FYI, I'm down South to see my Dad, so I'm not as able to do stuff as quickly this weekend. So it may be a bit brief on the blog for a few days.
Given that our Fair Guv has been jetting around the state for numerous "job announcement" photo ops that just happen to be at campaign contributors, I had an inkling that yesterday's Wisconsin jobs report may be bad.
Then I read the headline of Walker's DWD mentioning "around 45,000 manufacturing jobs since 2010" (a relatively meaningless stat, given the Obama Recovery), and I said, "Yep, it's bad."
But I opened the link to the report, and it was even worse than I suspected.
Wisconsin jobs, May 2018
All jobs -4,700
Private sector jobs -5,300
April revisions
All jobs -3,900
Private sector jobs -2,500
And given that April already reported minor job losses, this means that for the last two months, Wisconsin has lost 10,900 private sector jobs and 9,600 jobs overall.
Many of these job "losses" reflect lower-than-average seasonal hiring at sectors like bars, hotels, and retail. And maybe that's a reflection of the low unemployment rate in the state. But maybe it's also a reflection of the fact that a $7.25 minimum wage and reduced food stamp and medical benefits for those workers in poverty aren't cutting it these days.
The household report keeps unemployment at 2.8%, and claims more Wisconsinites are "working." I find the same report's claim of 4,000 more "employed" to be suspicious at best (where are all these people "working"? Uber? At home? Minnesota? Illinois?). And given that it becomes a Walker/WISGOP talking point that too much state media chooses to emphasize over the job losses, I really would like to see who is called on that household survey.
When combined with reporting 10,200 more jobs in May, it is obvious that Wisconsin fell far behind in May, and our low wages and regressive GOP policies are not attracting the people we need to keep up with the competition. That has to be changed, and this Fall's elections are a great way to stop the losing.
And now the Bureau of Labor Statistics came out today abd showed Wisconsin lost the most jobs of any state in America for both May, and in April-May combined.
ReplyDeleteHow is this not a top headline in every paper right now? And we'd better be seeing Dem ads for the 2 months BEFORE the August primary hammering on these numbers.
Don't let these dishonest photo ops and empty promises of "jobs coming soon" go unanswered. And you know WMC, Walker and other corporate sleaze will try to do even more of that.
As always, thank you Jake for the information and analysis. Please enjoy Father's Day with your dad.
DeleteWisconsin lost jobs and has low unemployment.That means people aren't looking for jobs. Boomers are retiring. Undocumented are leaving or unreported? And people who can get jobs at higher wages out of state are leaving. Sounds like a recipe for disaster.
ReplyDelete