Friday, February 6, 2009

Job loss mounts worldwide

The Jobs Report this morning showed another 598,000 Americans lost their jobs, the most in 35 years. The unemployment rate jumped from 7.2% to 7.6%. Totally heart-breaking! Don’t look for foreclosures to slow down . . .

So far in this recession, 3.5 million of us have lost our jobs. But, that pales in comparison to China, where some reports indicate 26 million workers have lost their jobs. The possibility of social unrest there should not be minimized. As they are our second most important trading partner, we need them to stay healthy enough to buy our goods, as well as to keep buying our Treasury debt.