“The only thing we have to fear…
… is fear itself.” Franklin Delano Roosevelt‘s (FDR’s) inaugural address on March 4, 1933 occurred in the middle of a bank panic. The next day started the “First 100 Days” of his “New Deal.” A number of bills were passed quickly because Congress was very cooperative – something that Congress today needs to remember! (…or read about for the first time, perhaps!)
It is very important to remember the truth of FDR’s words and not to mimic the behavior of “gutless financial dweebs” and make a bad situation worse. Another important thing to remember is that the economies of the U.S. and of the world were WORSE in 1933 than they are now. I wish that more people who experienced those times were alive now to guide us with their wisdom.
As you remember from last month’s exciting episode, the employment statistics for the U.S. were “tanking,” and now, December’s statistics are almost as bad, making the overall unemployment situation much worse.
The unemployment rate for the whole United States rose from 6.8% to 7.2% (11.1 million people) in December 2008. Nonfarm payroll employment declined by 524,000 people in December and by 1.9 million people over the last 4 months of 2008, as described in the Bureau of Labor Statistics report released yesterday. Job losses in December were “large and widespread across most major industry sectors,” according to the report.
In addition, the number of “involuntary part-time workers” in December reached 8.0 million people, up 3.4 million over the last 12 months. The number of people “marginally attached” to the labor force in December, including those workers too discouraged to look for work, reached 1.9 million additional people.
Well, those are the staistics. That is the hand that we have been dealt. How we play the hand is up to us.
Now is the time to get positive and roll up our sleeves and work to pull ourselves out of this situation.
After all, the United States, and the world, have already been through much worse.
-Bill at Cheshire Cat Photo™
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