Korean Job Discussion Forums

[mises]

In my opinion, this is an example of why Obama was the right choice. He will pick the best minds available to manage this crises, as opposed to the current guy:

http://tpmelectioncentral.talkingpointsmemo.com/2008/11/obama_rolls_out_economic_trans.php

[mises]

This isn't pretty, though:

http://www.clusterstock.com/2008/11/october-job-report-hideous-6-5-unemployment-240-000-jobs

[canuckistan]

Now we've got the next wave--previously solid mortgage holders losing their jobs and sliding towards more foreclosures.

We haven't seen the bottom of this yet--it's going to get a lot worse before it gets better.

I don't envy Obama in this mess he has inherited from Bush & Co.

[mises]

Yes, it will get worse.

[BS.Dos.]

I'm not sure I share that optimism. I think the Obama victory represents nothing more than a timely distraction. A distraction that's nothing more than the application of a band-aid to a hemorrhaging gunshot victim when what's really needed is a tourniquet. There again, perhaps Obama is the tourniquet. It's too early to say. I just think the economic problems we've all heard so much about lately will re-emerge and once again dominate the news sheets just as soon as the euphoric election dust has settled.

[Ya-ta Boy]

So far, Obama has been handling things in a way that inspires confidence. That's no small thing. He's making appointments, famous respected names are floating around and there will be a press conference on the economy. Good solid start.

[mises]

Exactly. Obama said it best. The issue isn't big government or small government, but smart government. He is, at least in the economic front (all I know) surrounding himself with the best of the best. And I feel much more confident in both him and the American economy as a result. The ship has been 100% rudderless for years.

[Gopher]

And just like that, the America-is-in-steep-decline! and the America-is-finished-and-so-is-the-entire-Bretton-Woods-order! tropes fade away into obscurity where they belong...all contingent on a single election and the election of one man who will leap tall buildings in a single bound, etc., etc., etc.

Pro-Obama psych warfare. No more no less. Never was any real, substantial analysis there.

[mises]

Yeah, or not.

Global macroeconomic change can be handled well or poorly, and how it is handled matters a great deal. The era of the dollar standard, huge global imbalances and a FIRE economy as growth is over. What replaces it depends upon a great many things. America could go the way of Argentina and become permanently dysfunctional, or not. How it is governed will make the difference.

[Gopher]

[Leslie Cheswyck]

That's how I look at it, too... Kondratiev waves.

[sojourner1]

I believe it's good Obama got presidency and believe he will make change, but these changes may come too slow and late due to bureaucracy. America is on the verge of slumping into Great Depression 2.

I have no confidence in the economy it's in a sorry pitiful state after corporations sold us out by off shoring jobs and manufacturing while downsizing and undervaluing American workers out of executive greed. Our core competencies have gone down to a level of almost nothing, but highly artful deceitful sales and marketing paying desperate people only about $8/hour to scam and take average knuckleheads livelihood. This trend in management style really started about when the 1st Bush was in office back in the early 90's.

I have little confidence in the US economy due to it failing the majority and it's obvious why this is. Average knucklehead is beginning to see how we were screw, blued, and tatood as incompetent failures to be milked for everything we got and then some.

Finally, I have no confidence since companies and corporations don't have confidence in their American workers so it's a hostile corrupt work environment with little or no opportunity to advance in a stable well managed company. Most are badly mismanaged today. If you refute my statement, go work in a corporate cubicle and most retail stores to see for yourself. It's sorry ass shite.

[Ya-ta Boy]

In an effort to balance the pervasive cheerfulness around here, I thought I'd post this:

Jobless ranks hit 10 million, most in 25 years

About 10.1 million people were unemployed in October, the most since the fall of 1983. More people have jobs now, since the population has grown, but it's still a staggering jobless figure. With employers slashing jobs every month so far this year, some 1.2 million positions have disappeared, over half in the past three months alone...

But economists were much less upbeat than politicians.

"There is no light at the end of the tunnel, and the outlook is pitch black," said Richard Yamarone, economist at Argus Research.

And Bernard Baumohl, chief global economist at the Economic Outlook Group, said the report "depicts an economy still in free fall and without a safety net anywhere in sight."...

In the 1980-1982 recession � considered the worst since the Great Depression in terms of unemployment � the jobless rate rose as high as 10.8 percent in late 1982 just as the recession ended, before inching down.

[BS.Dos.]

Obama's Green Jobs Revolution.

I liked the fact that in giving his victory address, Obama referenced environmental problems ahead of the current the economic mess. Hopefully, this will usher in the dawn of the green-collar age. I like the sound of this 'Apollo Project', but whether this particular promise gets delivered remains to be seen.

[Ya-ta Boy]

Twice before, during the years right after the Civil War when the government poured millions into supporting the railroads and again in the 1950s when we poured billions into building the interstate highway system the government played a major part in building the infrastructure that led to decades of economic prosperity. There's a lot to be said for looking forward to long-term development. That's hard to do in 1980-something when you are fighting FDR in the '30's.

If Bush hadn't been Bush we might have gotten a headstart on this next one--not to pick on Bush, there were other opportunities earlier but when you decide that government is a problem itself, it pretty much hinders your ability to use the tools at your fingertips to solve problems--although you can throw the army at the foreigners and distract people from the problems at home.

I'm as 'sure' as I can be that Obama is going to use this opportunity to invest in alternative energies. We've known since the 70's that we had to do this, but through a massive failure of leadership at the top, we've failed and so ended up where we are now.

Gopher of course thinks I'm too busy pointing fingers at the failure of his party to do its job, but then its his party that is guilty of not doing its job and he is naturally defensive about that. Mises thinks the US is on the way down. It could be true, but I'm not convinced it's more than a bump in the road. The US is immensely innovative, but we need leadership that is visionary. However, the current Republican leadership is more concerned with who you are sleeping with and wrapping it in a flag than they are with building a future.