Here’s a little more information from don surber at the Daily Mail (
http://blogs.dailymail.com/donsurber/archives/855)
The stimulus backfired.
It undermined confidence in the economy.
And people are reacting.
Not only are companies cutting back on employees, but workers are throwing in the towel. Rather than look for another job, they are retiring or filing for a disability.
The Associated Press reported: “Applications for retirement benefits are 23 percent higher than last year, while disability claims have risen by about 20 percent. Social Security officials had expected applications to increase from the growing number of baby boomers reaching retirement, but they didn’t expect the increase to be so large.”
Geoff at Innocent Bystanders: noted that “Once again, the unemployment rate would have risen by a much larger amount if the civilian labor force hadn’t lost 570,000 people since last month. As we mentioned in previous posts, the labor force normally increases by ~ 150,000/month, so that’s a huge, very unusual, decrease. In fact, had the labor force size simply remained the same, the unemployment rate would have jumped to 10.2%.”
