Republican Economics: Screw the Workers

The great Billmon, in a diary over at Daily Kos, presents the following chart, ranked by the rate of job creation during their presidencies, of every post-war president. Notice the political party of every single person at the top of the list:



As Billmon says:

[E]ach and every Democratic President (including the much-maligned Carter) ranking ahead of every GOP president (including St. Ronnie). Draw your own conclusions.

Hard Times Deepen

The unemployment numbers are worse than projected: 7.2 Percent by the narrow measure, and 13.5 percent by the more realistic measure (as in related to actual peoples' misery).

It's getting bad out there

This backs up stories I've been hearing about the system buckling under the strain of depression, level layoffs:

Swamped by a post-holiday surge of claims from laid-off workers, New York State’s computerized unemployment insurance system shut down briefly Monday afternoon and then again for several hours on Tuesday, according to the state Department of Labor.

The system, which serves as the gateway to unemployment benefits for New York residents, could not handle the volume of calls and online inquiries it was receiving, said Leo Rosales, a spokesman for the department. As many as 10,000 people an hour tried to log into the system to file new unemployment claims or to check on existing claims, Mr. Rosales said.