Unemployment shoots up!

[NDN]

In another sign that the US economy's worst days lay ahead, unemployment shot up to 5.5% from 5%.

A .5% increase is not 'shooting up.'

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True.

[NDN]

.5% is the most since probably the Reagan administration, but the way you phrased it implies that 5.5% is somehow a high number. It's not, that's still lower than a lot of the 1st world even if the actual number is probably a couple percentage points higher. Basically the reported rate is too low for .5% to really be that scary.

I'm much more concerned about the blatant oil price gouging and the resulting increase in cost of living than the unemployment rate.

[NDN]

Unemployment is mostly distorted because we stop measuring people looking for work after a point. But that's not as big of a deal as underemployment. JS is right there, if you've paid thousands to go to college and you're working a job that anyone with a HS diploma (or less) could do there's a problem.

[NDN]

The problem with that is that China basically owns us. If we decide to dump them they could make it so that we had to buy all our goods with tuna or cigarette cartons within a day. It's sort of like economic MAD.

[NDN]

I don't see it happening, that would be horrible for growth in the long term which the elites would not allow. Also oil production has not seriously declined yet. The high prices we're seeing now are pretty much entirely speculation driven.

[NDN]

High prices won't last though. Right now oil is trading at nearly $1.40 a barrel, and 60% or more of that is speculation. The price increases can only go on so long before consumers cut back on consumption due to being priced out of the market, OR the government steps in.

[NDN]

They'd probably build more refineries, release some of the reserves, or limit oil futures trading instead. Rationing is unlikely barring another embargo and nationalization isn't happening so long as the oil lobby is around (although it might not be that horrible).