Unemployment Skyrockets To 7.2%, Err I Mean 13.5%

The Department of Labor released their ominous report today showing the unemployment rate (not including the underemployment and non-reported unemployed, where the rate is now 13.5%) to have jumped 0.4% last month to a sixteen year high of 7.2%. More than half a million jobs were lost in December and 2.6 million overall last year. As Bush exits, he leaves a devastating trail of economic ruin that the new President must try and clean up.

From The NY Times:

The unemployment rate jumped to 7.2 percent in December from 6.8 percent in November and 5 percent last April, when the recession was four months old and just beginning to bite. More than 11 million Americans are now unemployed, and their growing ranks seem likely to put pressure on President-elect Barack Obama and Congress to act quickly on a stimulus package that mixes tax cuts and public spending.

“These numbers, back to back, of more than a half million a month suggest that the U.S. economy is in a freefall,” said Nariman Behravesh, chief economist at IHS Global Insight. “It’s scary, and it indicates that unless something is done and done quickly to turn this economy around, we’re looking at an awful situation this year.”

The 7.2 percent was the highest unemployment rate since January 1993, when the country was still shaking off a jobless recovery from the 1990-91 recession. The loss in total jobs for 2008 was the largest since 1945.

And there is no sign of it stopping anytime soon. David A. Levy, chairman of the Jerome Levy Forecasting Center thinks we are looking at a 9% unemployment rate by the end of this year. The numbers sorted by state aren't out yet, but one can assume things are looking extremely off in the Empire State. Wall Street is the epicenter of this debacle and economists know that the worst effects are felt here before they reverberate across the country.

This means that not only does Barack Obama have his hands full, so does our Governor, State Assembly and Senate. Now more than ever, we need drastic change in the way New York does business, and sugar taxes aren't going to cut it. We need to have true shared sacrifice in this state, and that starts at the top, with a truly progressive income tax. Get to it Governor....get to it Shelly Silver...get to it Malcolm Smith!