high — according to data released by the Labor Department on Friday.

The U.S. economy added just 39,000 jobs last month, a steep decline from the 172,000 jobs created in October.

The bleak news came just days after unemployment benefits expired for thousands of Americans on Nov. 30 as Republicans and Democrats in the Senate continued to argue on the terms of the extensions.
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It’s amazing how little has changed in two years. On Thanksgiving 2008, just after the economic collapse, we wrote: “Whole institutions have failed or come close. Jobs and homes have been lost. The automobile industry, in its land of origin, is said to be on the brink of collapse. People are frightened. Experts are at a loss. The future is uncertain.”

Today things have stabilized, but in many ways our uncertainty has only deepened: The U.S. economy has failed to rebound significantly, while fidgety Western European economies are barely holding together. There are worries that federal overspending here could lead to inflation or worse. Our leaders in Washington seem to be at a loss for what to do.
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A permanent extension of tax cuts is needed “to reduce the uncertainty in America” that’s chilling business investment and hiring, John Boehner, the presumptive U.S. House speaker, said today.

Asked whether he’s willing to compromise with President Barack Obama on the tax reductions enacted in 2001 and 2003, the Republican leader said he wants the cuts, which expire at the end of this year, to be made permanent for all taxpayers.

Congress will take up the issue when it returns next week for a lame-duck session, following the midterm elections that put Republicans in charge of the House and reduced the Democrats’ majority in the Senate. Democrats will retain control of both houses of Congress until January.
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With all the criticism of stimulus programs and bailouts, North Dakota`s senior senator is defending the federal government`s response to the national economic crisis.

Sen. Kent Conrad held a news conference in Bismarck this morning defending the actions of both the Bush and Obama administrations, as well as Congress, when the economic meltdown hit. But the state GOP questions Conrad`s timing and credibility.

The chairman of the Senate Budget Committee, Conrad, says Congress had no choice but to vote for bank bailouts and stimulus, which he says averted a catastrophe.
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