Job growth continues despite Tea-Publicans’ best efforts to kill jobs

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

Steve Benen writes at the Political Animal – The disjointed debate:

Here’s what’s going to happen today: Republicans and many in the media will look at the weak job numbers and argue that it’s evidence that President Obama’s economic policies aren’t working.

Here’s what’s not going to happen today: a public discussion about the extent to which President Obama’s economic policies aren’t even being tried.

On Thursday, the President's infrastructure plan was killed by a Senate GOP filibuster:

Republicans in the Senate Thursday dealt President Barack Obama the third in a string of defeats on his stimulus-style jobs agenda, blocking a $60 billion measure for building and repairing infrastructure like roads.

Supporters of the failed measure said it would have created tens of thousands of construction jobs and lifted the still-struggling economy. But Republicans unanimously opposed it for its tax surcharge on the wealthy [a 0.7% surtax on millionaires and billionaires, representing just 0.2% of the population] and spending totals they said were too high.

Job growth continues despite Tea-Publicans' best efforts to kill jobs, the economy added a total of 80,000 jobs in the month of October. Steve Benen writes at the Political Animal – Sluggish job growth continues in October:

In keeping with the pattern we’ve seen for a long while, the private sector fared significantly better, creating 104,000 jobs, while the public sector, which continues to be a significant drag on the economy, lost 24,000 jobs, thanks to spending cuts.

Republicans, it’s worth noting, are eager to force more public-sector layoffs, making the jobs landscape worse on purpose, while President Obama’s American Jobs Act seeks to do the opposite.

The overall unemployment rate ticked down, from 9.1% to 9%, due to statistical revisions. No one should see this as evidence of a good jobs report, which this isn’t.

Indeed, there can be no doubt that the latest data points to an ongoing jobs crisis. Just to keep up with population growth, the economy should be adding over 150,000 jobs a month. To bring down the unemployment rate quickly, we’d look for 300,000 jobs a month or more. October’s total of 80,000 suggests we’re struggling to keep our heads above water.

In a sane political environment, policymakers would see a jobs report like this one and feel the need to act. Instead, what we see are Democrats presenting a credible jobs agenda, and Republicans killing every bill brought to the floor.

If there’s a silver lining to the new report, it’s that the job totals for August and September were both revised sharply in an encouraging direction, with an additional 102,000 jobs between them that had been previously unreported. That’s a fairly big revision.

With two months remaining in 2011, we’ve now seen 1.25 million jobs created this year, which isn’t even close to good enough, but which has already surpassed the totals from 2010.

Steve Benen continues at the Political Animal – Private-sector job growth sluggish, too:

it’s the private sector that continues to fare significantly better. Last month, businesses added 104,000 jobs, and the revised totals for August and September also show stronger growth than originally estimated.

But, just as a reminder, even 104,000 private-sector jobs, though in keeping with expectations, should not be considered “strong” growth. Given the severity of the recession, there’s some satisfaction when the monthly jobs total reaches six digits, but this is still a weak recovery.

With two months remaining in 2011, the U.S. private sector has now added 1.5 million jobs this calendar year, well ahead of last year’s private-sector total of 1.2 million. Since March 2010, American businesses have created 2.74 million jobs. (In 2008, the private sector lost 3.8 million jobs, and in 2009, the private sector lost 5 million jobs.)

And with that, here’s a different homemade chart, showing monthly job losses/gains in the private sector since the start of the Great Recession.

Back to Benen's point at the start of this post The disjointed debate:

It’s a nice little scam Republicans have put together: when more jobs are being created, it’s proof they’re right; when fewer jobs are being created, it’s proof Obama’s wrong. Heads they win; tails Dems lose.

In case anyone’s forgotten, the GOP whining is misguided — whether they want to admit it or not, the economy is advancing as they want it to. The private sector is being left to its own devices; the public sector is shedding jobs quickly; and lawmakers are focused on debt-reduction.

This is the script the GOP wrote. When it’s followed to the letter, Republican complaints are absurd.

* * *

The message Republicans will be emphasizing — today and over the next year — is that we should try things their way. But we already are, and no one’s satisfied with the results.

Indeed, arguably one of the most dramatic Democratic dilemmas of 2011 and 2012 is overcoming the realization that Republicans are getting their way on economic policy and then denying any responsibility for the results. Indeed, it’s a rather extraordinary con: GOP officials see much of their agenda implemented, then see it fail, and then blame Obama when their policies don’t work.

* * *

Rather, we’re stuck looking in this funhouse-mirror in which Republicans block Democratic economic policies, and then condemn the policies for failing.

This is what happens when you have an electorate ignorant of economics, and a political party and conservative propagandist media willing to take advantage of their ignorance.