Unemployment, the Government and you.

[Bob Hubbard]

So.....hows that economy huh? With almost 3 million Americans out of work, whose responsibility is it to 'fix' the problem?

====
Jobless claims jump by 18,000
Initial claims for unemployment insurance rise to 369,000, coming in above estimates.
Continuing claims, or those people who have already received one week of assistance, fell to 2,873,000 in the week ended Sept. 18, the latest figures available, down from 2,876,000 the previous week.
http://money.cnn.com/2004/09/30/news/economy/jobless/index.htm?cnn=yes
Both the number of unemployed persons, 8.0 million, and the unemployment
rate, 5.4 percent, were little changed from July to August. The jobless rate
is down from its recent high of 6.3 percent in June 2003; most of this decline
occurred in the second half of last year. In August, the unemployment rates
for the major worker groups--adult men (5.0 percent), adult women (4.7 percent),
teenagers (17.0 percent), whites (4.7 percent), blacks (10.4 percent), and
Hispanics or Latinos (6.9 percent)--showed little change over the month. The
unemployment rate for Asians was 3.6 percent in August, not seasonally adjusted.
http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.nr0.htm

U.S. Unemployment, 1960 to the Present
http://www.j-bradford-delong.net/multimedia/Unempl.html

 

[StraightRazor]

Yeah man it sucks!!! Make me a job!



a high paying one please.

 

[Bob Hubbard]

NYers must talk to Mrs. Clinton as she promised to create something like 200,000+ new jobs. I contacted them and asked when I could start, but they said they weren't hiring. Man, I didn't think they would go that fast.

 

[Cryozombie]

Yeah I was thinkin...

How come when we have these damn recessions and everyone is gettin laid off... and everyone is on unemployment...

How come I still gotta work?

I could use a few months of Government cheese...

(The Preceding was Satire, I am glad to still have a job)

 

[rmcrobertson]

Just as a sidebar, the figures we now have for unemployment are arrived at differently than they were twenty years ago.

Under Reagan, the government started to count members of the armed forces as employed. If memory serves, they previously were simply left out of the calculations altogether.

 

[StraightRazor]

Just as a sidebar, the figures we now have for unemployment are arrived at differently than they were twenty years ago.

Under Reagan, the government started to count members of the armed forces as employed. If memory serves, they previously were simply left out of the calculations altogether.

Do soldiers pay taxes? (I honestly dont know) If they do, I would say they are employed.

 

[rmcrobertson]

Point is, the jump in employment came from changing the way the stats were measured, not from improvements. You probably want to raise the unemployment rate 1% or so to compensate.

 

[Tkang_TKD]

Do soldiers pay taxes? (I honestly dont know) If they do, I would say they are employed.

Yes we do, but not in the conventional sense.

We pay taxes based on our basic pay only. We get allowances for food (~$250.00 per month), an allowance for housing which varies with paygrade, and in some cases we get special pays (hazardous duty, combat zone, etc...all of which could be subjected to tax).

To summarize, if it's listed as "Pay" we are taxed federally, and state if the state has a tax, and does not defer or remove taxes on Military personnel.

The exeption to the tax on pay, is that when we are serving in a combat zone, we are exempt from Federal tax (We still pay social security and state), or in the case of some officers, they get a certain amount of their pay tax free.

If it is listed as an "allowance", it is not calculated into our pay for tax purposes, except in determining things like the child tax credit.


Any bonus we recieve (re-enlistment incentives for some) is taxable at a 28% rate, regardless of the soldier/sailors tax bracket (mine is around 17% normally). So basically, if I get a $45,000 re-enlistment bonus, 28% of that goes immediately to taxes, even though my regular pay is taxed at 17%.

Bonus' received in a combat zone are tax free, just as our pay is.

 

[Flatlander]

Mr. Kangas, thank you for volunteering that information. :asian:

 

[Tkang_TKD]

Mr. Kangas, thank you for volunteering that information. :asian:

No problem at all :asian: Please note though that even with all these perks, I still don't take home alot of pay. My annual takehome is a little over 25,000 per year in pay that I actually see, and 45,400 if you count the $1700.00 per month that I would recieve if I didn't live in Military Family Housing.

I am an Information Systems specialist by trade (15 yrs experience), and I in fact teach Cisco CCNA curriculum, as well as Microsoft MCP curriculum in my current assignment as a Navy Instructor.

I guess I break out in the lower part of the payscale for persons of my qualifications in the civilian community (most make 2-3 times my salary).

 

[Phoenix44]

I'm employed. In fact, I now work two jobs. All tolled, they don't pay as much as one real job, nor do they have full time benefits. Sounds like a lot of people I know.

 

[kenpo tiger]

As one of the unemployed (at least for a few more weeks) in the arts, I can safely say I don't enjoy having to apply for a check each week. Nor do I enjoy having to speak to those in the NYS unemployment office, who are just typical civil servants who don't give a damn and are downright rude. I can't wait to go back to work, even though it will be a gradual phase-in to chaos revisited and then a gradual phase-out to be unemployed again for a few months. No money for the arts. And, by the way, I don't make a lot of money. I'm just one of the guys in the white hats.