The government reports more grim news about the economy: 240,000 jobs lost in October...

[Amerigo Vespucci]

Source: CNN

The government reports more grim news about the economy: 240,000 jobs lost in October; unemployment rate spikes to 6.5 percent.



Read more: http://www.cnn.com/

---

(Breaking Headline ONLY so far, no story yet)

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

1. Which makes it about 11% in reality.

[UnrepentantUnitarian]

7. Plus, because the population is constantly growing...

the need for an additional 100,000 jobs every month just to keep up with that...means that we really lost a solid third of a million jobs last month. They never tell you that "growing population" part.

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

14. That number is closer to an 150,000.

[onehandle]

11. I was ordered to lay off two contractors last week.

Nope. They aren't in those numbers.

[FreeStateDemocrat]

2. Wall Street market futures are all up, fuck mainstreet.

[Nicholas D Wolfwood]

3. Yikes....

My sincere condolences to any DUers that got caught in that tsunami...

[Amerigo Vespucci]

4. MSNBC has the story:

WASHINGTON - The nation’s unemployment rate bolted to a 14-year high of 6.5 percent in October as another 240,000 jobs were cut, the government said Friday. It was stark proof the economy is almost certainly in a recession.

The new snapshot, released by the Labor Department, shows the crucial jobs market deteriorating at an alarmingly rapid pace.

The jobless rate zoomed to 6.5 percent in October from 6.1 percent in September, matching the rate in March 1994. Employers have cut jobs each month this year.

Unemployment has now surpassed the high seen after the last recession in 2001. The jobless rate peaked at 6.3 percent in June 2003.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/27591780/

[BR_Parkway]

5. "almost certainly in a recession" ???? WTF does it take for them to

actually say that it is?

[MissB]

10. A depression.

[bulloney]

17. It's like being "sort of pregnant."

[Nostradammit]

18. A Democrat in the White House. n/t

[SpiralHawk]

6. The putrid fruit of republiconomics

[UnrepentantUnitarian]

8. Reaganism gone to seed...

The stinking rot of Norquist/Bozell-ism.

[SpiralHawk]

12. "Smirk" - Ronald 'Draft Dodger' Reagan (R - Chickenhawk)

[mrJJ]

9. 500K+ jobs lost in 2 months....

284,000 in September & 240,000 in October

Nonfarm payroll employment fell by 240,000 in October, and the unemployment rate
rose from 6.1 to 6.5 percent, the Bureau of Labor Statistics of the U.S. Department
of Labor reported today. October's drop in payroll employment followed declines of
127,000 in August and 284,000 in September, as revised. Employment has fallen by
1.2 million in the first 10 months of 2008; over half of the decrease has occurred
in the past 3 months. In October, job losses continued in manufacturing, construc-
tion, and several service-providing industries. Health care and mining continued
to add jobs.
http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.nr0.htm

[llmart]

13. There are many, many people......

here in Michigan whose unemployment benefits and subsequent extensions ran out a long time ago. They are no longer counted. President Obama has his work cut out for him. Let's never forget who created this mess.

[WarhammerTwo]

15. I'll be part of that number soon

I'm a scientist doing antibacterial drug discovery. They're shipping my job (the whole Infectious Disease Department, really)out of the country. They also hired an Indian firm to do a lot of pre-clinical research... a firm that just got banned from importing drugs into the country due to safety violation and are possibly charged with falsifying data to the FDA. Nice, right? Gotta save a buck to make the Wall Street investors happy. Cuz God knows the investors gotta come first. Not the patients. Not the employees. Nope. The investors. Gotta make good on our promise for a fair and reasonable return on their investment as per our mission statement. Thing is, Wall Street doesn't want a FAIR and REASONABLE return. They want outlandish returns and they wanted them yesterday. They want unsustainable double digit growth quarter after quarter with a "what have you done for me lately" mentality. But they come first. Glad to see Corporate America has it's priorities straight. Man, I hate Wall Street and their unfettered free trade. If ya ask me, THAT is the greatest threat to this country. Not illegal immigrants. not the drug trade. Not terrorists. Wall Street and Disaster Capitalism. I have a great article about Disaster Capitalism posted on my MySpace blog if you're interested: http://blog.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog.ListAll&friendID=61215564

I will give credit where credit is due. My company just didn't come in and pull the rug out from underneath us and lay us all off out of the blue. They told us by December 2009, my department will be gone. As projects come to an end, they'll be letting people go. Layoffs will be in waves next year. So they have been kind enough to give us AMPLE warning and we are all able to look for work and interview on their dime. So yeah, we're getting effed, but at least they greased up first so it's not as painful as it could be. Hopefully, in that time, I'll either find another position inside the company or another job outside and avoid becoming a statistic.

Still. It sucks having this looming in the distance.

[bulloney]

16. THE. FUNDAMENTALS. OF. THE. ECONOMY. ARE. SOUND.

[OhioChick]

19. The hemorrhaging continues......

K&R