With tomorrow being the federally observed fourth of July, the monthly Jobs Report was released a day early. The headline Unemployment Rate dropped to 5.3%, the lowest since our rebound from the Great Recession started seven years ago. However, the thing about headlines is that they can be deceiving, and if you delve into the BLS Report, there is concern among those who know their way around a calculator.
To Wit: The Labor Force Participation Rate dropped to a 38 year low, showing that only 62.6% of the working age population is actually employed. Um, yikes. On top of that, the Average Work Week is still only 34.5 hours–meaning that a large portion of workers are only employed part-time. Despite what the Unemployment Rate shows, fewer people are really employed full time. Additionally, wage growth increased a measly 2% from this time last year. Those jobs that are being created are low paying.
So What? Well, let’s look at our beautiful nation. The thing about a government, any government, is that it “earns” most of its money by collecting taxes. And if Americans are paying less taxes (because individuals and corporations are earning less money), while at the same time the government is shelling out more and more money to social programs, sooner or later they are going to run out of money.
We need to learn a lesson from Greece and get our act together. The U.S. is now where Greece was some 30 years ago. We have a large national debt and interest rates are going up. Though we don’t have much control over what Washington does, we do have control over how we spend our money and how much debt our family has. Not everyone in Greece right now is standing in line at the ATM; many, many people could see this bank shutdown coming and prepared themselves accordingly. The financial turmoil in Greece has been in the news for several years, and the suffering is happening among the folks who have done nothing to help themselves and are still waiting for their bankrupt government to help them out.
If you need someone to help you put together a plan to get you back on track, let me know. I will help you out free of charge. Have a happy and safe fourth of July my friend!
