Government Dependency

Jobless Claims Back on the Rise, Topping 460,000

October 14, 2010

CNNMoney.com - The number of Americans filing for first-time unemployment benefits rose last week, according to a government report released Thursday.

There were 462,000 initial jobless claims filed in the week ended Oct. 9, up 13,000 from an upwardly revised 449,000 the previous week, according to the Labor Department's weekly report.

Economists surveyed by Briefing.com were expecting 450,000 new claims.

The weekly figure has been stuck in a tight range since last November, hovering in the mid- to upper-400,000 range, and even ticking slightly above 500,000 in mid-August.

The 4-week moving average of initial claims -- a number that tries to smooth out week-to-week volatility -- was 459,000. This number is up 2,250 from the previous week.

While not a eye-popping number, Robert Dye, a senior economist at PNC Financial Services, says it is more evidence that the job market remains hobbled.

"Claims are going in the wrong direction again, but it's a one week move after several weeks of improvements," he said.

According to Dye, smoother sailing should be ahead as the last of the temporary workers hired by the Census work through the system.

Continuing claims: The government said 4.399 million people continued to file unemployment claims for their second week or more, during the week ended Oct. 2, the most recent data available. That's down 112,000 from an upwardly revised 4.511 million the week before.

Economists were expecting 4.450 million people to file ongoing claims.

The 4-week moving average for ongoing claims fell by 34,500 to 4.488 million.

Continuing claims reflect people who file each week after their initial claim until the end of their standard benefits, which usually last 26 weeks. The figures do not include those who have moved to state or federal extensions, or people who have exhausted their benefits but are still out of a job.

State-by-state: Jobless claims in two states declined by more than 1,000 in the week ended Oct. 2, which is the most recent state data available. Claims in California dropped the most, by 6,131. The state attributed the drop to fewer layoffs in the trade and service industries.

Claims jumped by more than 1,000 in three states. They rose the most in Pennsylvania, by 2,869, due to layoffs in layoffs in the rubber/plastics, food, construction, and service industries.

Federal Hiring Burdens Taxpayers

May 4, 2010

Citizens Against Government Waste - Taxpayers have another reason to worry about the wastrel federal government. A new Gallup poll showed that federal hiring outpaced private sector-hiring for the month of April. According to the poll’s written analysis,

“By almost a 2-to-1 margin, federal employees say their employer is hiring rather than firing, giving the federal government a relatively robust +18 Job Creation Index for April. (Federal workers make up about 5 percent of the sample of workers Gallup interviewed in April.) . . . The Job Creation Index among private-sector and other non-government workers is +9.”

Taxpayers have reason to be concerned about the hiring of more federal workers. A recent survey of federal and private-sector pay by USA Today confirmed that the feds overcompensating their workers; average federal salaries exceeded average private-sector pay in 83 percent of comparable occupations.

Unfortunately, taxpayers are not only burdened with paying monstrous federal salaries, but also must underwrite exorbitant benefit packages that continue for decades after an employee leaves a job.

According to an April 5, 2010 FOXNews.com article,

“According to the Bureau of Economic Analysis, average health, pension and other benefits tally up to $40,785 per federal worker — compared with just $9,882 per private worker.”

Among the problems with this, is the fact that the federal government does not have “profits” it can use to pay its workers more money. The government must raise taxes on the hardworking public to pay these increases, or borrow the money. The federal government is currently operating at a $1.6 trillion budget deficit and has a $12.8 trillion national debt.

For taxpayers, the one bright spot in the Gallup poll was the fact that state and local governments are downsizing. According to the poll’s written analysis,

“This contrasts with Index values of -28 among state and -26 among local government workers (about 7 percent and 5 percent of Gallup’s workforce sample, respectively).”

Another recent development in the private/public pay issue according to a May 4, 2010 article written by Josh Barrow of the Manhattan Institute is that private wages are on the rise. According to Barrow,

“The first quarter of 2010, private employee compensation growth outpaced state and local government employee compensation growth.”

While this is good news, it will be some time before the private-sector catches up to the public’s extravagant wages and, unfortunately, it seems that public employees’ wages will not ever decrease markedly.

Sadly, state and local governments have been known to inflate salaries and benefits, just like the federal government. An article by Fred Barnes in the May 3, 2010 edition of The Weekly Standard highlighted the alarming fact that 20 million people work for state and local governments and an additional three million have retired with pensions. Barnes cited the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data showing that state and local government salaries are 34 percent higher than those for private sector jobs and benefits are 70 percent higher than the private-sector. The Weekly Standard also reported that,

“In Contra Costa, California, the final salary of one fire chief, 51, was $221,000. He was given an annual, guaranteed pension of $284,000. Another chief, 50, whose final salary was $185,000, got a pension of $241,000.”

Until the federal, state, and local governments can tamp down the inflation in salaries and benefits to reasonable levels and cut excessive spending, taxpayers should continue to cringe every time they hear that the government is hiring.