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Poor jobless numbers are tip of the iceberg for President Bush

Date Posted: October 31 2003

As of the end of October, the U.S. stock market had risen 30 percent since March, consumers were spending more, industrial activity was on the rise, and 57,000 jobs had been added to the U.S. economy in September.

"Things are getting better," said President Bush. "But there's still work to do."

Work to do, indeed.

The fact that the 6.1 percent national unemployment rate remained the same from August to September was actually seen as a small victory by the Bush Administration, which began in early 2001 with a 3.9 percent jobless rate, a number which has steadily worsened.

The unemployment numbers are of little comfort to the nearly 600,000 Americans who lost their job from February to August - the longest losing streak for jobs during an "economic expansion" in U.S. history. Job losses are just the start of the poor economic record of the Bush Administration, which has been in place during three years of some remarkably bad economic years.

  • Three million jobs have been lost during Bush's presidency.
  • The national news was filled with reports this month that the number of Americans without health care benefits rose in 2002 by more than half a percent to 43.6 million.
  • Average hourly wages fell 1 cent in August to $15.45, the federal government reported, the first decline in wages since May 1989.
  • In Michigan since Bush took office, 174,600 jobs have been lost, resulting in the current 7.4 percent jobless rate. In early 2001, the unemployment rate in our state was 4.6 percent.
  • And looming over everything is the federal budget deficit. According to CBS News, "The federal budget deficit hit a record $374.2 billion in 2003, more than double last year's imbalance of $157.8 billion, "as the costs of the war in Iraq, a new round of tax cuts and economic weakness pushed the government's red ink to the highest level in history."

And the president's Office of Management and Budget predicted the 2004 deficit would top $500 billion. "Today's budget numbers reinforce the indications we have seen for some months now: that the economy is well on the path to recovery," Treasury Secretary John Snow said in October.

White House budget director Joshua Bolten said spending restraint and policies aimed at bolstering the economy can wrench the budget onto a course to halve deficits - but not until 2009. Democrats mocked the administration's spin on the budget numbers, noting that the current red ink surpassed the $290 billion record set in 1992.

"I'm somewhat amused to see them say they thought that was good news," said Sen. Kent Conrad of North Dakota, top Democrat on the Senate Budget Committee.

There's at least one bright spot in all of this - things are looking up for temporary workers. One business columnist said that ManPower, the nation's largest temp agency, "reports that employers are rapidly ramping up their temp hiring plans."