True unemployment near Depression-era levels

As of this writing the official unemployment rate nationally is 9.4 percent. California's jobless rate stands at 11.5 percent.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics puts the number of jobless at 14.5 million. That's a lot of people. If half of those were primary breadwinners, it puts over 7 million families in severe jeopardy.

The saddest thing is that even those depressing numbers are deflated. They reality is even worse. Let's not forget that to be counted among the unemployed, one must actively seek work. Millions have given up that search. In addition, for every unemployed person, there are probably two whose hours have been scaled back. The back of my envelope says that there are between 30-40 million people in this country who are either jobless or underemployed, not including the migrant workers whom I see standing on the street waiting in vain to be picked up for day labor. It's a catastrophe any way you cut it.

What happened to the economic stimulus? It was supposed to have started adding jobs to the economy by now, five months after its enactment. What happened to all that money? How does $350 billion vanish? To put perspective on this, you could pay 7 million (7,000,000) people $50,000 with that money. Where did it go? Should we not see at least a couple million new jobs by now? Figure 2 million new jobs directly and another couple million indirectly as the money circulates in the economy. Where did that money go?

These are very hard times. I don't know what else to say about it. The official jobless rate does not begin to tell the story.

What can we do about this? There will be no recovery. We're not going back to the way things were. That might not be a bad thing if this crisis turns into a catharsis, fundamentally restructuring our economy to make us more independent and sustainable. Instead of relying on financial shenanigans for growth, we might have to produce things again. In the meantime, though, it's going to be rough.

Good luck to everybody struggling with joblessness. Survive!

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