Unemployment high in March, Officials say
Friday, April 3, 2009
By Michael Ruhl, University of New Mexico – Talk Radio News Service
A day after President Barack Obamaʼs budget was passed by a Congress boiling with
partisanship, the Bureau of Labor Statistics released a report showing unemployment at
its highest since 1983. There are now 13.2 million Americans out of work.
The pouring rain in Washington mirrored the sobered mood in the room, as the Joint
Economic Committee heard the testimony of Keith Hall, the Commissioner of the
Bureau of Labor Statistics.
March was one of the worst Months on record for unemployment, and when asked
outright, Hall told the committee that there were no “bright spots” in the report.
National unemployment climbed to 8.5 percent in March, rising from the level of 8.1
percent in February and 7.6 percent in January.
Hall said that two-thirds of the job loss has happened in the past 5 months. Every state
is in recession for the first time in 30 years, according to Carolyn Maloney (D-NY).
Official unemployment numbers do not encompass underemployed Americans or those
who have officially left the workforce. It is reported that 16 percent of the country is out
of work or underemployed. One in four of those unemployed have been out of work for
more than six months, and of those, half have been looking for work for over a year, Hall
said.
Maloney highlighted that last month, 8,000 jobs were lost in the news publishing
industry. Those losses total 70,000 job cuts since Dec. 2007, Hall said, adding that most
job losses have been see in the manufacturing, construction, and temporary services
industries. The only area to see any growth in March was the Healthcare industry, Hall
said.
Ranking Committee member Senator Sam Brownback (R-KA) noted that the impact of
the ongoing recession was not severe for almost a year after it began in December
2007. Brownback attributed recent dramatic jumps in job losses over the past five
months to the lockup in the credit markets and the government bailouts that followed.
The Federal Reserve believes that unemployment will peak at 8.8 percent this year, but
Ranking House Committee Member Kevin Brady (R-TX) said that the unemployment

rate is already higher than what the administration anticipated for 2009. Brady said that
the Obama Administrationʼs “optimistic assumptions” would not get the country out of its
current mess.
President Obamaʼs Economic Stimulus package was passed by Congress earlier this
year, and saw an unprecedented amount of money placed into public works meant to
put people back to work. Obama has pledged the legislation will save or create three to
four million jobs over the next two years.
Read the BLS report here: http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.nr0.htm
Link: http://talkradionews.com/2009/04/unemployment-high-in-march-officials-say/