Right Change: Jobless Claims Up

The Labor Department issued its standard weekly report on jobless claims, which showed the number of Americans filing claims for unemployment benefits was up for the fifth time in six weeks despite the drop in consumer prices.  From CNBC:

“Another government report on Thursday pointed to persistent weakness in the labor market as the number of Americans filing new claims for unemployment benefits last week rose for the fifth time in six weeks. "The data shows that there is skepticism on the part of companies that are hiring," said Peter Cardillo, an economist at Rockwell Global Capital in New York.

The Labor Department said its Consumer Price Index dropped 0.3 percent last month after being flat in April. May's decline was the sharpest since December 2008.

Outside the volatile food and energy category, inflation pressure appeared to be modest. Core CPI climbed 0.2 percent higher, as expected, matching the increase posted in April. Prices for U.S. government debt pared losses following the publication of the data.”

This comes on the heel of a terrible jobs report and a bad report on retail sales in May.  Despite President Obama’s remarks last week that the private sector is “doing fine” and despite the fact that those remarks were proved completely incorrect, Americans expect a terrible jobs report because they don’t need the government to tell them so; they feel the poor economy. Perhaps the conversation needs to turn to what President Obama’s plan to turn things around (since he failed to do it in one term).

Candidate Obama has outright pledged to take advantage of cheap money and borrow from China to pay for more infrastructure and energy projects. In fact, that’s what he will be in Ohio to talk about today: his next plan to boost the economy since the other hundred failed. Government deficit spending will be kicked into high gear if Obama gets reelected. Another so-called jump starter will be a slew of tax increases, known as Taxmageddon, on top earners. Obama will continue to sell this economic plan despite the fact that even his fellow Democrats think it’s a terrible idea. We happen to agree with them on this point. Obama’s plan for the economy is to do what he has done already on steroids and clearly it isn’t working. Romney may not be your guy for the job, but we need a change from what we’ve got in order to get the economy on track. 

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