[geeks] Socialized medicine [was Re: nVidia 8800GT for Apple Mac Pro]

[Phil Stracchino]

Lionel Peterson wrote:
> Unemployment rates are at 4.5-5% here right now, using the only measure 
> available.

Except that it's not the only measure available.  The "official" 
unemployment rate includes only one category:  People who lost their 
jobs and are receiving unemployment benefits or government-provided 
retraining.  If your unemployment benefits have run out, you're no 
longer considered unemployed.  Which is sort of like saying a systems 
failure after the sysadmin has gone home for the night doesn't count. 
Likewise, if the only work you can get is a single four-hour shift at 
MacDonalds per week, you're considered employed.  (A single hour per 
week gets you out of the "unemployed" list, in fact.)

There is another figure also provided by the Dept of Labor, which 
includes people whose benefits have run out and still haven't found work 
yet, and people who don't have jobs and want them, but have given up 
looking because they can't find work (there's a special term for them; 
the DoL calls them "discouraged workers").

That figure is rather higher ... it's currently running about 13%, if 
memory serves.


-- 
   Phil Stracchino, CDK#2     DoD#299792458     ICBM: 43.5607, -71.355
   alaric at caerllewys.net   alaric at metrocast.net   phil at co.ordinate.org
          Renaissance Man, Unix ronin, Perl hacker, Free Stater
                  It's not the years, it's the mileage.