Little Hope For The Jobless Economy

With the winter rush and the economy slowly growing, people have been scrambling for jobs in hope of finding stability financially.

On February 5^th, 2010, the BLS (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics), released a statement reporting the most recently recorded unemployment rate.

According to the BLS, the number of unemployment has decreased to 14.8 million people. The rate of unemployment went down to 9.7 percent by 0.3 percent in January.

“It’s nothing like we had in the free fall of last winter, but we’re not about to turn around. We’re still looking at a really weak economy,” says Dean Baker, co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research in Washington.

The jobless rate for specific major groups showed very little change since last month. Within gender groups, the rate for men went down to 10.0 percent, as the rate for women fell to 7.9 percent.

Within major racial groups, the rate for blacks declined to 16.5 percent, the rate for Hispanics fell to 12.6 percent, the jobless rate for whites were 8.7 percent, while the rate for Asian were 8.4 percent. As for teenagers, the rate went down to 26.4 percent. To see your potential unemployment rate, click here.

About 85,000 jobs have been lost during December. The unemployment rate due to job loss has decreased by 378,000 to 9.3 million.

“Since everyone is struggling, no one wants to buy anything that’s not absolutely a necessity. I’ve been continuously looking for another job for months now since my business has been plummeting to almost nothing. I’m still having trouble finding a job. I have a family to support and I’m barely getting by, things don’t seem to be getting better regardless of what the unemployment rate is saying,” says Teresa Estrello, owner of a company called Imperial Countertops.

The economy has been steadier than the past months, but economists believe that this steady state will soon collapse and result in the highest unemployment rate in the coming months, causing more struggles to keep and find jobs.

“I’ve been unemployed for 6 months. It’s difficult to deal with because it’s almost impossible to afford everyday essentials. I had to drop out of school to work for a bit because things got that serious,” says Laura Xu, a former freshman in college.

Although the rate in job loss has decreased in the nation compared to last winter, it is evident that the economy is still suffering.