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U.S. employers slashed jobs for the third straight month in March and unemployment rose to a nearly three-year high, offering the latest signs that the economy has fallen into a recession.
The Labor Department's much anticipated report showed a net loss of 80,000 jobs last month. That marks the third straight month that jobs have fallen - the longest period of decline since early 2003.
Economists surveyed by Briefing.com had forecast that payrolls would fall by 50,000 in the latest reading.
The new report also pegged job losses in January and February at 76,000 each month.
Those revisions added an additional 67,000 job losses to previous readings. The Labor Department now estimates that the economy has shed 232,000 jobs in the first three months of this year.
"The revisions are the real surprise in the report," said John Silvia, chief economist for Wachovia. "If we had known it was anything like that, there would not have been any debate going on about whether we were in a recession. It's pretty stark."
The job losses were widespread, with the battered construction sector losing 51,000 jobs and manufacturing employment falling by 48,000. But there were also losses in key service sector industries. Retail employment dropped by 12,000 jobs, and business and professional service employers cut staff by 35,000. |
AND......corporations are busily cutting jobs, laying off workers, outsourcing work away from American workers
THEN....our government has an obligation to punish those corporation and should absolutely prohibit the outsourcing of future jobs. Moreover, our government should guarantee a full time living wage (52K per year) job for every worker with benefits and a pension.
Not only will this be a huge boost to our economy, it will alleviate poverty, relieve economic stress, reduce financial worry, and provide something that most all Americans now lack. A future.
No country in world history has ever become successful as a nation or maintained its status by allowing its own corporations to effectively destroy its citizen's jobs, pull the rug out from its own workers and families, and reward the wealthy for creating ruin.
IF the USA is to have a viable future and not drown in bankruptcy and hopelessness and stupidity, it must act for the good of the general public first and foremost instead of protecting the superwealthy 1% of the population.