African-American Male Worker Jobless Rate Under Obama Regime: 17 Percent

The official “seasonally adjusted” jobless rate for African-American male workers over 20 years-of-age under the Democratic Obama Regime jumped from 15.8 to 17 percent between July and August 2009; while the rate for African-American female workers over 20 years-of-age increased from 11.7 to 11.9 percent in August 2009, according to the latest Bureau of Labor Statistics data. The official “seasonally adjusted” unemployment rate for all African-American workers (which also takes into account the 34.7 percent jobless rate for African-American youth between 16 and 19 years of age) increased from 14.5 to 15.1 percent between July and August 2009.

Between July and August 2009, the official “not seasonally adjusted” jobless rate for Hispanic or Latino male workers over 20 years of age increased from 11.2 to 12.3 percent. For all Hispanic or Latino workers over 16 years of age (which takes into account the 34 percent “not seasonally adjusted” jobless rate for Latino youth), the official “not seasonally adjusted” unemployment rate increased to 13 percent in August 2009.

For white male workers in the United States over 16 years of age, the official “seasonally adjusted” jobless rate increased from 10.5 to 10.9 percent between July and August 2009, while the rate for white female workers over 16 years of age increased from 8.1 to 8.2 percent.

The “not seasonally adjusted” unemployment rate for Asian-American workers did decrease from 8.3 to 7.5 percent in August 2009. But the official “seasonally adjusted” national jobless rate for all U.S. workers increased from 9.4 to 9.7 percent between July and August 2009.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ September 4, 2009 press release:

“In August, the number of unemployed persons increased by 466,000 to 14.9 million, and the unemployment rate rose by 0.3 percentage points to 9.7 percent…

“In August, the number of persons working part time for economic reasons was little changed at 9.1 million. These individuals indicated that they were working part time because their hours had been cut back or because they were unable to find a full-time job…

“About 2.3 million persons were marginally attached to the labor force in August…

"These individuals were not in the labor force, wanted and were available for work, and had looked for a job sometime in the prior 12 months. They were not counted as unemployed because they had not searched for work in the 4 weeks preceding the survey...

“Among the marginally attached, the number of discouraged workers in August (758,000) has nearly doubled over the past 12 months. (The data are not seasonally adjusted). Discouraged workers are persons not currently looking for work because they believe no jobs are available for them….

“Total nonfarm payroll employment declined by 216,000 in August….

“In August, construction employment declined by 65,000...

“In August, manufacturing employment continued to trend downward, with a decline of 63,000…Motor vehicles and parts lost 15,000 jobs in August…

“Financial activities shed 28,000 jobs in August, with declines spread throughout the industry…

“Wholesale trade employment fell by 17,000 in August. Employment in information continued to trend down over the month…

“The change in total nonfarm payroll employment for June was revised from -443,000 to -463,000, and the change for July was revised from -247,000 to -276,000…”

`Reader's Digest''s Hidden History--Part 8

(The following article originally appeared in the October 27, 1993 issue of the now-defunct alternative Lower East Side weekly, Downtown. Between 2007 and its 2011 bankruptcy, Reader’s Digest was owned by Citigroup board member Tim Collins’ Ripplewood Holdings’ private investment/leveraged buy-out firm. See below for parts 1 to 7 of article).

After Reader's Digest Founder DeWitt "Wally" Wallace started selling Reader’s Digest on U.S. newsstands in 1929, some of the editors and publishers who had been letting him reprint their magazine articles in condensed forms for free finally realized how profitable the Digest had become by that time. Some now began to view Reader’s Digest as a competing product on the newsstand. So to induce them to keep allowing Reader’s Digest to reprint articles from their magazines and to insure that imitators would not have access to a similar source of articles, Wallace signed exclusive reprint agreements with 35 other U.S. magazines in 1929, in which he agreed to now pay these magazines quite generously.

By 1934, 1.5 million copies of Reader’s Digest were being circulated in the U.S., including over 500,000 copies that were sold on U.S. newsstands. The magazine’s then-net profit exceeded $400,000 during the height of the Great Depression and by 1938 Reader’s Digest’s circulation had jumped to three million—the largest of any U.S. magazine at that time. By 1942, its U.S. circulation was five million. And by 1946, the U.S. circulation of Reader’s Digest was 9 million.

After 1939, the Reader’s Digest Association began publishing the international editions of its magazines in nine foreign languages, as well as in English, which the CIA apparently utilized as propaganda outlets following World War II. By 1947, the combined circulation of Reader’s Digest’s international editions exceeded 4.6 million. The nine foreign languages utilized were Spanish, Portuguese, Swedish, Arabic, Norwegian, Danish, Japanese, French and German. (end of part 8)

(Downtown 10/27/93)