Part-time nation

8M & growing: The hidden underworked

By JOHN AIDAN BYRNE
Last Updated: 4:43 AM, September 9, 2012
Posted: 10:44 PM, September 8, 2012

(New York Post) - “You want fries with that?”

It’s the unfortunate fate for more than 8 million American workers who are not unemployed but who can’t find a full-time job.

A growing percentage of Americans are falling off the margins when it comes to jobs, as the economic malaise continues to grip the country.

Friday’s jobs report for August showed further deterioration in the employment picture. Even the fact that the unemployment rate fell two-tenths of a point to 8.1 percent is worrisome, due to the fact that nearly 400,000 Americans have thrown in the towel on the prospect of finding any work.

One analyst crunched some numbers that suggested that if the labor force were at same level as it was four years ago, the unemployment rate would be 11.2 percent.

At 63.5 percent, we are now at the lowest participation rate since 1981, which led to the falling jobless rate. And the category of men 16 years and older is at a level not seen since 1948, 69.8 percent.

The August jobs report showed there were at least 23 million American workers in trouble. That’s a distressing 12.5 million unemployed workers, along with the 8 million part-time and 2.6 million “marginally attached.” The last are not officially counted by the government as “unemployed,” due to seasonal work.

The 8 million part-timers face a particularly bad situation. If you work more than 10 hours a week, you don’t quality for unemployment. Yet those jobs often lack benefits, raises or the chance to get more hours.

Overall, 96,000 jobs were created in August, almost 30,000 below the consensus estimate.

Another jobs crusher: Earlier June and July payrolls numbers were adjusted down on Friday. June came in at 45,000, versus an earlier estimate of 64,000, and July payrolls increased by 141,000, compared with the 163,000 that were initially reported.

Gary Burtless, senior fellow at the nonprofit Brookings Institution, says the latest rate of job gains is just about right in order to keep on a stay-even pace with the rise of the working-age population. But, he warned, “if maintained over several months . . . it is too slow to put a dent in the nation’s unemployment rate.”

Where are the workers? The latest data show the total number of Americans on food stamps hitting a record 46.67 million, with 173,600 new applicants in June.

Total new food-stamp applications in June were almost four times greater than the number of new jobs created.

Relief agencies fear the worst. Jilly Stephens, executive director of New York charity City Harvest, says the number of Americans in “food-insecure households” is growing.

“As we see at the community programs we work with in New York City, demand at food pantries and soup kitchens remains high,” Stephens said.

Hat tip: MichaelSavage.Com