U.S. loses 533,000 jobs in Nov.

An astonishing amount. Far above expectations.

I can only be grateful that I and my wife are still gainfully employed. She works in the financial world, which has been extremely hard-hit by this downturn, but, fortunately for her (and me) she works for a privately-held company that did NOT in any way get involved in the clusterfuck for fees in the sub-prime mortgage arena. Her company's management is too scrupulous to go insane for all those short-term profits at the expense of long-term health.

As for me, I am lucky enough to be employed by one of the oil majors who are still experiencing record profits. Paradoxically, or perhaps not, even with record profits, there is a drive afoot to trim costs wherever possible. Fortunately, for me again, we hope to meet our cost-reduction targets merely through attrition. Of course that also means that when someone retires, there is a good chance that they will not be replaced per se, but that their work will be absorbed by the remaining employees. And hey, as long as they continue to give us raises and bonuses, we're OK with taking on more work.

Now, if they give us more work and cut salary, you will see a revolt.

I certainly hope that this recent economic downturn will give pause to the free-marketers. Without stringent regulations and strong oversight in place (hello SEC!!), businesses, left to their own devices, will strive for short-term gain over all.

It's a nasty race to the bottom line, and people get crushed in the process. But I hold no great illusions. There will be a backlash from the right that will decry any attempts to re-regulate the financial world, and they have powerful media behind them.

Some people just never learn. But it's really more than that. People learn alright. They learn how to get around the rules. They learn to cut corners. They learn that they get more respect when they get more profits, and so anything and everything that leads to increased profits becomes a "good." Many people give not one shit who gets hurt in their drive for more and more and more money.

Payrolls plunge by stunning 533,000 in November

Jobless rate rises to 15-year high of 6.7%

WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) - U.S. nonfarm payrolls plunged by an astonishing 533,000 in November, the worst job loss in 34 years, the Labor Department reported Friday.

It's only the fourth time in the past 58 years that payrolls have fallen by more than 500,000 in a month. Since the recession began 11 months ago, a total of 1.9 million jobs have been lost.

"This is almost indescribably terrible," wrote Ian Shepherdson, chief U.S. economist for High Frequency Economics. "The pace of job losses is accelerating alarmingly."

An alternative gauge of unemployment - which includes discouraged workers and those whose hours have been cut back to part-time - rose to 12.5% from 11.8%. The number of workers forced to work part-time rose by 621,000 to 7.3 million.

In goods-producing industries, 163,000 jobs were lost, according to a survey of work places. Manufacturing lost 85,000 workers, while construction lost 82,000.

In the services, 136,000 jobs were lost in business services, including 101,000 in employment services, such as temporary jobs. Financial services cut 34,000 jobs. Retail shed 91,000 jobs, including 24,000 at auto dealers. Leisure and hospitality industries cut 76,000 jobs.

Health and education services industries added 52,000 jobs. Government added 7,000.

In a separate survey of households, the government found that employment fell by 673,000, the largest lost since August 2001. Unemployment rose by 251,000 to 10.3 million. Unemployment has increased 2.7 million during the recession and 2.7 million more have been forced into part-time work.

In November, 637,000 people dropped out of the workforce.

The employment-population ratio fell to 61.4% in November from 61.8%. The labor force participation rate fell to 65.8% from 66.1%.

the original story, with more gory details, is here.

Even with all this bad news, I still feel that things are actually getting better now. These jobs cuts are basically historical, and while it bodes poorly for the upcoming holiday season (e.g. spending spree), which will hurt retailers even further, I think that we are turning the corner. I think we're at the bottom.

Bush administration officials, some of the most incompetant and corrupt in history (yes, that's not an oxymoron), are finally doing some of the right things, but only because the pain is getting too great in the country to NOT do the right thing. If Obama really wants to bring about "change" he needs to jettison some of the people who are in large part responsible for the current mess (Cox, Geithner, Paulson, Bernanke, etc). Otherwise, it will just be a different group of people that will loot the Treasury.