6 Million Benefit-Paying Jobs Vanish in One Year! (Mish Shedlock)

Perhaps I should start a seperate economics (hick!) blog ??

Well, no not really, but the hits just keep on a coming and some stuff is just too precious NOT to post. I don't politically always agree with Mish Shedlock 100% but his data is more than always impressive.

In light of the coming prescribed cuts in social security, consider these following FACTS !!

(and thanks Mish. More great ammo. Ain't that economic stimulus propoganda just stunning?)

6 Million Benefit-Paying Jobs Vanish in One Year!

Posted: 17 Nov 2010 02:05 AM PST

Analysis of weekly unemployment data and covered employees shows that 5,977,844 benefit-paying jobs have been lost in the last year.

click on chart for sharper image

The above chart is from reader Tim Wallace. I added the date and numeric annotations. Thanks Tim!

Covered Employment Stats of Merit

• Covered employment is back to 2004 levels.
• Close to 6 million benefits paying jobs have vanished in a year.
• Over 8 million benefits paying jobs have vanished since the 2008 peak.

What is a Covered Employee?

The exact meaning of "covered employee" varies slightly state to state, but not by much. In simple terms it means one is eligible for unemployment insurance benefits.

Most states exclude the self-employed, commission based employment such as real estate agents, those in student training programs, academic and hospital internships, employment by churches or religious organizations, and rehabilitation programs.

Self-employed individuals must pay into unemployment insurance programs, however, the self-employed are not eligible for benefits anywhere.

Nearly 6 Million Jobs Vanish

By the above intrepretation, it is safe to conclude that 5,977,844 jobs totally vanished (not just benefit paying jobs).

The only way that cannot be true is if there was a sudden shocking increase in the number of real estate agents, church hiring, or close to 6 million people all of a sudden decided to go into business for themselves.

All of those possibilities are highly unlikely to say the least.

Tim Wallace writes ....

The ANNUAL ADDITIVE TREND from 2004 to 2008 of 1.9 million is now a net loss of 8 million the past two years

Year....Covered...........Number added from previous year

2004....126,276,670....Data from hard copy sheets

2005....127,622,590....1,345,920

2006....130,605,286....2,982,696

2007....132,623,886....2,018,600

2008....133,902,387....1,278,501 average added per yr = 1,906,429

2009....131,823,421....-2,078,966

2010....125,845,577....-5,977,844

Did the stimulus SAVE or CREATE any jobs, or did we lose over 8 million jobs in two years in spite of record amounts of stimulus?

Download data including the covered column is found on the US Department of Labor website, Weekly Claims Data.

Was there a Massive Surge in Retirees?

click on chart for sharper image

There was no massive surge in retirees so that cannot account for the loss of benefits-paying jobs.

Retiree Data

• In October of 2006 there were 30,908,097 retirees.
  
• In October of 2007 there were 31,467,071 retirees, an increase of 558,974.
  
• In October of 2008 there were 32,222,895 retirees, an increase of 755,824.
  
• In October of 2009 there were 33,366,881 retirees, an increase of 1,143,986.
• In October of 2010 there were 34,463,650 retirees, an increase of 1,096,769.

Information on retirees is from the Social Security Administration. It undercounts retirees not in the system so actual numbers would be somewhat higher.

The number of retirees is certainly increasing which suggests the number of jobs needed to keep the unemployment rate steady is dropping. It also helps explain a falling participation rate (although not at the rate that it is falling).

That aside, the growth in the number of retirees cannot begin to explain the massive loss of benefits-paying jobs.

The increase in retirees from 2008 to 2010 is only 2,240,755 total. Civilian population growth was rose by 1,980,000 just last year.

Population Changes

I recently discussed population changes in my post In Search of 1.1 Million Jobs Claimed by Obama; Where the Hell are They?

Let's take another look at the BLS October Jobs Report.

Scroll down to page 5: HOUSEHOLD DATA Summary table A. Household data, seasonally adjusted.

click on chart for sharper image

The first item of interest is the Civilian Noninstitutional Population(i.e the population aged 16 and up not in school, prison, or other institutions).

In the last year, the table shows Civilian Noninstitutional Population rose by 1,980,000 an average gain of 165,000 potential workers a month.

Expected Increase In Workforce

In the last year the Civilian Noninstitutional Population rose by 1,980,000. There were 1,096,769 retirees. That mean the labor force should have increased by 883,231 workers. Instead the BLS reports the labor force increased by 50,000 workers (second line in table A above).

The rest supposedly dropped out of the workforce.

Hard Facts

Please remember the numbers in Table A are from phone surveys, seasonally adjusted, and arguably quite error prone.

On the other hand, the covered employees chart was produced from actual jobs data from the states.

Hard data says the US lost 5,977,844 benefits-paying jobs in a year, and 8,056,810 benefits-paying jobs in 2 years when we should have gained close to a million jobs a year or so based on population growth, even factoring in the number of retirees.

6 Million Benefits-Paying Jobs Vanish and Unemployment Rate Drops!

In spite of losing nearly 6 million benefits-paying jobs in the last year (and not gaining another 800,00 to a million more based on population growth minus retirees), the unemployment rate in October of 2009 was 10.1% and it is nowsupposedly a half-point lower at 9.6%.

Is this a crock or what?

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com

FREAKING DOOMED BY DOUBLING POWER: Mogambo Guru

As delightful as ever!!

You go, Mocambo Guru!

Doom and gloom. Doom and gloom. That's the BuZh recipe for success.

The Daily Reckoning PRESENTS: The Mogambo finally looks something up on his own. It is quite momentous; but it is simultaneously quite sad, as he discovers the truth about the raging inflation that is destroying our economy. Read on...

FREAKING DOOMED BY DOUBLING POWER
by The Mogambo Guru

Dave Gonigam at The Desidooru Saloon reports that it looks like the “economic stimulus plan” being formulated and enacted by the government will, “result in tax rebates of $300 per person, $600 per couple, just like when the same scheme was used in 2001.”

The funny part is that Gonigam notes that, “$300 per person did nothing to goose the economy in 2001, and it’ll do even less now.” Immediately, they were hooted down by non-believers who said, “Says who? You? If you are being quoted by that Lowlife Mogambo Idiot (LMI), then you must be an idiot, too!”

But good old Dave was cool, and just said, with the hint of a mocking smile in his voice, “Using the Minneapolis Fed’s handy-dandy inflation calculator, just equaling that figure adjusted for inflation would take $350.” Hahaha! Thanks to the incompetence of government, the dollar has been devalued by 17% since 2001? Hahaha! We’re freaking doomed!

“And”, he goes on, “

God only knows what it would be if the inflation numbers weren’t doctored; the fearless John Williams says if the CPI were calculated the way it was back in Jimmy Carter’s day, it would be close to 12%.” Yikes! Inflation at 12%!

Hoping that they were wrong, because this rate of inflation would be horrendous, I went to Mr. William’s ShadowStats.com to find, sure enough, that

inflation has taken a sudden spike to 12%, with no sign of stopping! Yikes!

Suddenly, I was surprised that people were clapping me on the back and congratulating me on actually looking something up for myself, instead of me always stealing the ideas and work of other people and other employees.

And it must have surprised Bill Bonner, too, who also had a wry take on the stimulus package, which, “is only $145 billion. U.S. stocks lost more than twice that much in the first few seconds of trading (Monday).” Hahaha! Good point!

And when you plug this kind of loss into the Federal Reserve’s precious little models containing the “wealth effect”, then things get real gloomy, and pretty soon you are really getting scared, and you know it is only a matter of time before you pee in your pants out of sheer terror, and I’ll bet everyone at the Federal Reserve is wearing a disposable adult diaper under their clothes right now, just like I am here in the Ultimate Mogambo Bunker (UMB), and believe me it is mighty, mighty comforting!

Mr. Bonner, as usual, is apparently not into discussing nasty little people like me peeing in their pants and swilling wine out of a bottle in a paper sack, and says, “And the whole idea of providing more cash and credit is the wrong strategy anyway. These efforts at Keynesian stimulus were designed to overcome a different kind of enemy...a case where consumer demand was low...or where consumers saved too much money. Keynes worried that people had a ‘propensity to save,’ which needed to be corrected by reducing the returns to savers. But the real rate on savings now is less than zero. And the savings rate is down to minus 0.5% of disposable income.”

“No,” he says, “the problem is not that consumers spend too little, but that they spend too much they don’t have. Nor is the problem that consumers save too much, but that they don’t save enough.”

True enough! And then I notice that all of this leads to the big freaking problem of falling tax revenues. As the American economy morphed into one that relies on government spending for over half of all economic activity, any drop in revenues is bad news at the federal level, but catastrophic news if you are a citizen in one of the states that spent every extra dime of revenue from the boom to create permanent spending programs. And most did! Hahaha!

Jim Sinclair at jsmineset.com agrees with me, even though everyone is too polite to tell him so, and says that, “lower economic activity equals lower profits”, which is bad enough for investors, but that, “Lower profits leads to lower Federal Tax revenues”, which is even worse for the enormous, sprawling, rapacious system of government with which we have saddled ourselves, which is enough to send me into a Mogambo Screaming Fit Of Outrage (MSFOO) because these government weenies are going to be borrowing lots and lots and lots of money, creating money and debt like crazy during the long, ugly coming economic downturn, which means higher taxes at the exact wrong time of the cycle or less government spending at the exact wrong time of the cycle, too.

In fact, I was actually taking in a deep breath to really start the MSFOO in style, when I was saved from certain embarrassment by Mr. Sinclair, who says that the problem is a lot worse than I think, because,

“Lower Federal tax revenues in the face of increased Federal spending causes geometric, not arithmetic, rises in the US Federal Budget deficit. This is also true for cities & States as it is for the Federal government.”

And if you want to see what happens in a geometric rise, take a blank piece of paper and write down a 1, double it to get 2, double that to get 4, double that to get 8, double that to get 16, and keep doubling and doubling until the numbers reach a point where you suddenly leap to your feet and say, “Holy crap, Batman! That Stupid Mogambo Moron (SMM) is right; we’re freaking doomed!”

Until next time,

The Mogambo Guru
for The Daily Reckoning

Editor’s Note: Richard Daughty is general partner and COO for Smith Consultant Group, serving the financial and medical communities, and the editor of The Mogambo Guru economic newsletter - an avocational exercise to heap disrespect on those who desperately deserve it.

The Mogambo Guru is quoted frequently in Barron’s , The Daily Reckoning and other fine publications. Click here to visit the Mogambo archive page .

Casaubon's blog - what to do with your stimulus rebate!!

Be sure to check out the comments which are accessible on the link above!!

Veeger


Friday, February 01, 2008
Economic Self-Stimulus: Ideas for One Last Financial Orgasm

Well, it looks like we're all going to get a check in the mail, as part of the "economic self-stimulus, please masturbate the economy into some state of excitement so we can pretend the fundamentals aren't as frigid as Condoleeza Rice"plan.


And since the government, instead, of say, paying down its ridiculous debt or investing in something we might need, like renewable energy, is sending it to you, in the assumption that as usual, we'll blow it all on porn and beer. But that might not be entirely wise, and I feel honor bound, as your Friendly Neighborhood Apocalyptic Dominatrix to offer some helpful suggestions about what to do with the money.

For those of you who live in other countries, where their governments, when on the verge of financial collapse, don't send you checks and accellerate the proces, while spraying imperialist goo all over the rest of the world, all we can do is pity you. And wish desperately we could move to your country. How do you say "I am not personally responsible for my country's economic or foreign policy in Finnish again?"

Now I would dare say that things are, fiscally speaking, going to hell in a handbasket - I don't claim to be an expert. My friend Roel is, though and the blog he shares with a couple of similarly knowledgeable sorts http://www.theautomaticearth.blogspot.com/ is an excellent place to go for all the crappy financial news.

Now it may be that this particular economic crisis will pass a la kidney stone, and we'll go on to later climate and peak oil crises, but it is also not impossible that this is the beginning of those crises.We are being handed the cash for one more climactic shopping trip - and here I am with my black boots, riding crop and firm demeanor proposing, that just perhaps, you might want to think about this as the last big burst before a very, very, long dry spell. So here are some suggestions to spend your money.

1. Forestall foreclosure. Pay the mortgage, and then use what strategies you have to keep your house: http://casaubonsbook.blogspot.com/2007/05/how-to-keep-your-house.html. Or, better yet, if you are already teetering on the cusp of foreclosure, consider getting in touch with these people: http://www.youwalkaway.com/index.html. They don't seem to charge much - you could come out of this with enough cash to put a downpayment on a rental. If you are secure in your home, perhaps invest in some extra fold-away futons, warm blankets and spare towels so that when your family and friends who aren't so secure lose their homes, you can all live together comfortably: http://casaubonsbook.blogspot.com/2007/08/brother-in-law-on-your-couch-vision-of.html

2. Send it to Haiti - here's why:
http://depletion-abundance.blogspot.com/2008/01/i-often-say-that-worst-excesses-of-rich.html My own favorite Haitian relief charity is the Mennonite Central Comittee - they've sponsored a number of programs that I know some of the players in, and they are generally a really good charity. Here's information about their Haitian programs: http://mcc.org/haiti/Heifer International and Doctors Without Borders are also excellent Charities that work in Haiti

3. Buy livestock. Seriously, food prices are rising rapidly. Your annual organic milk costs could probably be covered if you had a cow or a couple of really teeny, super cute Nigerian Dwarf goats. Same with your eggs for chickens. Here's Edson's essay about what he's thinking of doing with his economic stimulus:
http://greenbluebrown.blogspot.com/2008/01/when-are-you-gonna-blog-about-cow.html

Poultry are excellent starter livestock, and many people can have them even in cities. Heck, I've heard of people keeping them in apartments. If you are dreaming of poultry try here, and buy something in danger of going extinct: http://www.sandhillpreservation.com/

4. Say goodbye to wealth and the growth economy by indulging in its very worst excesses. I shouldn't suggest this, of course, but the reality is that who am I to criticize if your dream is to go into hard times with painted toenails and botox injections, or the knowledge that you actually have been to see spring training. So take your 800 bucks and go drink 100 year old champagne, or buy that original live recording of the Led Zepplin studio sessions. Go for it. Just remember, you can't eat commemorative plates.

5. Get your teeth fixed. Seriously, dentistry is one of the big worries, and millions of Americans can't afford it now. It is a fairly energy intensive process:
http://transitionculture.org/2007/07/24/peak-oil-and-dentistry-the-final-taboo This might be a good time to get everyone a checkup, or that root canal you've been needing.

6. Endow your local peak oil group. If you don't desperately need your tax refund, and perhaps that's true of some of your fellow peakists, get together and put the money into your local peak group. Money buys power and influence in our society, and also enables you to do common good projects. Consider asking everyone who can to put half their refund into a collective good account, designed, for example, to make micro-emergency loans in the community, or to fund solar panels for the local clinic.

7. Get together with others and buy a farm - remember, "farm" doesn't mean "1000 acres in Iowa" - consider a foreclosed upon rural property, for example, with 5 - 20 acres. There are a few of them out my way, and I'm willing to bet there are some where you are. The reality is that rising food prices are pushing land prices way up - we're starting to see what Aaron calls the "tertiary effects" of our energy crisis here:

http://property.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/property/buying_and_selling/article3283083.ece

Note the reasoning here - high grain prices look likely to persuade farmers to actually *sell* their land, and get out of farming, so that people can "invest" in land. Hmmm - we might need people who know how to farm sitting on dirt even more than expected.

8. Buy a musical instrument. Have you always wanted to learn the violin? Do you play a nice saxophone, but don't have one? Even in hard times, there are reasons to celebrate, and music makes celebrations. If the economy tanks and you are out of work, a. subway busking becomes a more economically viable choice (although pianos are tough for that) and b. you'll have time to practice, or to bug the kids into it. My husband adores the Lark in the Morning catalog www.larkinthemorning.com for a source for every conceivable instrument.

4. Say goodbye to wealth and the growth economy by indulging in its very worst excesses. I shouldn't suggest this, of course, but the reality is that who am I to criticize if your dream is to go into hard times with painted toenails and botox injections, or the knowledge that you actually have been to see spring training. So take your 800 bucks and go drink 100 year old champagne, or buy that original live recording of the Led Zepplin studio sessions. Go for it. Just remember, you can't eat commemorative plates.

5. Get your teeth fixed. Seriously, dentistry is one of the big worries, and millions of Americans can't afford it now. It is a fairly energy intensive process:
http://transitionculture.org/2007/07/24/peak-oil-and-dentistry-the-final-taboo This might be a good time to get everyone a checkup, or that root canal you've been needing.

6. Endow your local peak oil group. If you don't desperately need your tax refund, and perhaps that's true of some of your fellow peakists, get together and put the money into your local peak group. Money buys power and influence in our society, and also enables you to do common good projects. Consider asking everyone who can to put half their refund into a collective good account, designed, for example, to make micro-emergency loans in the community, or to fund solar panels for the local clinic.

7. Get together with others and buy a farm - remember, "farm" doesn't mean "1000 acres in Iowa" - consider a foreclosed upon rural property, for example, with 5 - 20 acres. There are a few of them out my way, and I'm willing to bet there are some where you are. The reality is that rising food prices are pushing land prices way up - we're starting to see what Aaron calls the "tertiary effects" of our energy crisis here:

http://property.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/property/buying_and_selling/article3283083.ece

Note the reasoning here - high grain prices look likely to persuade farmers to actually *sell* their land, and get out of farming, so that people can "invest" in land. Hmmm - we might need people who know how to farm sitting on dirt even more than expected.

8. Buy a musical instrument. Have you always wanted to learn the violin? Do you play a nice saxophone, but don't have one? Even in hard times, there are reasons to celebrate, and music makes celebrations. If the economy tanks and you are out of work, a. subway busking becomes a more economically viable choice (although pianos are tough for that) and b. you'll have time to practice, or to bug the kids into it. My husband adores the Lark in the Morning catalog www.larkinthemorning.com for a source for every conceivable instrument.

9. Hookers. Lots of hookers. Or one really expensive one. Now where would a farming Mom like me find a hook...er someone willing to raise my beds? I'd never heard it called that, but perhaps I was unimaginative. Either way, I knew that Crunchy Chicken could be counted on to help me with all my pay to play needs, over here: http://www.crunchychicken.blogspot.com/. Now it isn't clear to me that Crunchy actually can schedule his arrival at the homes of my heterosexual female and gay male readers, but she's an enterprising sort, so you never know. For my lesbian and male readers, I'm afraid you'll just have to do your own bargaining - Matt Savinar isn't yet offering these services on his site www.lifeaftertheoilcrash.net - any day now, though,
I'm sure ;-).

10. Food. 700-1200 bucks will buy a lot of stored grains and beans. And you can be virtually certain that the food you buy today will appreciate in value, probably much faster than your investments. http://www.economist.com/opinion/displaystory.cfm?story_id=10252015 (the link is useful for the graph, not the stupid boosterism). What today buys hundreds of pounds may buy only half of that. If possible, buy direct from farmers, ideally local farmers. If you can't find what you need, try www.waltonfeed.com. If you don't need food for your own storage, consider donating some of it to your local food pantry. There are already a lot of hungry people out there.

11. Give it to people who will fight the biofuels boom. http://www.foodfirst.org/ is one possibility.

12. Be ready in case the lights go out. In a period of increasing economic stress, utility bills can be tough to pay - even more so as the price of electricity rises. The example of South Africa: http://europe.theoildrum.com/node/3576#more is not quite what we're facing, but there are reasonable causes to be concerned about having enough electric power to go around, including increasing droughts, which put stress on coal and nuclear generators.

In addition, as times get tighter, sometimes we have to make hard choices - the electric bill or food? Let's be clear - the electric bill should always be the first to go. As I've argued before, it isn't necessarily grid problems that cause the power to go out:http://casaubonsbook.blogspot.com/2007/02/it-isnt-gridcrash-that-makes-lights-go.html .

So it would be wise to figure out ways to make do without electricity. That means an investment in solar powered battery chargers, rechargeable batteries, a woodstove in cold places, solar lanterns, a hand washer... Check out www.lehmans.com for the best in non-electric supplies.

13. Make your yard feed you. Invest in perennial plants like jerusalem artichokes and groundnuts, buy blueberries or gooseberry bushes, buy a good sized stock of seeds (great prices at www.fedcoseeds.com among other places) and regular or sweet potatoes, a couple of sacks of greensand, rock phosphate and anything else you might need. Put in drip irrigation, dig a pond, or add dryland plants if you anticipate drought. Fence if necessary. Vary your seed order, try something new. Buy in larger quantities - you can always donate extras to a local community garden.

14. Dig a hole and bury the money in the ground. Seriously, that's starting to look safer than many banks.

15. Clean up good. Those of us who are in those "married until we die or kill each other" relationships don't always seem to understand the plight of the single person. But who wants to go into an unending economic depression alone, with no one to fight with about the money you don't have? So if you are looking for love, now is the time to join that singles website, get a really good picture of yourself taken, or maybe get a decent haircut. Take a day off work without pay, and really work on that personal ad - remember, "Angry, anxious SWF terrified to go into apocalypse alone" is probably not the best start. Put a good face on things. And if you are married, try and stay that way for the following reasons: http://casaubonsbook.blogspot.com/2007/02/12-reasons-to-stay-married-after-peak.html

16. Superinsulate. This is likely to be a pricey project, but you could get a start. Check out the information here: about how to get started. http://www.affordablecomfort.org/ Whether your home is hot or cold, this will save you money in the longer term.

17. Invest in a really good bike. A lot of the bikes that are lying around aren't meant to be ridden long distances, for years at a time with minimal maintenence. I'm no expert on this issue, and won't try to advise you - instead, find a good bike shop and talk to people there. I personally covet one of these:http://clevercycles.com/store/?c=web2.67 and they have fascinating collection of family bikes at the same site.

18. Buy yarn. It has many uses - if you have enough, you can insulate an entire room with it. Not to mention that we're all going to need to make socks: http://casaubonsbook.blogspot.com/2005/02/great-sock-rant-of-05.html. Here's more about why knitting is an essential skill in hard times: http://casaubonsbook.blogspot.com/2007/09/knitting-for-apocalypse.html But you don't really need all these justifications, because the simple truth is that if you buy yarn, then you have yarn. What's not to like?

19. Pay down your debt. If you have old loans, consumer debt, etc... pay it down now. The US bankruptcy laws are moving rapidly towards eternal debt slavery, and that's not a role any of us want to play. As cool and shiny as the gizmos may look, pay down your debt if you can.

20. Make sure you have water. You can't grow food, wash, or live without it. Make sure you have a reliable source of water in the future. That could mean a well with a manual pump, or a cistern, a rainbarrel set up, a spring, solar direct pumping, or a public resource - perhaps a pump in a park or at the local school that can supply the community when the power is out.

21. Do your Christmas/Chanukah/birthday shopping now. Does this one sound weird, coming from anti-consumerist me? For all that a lot of us may deplore the crazy consumerism of the holidays, the "no gifts" idea is an easy one to take when you have everything you need, and live in a rich society. Gift exchange is tied into every culture, not just including, but especially poor ones. The ability to be generous to one another is part and parcel of being human. So maybe now is a good time to think ahead about what it would be like to be poor, if you haven't been, and how simple gifts might come in handy. Think useful things - a new shirt, a pair of boots, a pocket knife, a book, a special toy, a bottle of wine. Or perhaps think in terms of your ability to make something - beautiful soaps, or special traditional baked goods, a wooden toy or the above mentioned socks. Remember, gifts are going to look different in a poorer society. Don't forget to add a few things to donate - more kids will be missing Christmas next year, I suspect, and perhaps a few special trade goods that will be especially welcome among people who have done you kindnesses

22. Donate it to the George W. Bush Presidential Library. I know, I know, I hate him too, but think about what a gesture of charity this will be - have we ever had a president who needed a library more. Think what good the atlases and the beginning readers will do for him. But more importantly, think about what's going to be in those presidential papers, that sooner or later will be released (more realistically, donate your money to the people suing to get his executive order overturned). http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/28/opinion/28sun4.html War crimes trials, anyone? You could also give it to someone whose name you think would look better on a library - and how hard is that?

23. Build your own library. Heck, you can even call it a "presidential" library, and name it after one of the more obscure 19th century presidents. I mean who really knows whether James Knox Polk's library is in your house or not? I'd believe it. Meanwhile, if you don't live in easy walking distance of a really high quality library, build your own. A lot of us focus on gardening and sustainability books, and I certainly value that stuff - my own recommendations are here: http://casaubonsbook.blogspot.com/2007/12/best-books-about-nearly-everything-part.html and http://casaubonsbook.blogspot.com/2007/12/best-books-about-nearly-everything-part_18.html, but don't stop there. Think about how valuable history books will be, as we remake our society. What about a good supply of children's books, and educational materials in case you need to homeschool your kids or grandkids during periods of disruption. And everyone may want to settle down some evening and just not think about what's happening in their world, to escape with either a trashy novel or a great one, and be swept away into another place and time. The reality is that we sell books awfully cheaply - and they may not always be so cheap.

24. A stock of things you don't really want to have to try making. Whenever we talk about stockpiling, someone notes that it is possible to make just about anything at home. Needles? Can be carved out of bone. Necessary drugs? All you need is a small home chemistry lab? Shoes? First, chase down and kill a deer... Diva cup? Just go down to the ocean and snorkel around until you get a sponge...

All of which is entirely true. And the odds are not that these things are going away anytime soon (which someone else always mentions in these discussions) so much as there might be either supply constraints or other things you need to spend your money on. It is nice to know these things can be produced at home, and if it got dire enough, some of us probably would. But, sometimes you just don't wanna make it yourself. There are some conveniences that are kind of nice- and as long as someone is sending us a check...

So if you don't want to face a world without enough duct tape, menstrual supplies, wood screws or sneakers, throw a few spares in a box somewhere. When entering this category, think particularly about quality of life issues (here, again, I mention shoes), the components to fix things that you'd like to keep around that might break (my neighbor is facing our current ice storm without her woodstove for lack of a replacement catalytic converter) and things you use a lot.

25. The mind altering substances of your choice. I, of course, would be irresponsible if I advocated drunkeness, and doing something illegal if I advocated drug use. So, of course, I would never, ever do such a thing. But there's something about my nation, as it teeters on the edge of bankruptcy, giving cash to consumers to go shopping that makes me feel as though the proper response, between laughter and weeping, is probably a lost weekend, a moment of drunken, drugged out debauchery that won't actually meet any needs, improve our lives, or do anything good at all - but somehow seems to answer the state we've entered. Being a breastfeeding Mom of four, the chance of me doing so are the proverbial snowball's, but it does have its appeal. At the very least, perhaps you'd like to stock up on your preferred mind-altering substance, to help get you through the next moment of national idiocy. In fact, some seeds, or a still might not be a bad idea. Strengthens the informal economy, y'know.

Sharon

US election year/economy decelerating - NOW WHAT??

Leading The News

Pelosi brushes off candidate proposals

By Mike Soraghan, The Hill

Posted: 01/17/08 08:04 PM [ET]

Thanks, but no thanks. That’s the reaction House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) gave to the stimulus packages being suggested by the 2008 Democratic candidates, two of whom are sitting senators. It’s not so much that they’re dead on arrival, Pelosi explained. It’s just that what works with the base on the primary campaign trail isn’t going to work with narrow majorities and a Republican White House. Pelosi is reaching out to Republicans in an effort to quickly pass a stimulus and rack up a badly needed win for Democrats. “I haven’t had an opportunity to review their proposals in detail,” Pelosi said at a news conference Tuesday. “While I respect the hard work that went into them, we will be working in a bipartisan way with Republican leaders of the House to find common ground.” House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) said things might be different if the White House and Congress were all in Democratic hands. “When they become president, we look forward to working with them,” he quipped.

Hopes Grow For A Quick Stimulus Plan To Try To Boost Flagging U.S. Economy

January 16, 2008: 08:05 PM EST

Jan. 17, 2008 (Investor's Business Daily delivered by Newstex) --

Just before Christmas, President Bush declared victory in a yearlong fight to cut $23 billion from Democratic spending plans for '08.

But the two parties may be ready to start singing from the same hymn book. Amid lackluster retail sales, rising joblessness and a tumbling stock market, optimism is running high that a quick agreement could come on an emergency spending package that may exceed $100 billion.

A Deal Within A Month?

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., said Wednesday that he thinks a fiscal stimulus bill can be completed within 30 days.

"Bipartisanship is breaking out all over," Hoyer said.

Lawmakers are mulling various ideas, including more cash to the poor and unemployed, tax rebates for all, breaks for business and aid to the states.

The White House began publicly considering a stimulus package two weeks ago. In a speech last week, Bush suggested that his top economic priority was making his 2001 and 2003 tax cuts permanent.

By the end of the week, though, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson was singing a different tune.

In an interview with Bloomberg Television last Friday, Paulson noted signs that the economy "is slowing down fairly rapidly."

From a policy perspective, he added: "We are looking at things that could be done quickly. Time is of the essence."

Paulson conceded that the Democratic Congress was unlikely to extend the Bush tax cuts.

"If something were to be done here, I think the focus would be on something that's temporary and that could get done and make a difference soon," he said.

The urgency expressed by Paulson is consistent with his increasingly aggressive role to stem the fallout from the housing crisis by twisting the arms of mortgage lenders to provide broad-based relief to subprime borrowers.

Lawrence Summers, a Treasury secretary under President Clinton, told Congress to pass a $150 billion stimulus.

"The risks here of 'too little, too late' are far, far, far greater than the risk of 'too much, too soon,'" Summers said.

Election-Year Response

Greg Valliere, chief political strategist at Stanford Washington Research Group, attributed the prospects for rapid action on a stimulus bill to two factors: "The economy seems to be decelerating rapidly, and it's an election year."

Polls of voters in the early primary states and across the country show that the economy has become the leading issue in 2008. In New Hampshire last week, 97% of Democratic primary voters and 80% of Republican primary voters said they were worried about the state of the economy.

The White House is fielding "a lot of calls from nervous Republicans who are justifiably worried about steep losses this fall," Valliere said.

While the exact shape of a stimulus bill is to be determined, the broad outlines are coming into view.

The liberal Center on Budget and Policy Priorities says that a stimulus package should target help to lower earners through an expansion of food stamps and an extension of unemployment insurance. A flat tax refund to all tax filers, similar to the 2001 rebate of $300 per person, also would be "effective as stimulus," the center said.

Experts disagree on the effectiveness of the 2001 rebate, sent out in the middle of the year's brief recession. One study found only 22% of those surveyed said they planned to spend the rebate. But a 2006 study found that two-thirds of the rebates were spent within nine months.

The Democratic presidential contenders have all laid out plans that include fiscal relief for state governments, which are facing cuts in health care spending and other programs in order to balance their budgets.

Some Democrats and like-minded groups are calling for other elements that may defy quick agreement, such as government spending on infrastructure and "green collar" jobs, a foreclosure bailout fund, and relaxed loan limits for government-backed mortgage finance firms Freddie Mac (NYSE:FRE) and Fannie Mae. (NYSE:FNM)

The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities says government-funded construction projects take too long to get going to make any difference.

Missouri Rep. Roy Blunt, the second-ranking House Republican, said a stimulus bill is doable as long as it doesn't include offsetting tax hikes "and doesn't become an excuse to do other kinds of things that don't have much to do with stimulating an economy."

A business component of the stimulus bill is also likely. It could include accelerated depreciation to give small businesses an incentive to make investments sooner than later.

Valliere said another "hot idea" would let companies write off more operating losses.

Newstex ID: IBD-0001-22311870

Originally published in the January 17, 2008 version of Investor's Business Daily.

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See also:

Lawmakers push for quick US economic stimulus plan
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Top Democrats Urge Action On Economic-Stimulus Plan Wall Street Journal
US House leaders vow bipartisan economic stimulus Guardian Unlimited
Dems, GOP Pledge Quick Economic Action The Associated Press
Baltimore Sun - Atlanta Journal Constitution

Earthtimes

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