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The high cost of housing as affluent people from the northeast moved into southern Florida during the pandemic doubling the price of housing by 2024, is covered in this report in WSJ. This is pushing average Floridans making about $66,000 to leave the state or stay in far flung suburbs with long commutes over 2 hours a day. Unemployment at 2.7% is low yet making it in Florida and affording pricey housing is a struggle for many Florida residents.

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The WSJ shows the difficult and hard life of immigrants working at Brazilian company JBS meatpacking plants in the US in this report.

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Economic activity at the American base and hospital at Kaiserslautern, Germany. 36,000 American military personnel at this base and it provides jobs and work for the surrounding area. It is 73 miles from Frankfurt.

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Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Adityanath on the changes in the economy for modernization and clean governance in India's largest state.

"Our government neither fears the mafia nor bows to vested interests. Every policy, reform, and decision is guided by one principle: The welfare and empowerment of our citizens."

"Our vision is clear: Bring jobs to people, not people to jobs. Migration must be a choice, not a compulsion. Every citizen of UP deserves the opportunity to build a future in their own homeland. With the largest population in the country, UP’s greatest strength lies in its youth. In a world witnessing economic shifts, technological change, and global uncertainties, this demographic strength becomes a powerful asset."

 

 

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Anglo American CEO Cutifani says, "we are looking at every dollar and pulling everything back." He announced job cuts of 53,000, 35% of its workforce over 3 years. There is a sharp pullback by mining companies as the demand from China slows rapidly.

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Noam Scheiber of NYT provides this illuminating account of how the changes in employment affected Hispanic Americans since 2004. About 500,000 jobs were created in the U.S. construction industry in 2014. Of this 315,000 jobs went to Hispanics with the highest number in California, Florida, Texas and Illinois, which have large Hispanic population. This has enabled Hispanic employment to reach the pre-recession levels in 2015 before this happens for blacks and whites, according to the Economic Report of the President. The drop in immigrants from Mexico crossing the border as economic conditions deteriorated in the U.S. in 2009-2012, and the stricter enforcement, has resulted in native born Americans benefitting most from the jobs created. Hispanics took the biggest hit following the recession in 2009-2012, with a loss of 700,000 jobs for the 3 million Hispanics employed in construction. During the 2004-2007 construction boom Pew Research shows 1.6 million jobs going to immigrants, of which 800,000 went to native born Hispanics, before the collapse in construction in 2009. This time the recovery is benefitting native born Americans most....

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According to Germany's Federal Labor Agency, about 1.5 millon workers in about 63,000 companies were in the short-work or Kurzarbeit plan. Under this plan companies are able to put workers on shorter work week schedules without seriously impacting wages. Companies pay for the hours put in by employees on shorter work schedules and the government pays upto 67% of remaining wages. For March 2010 693,000 workers were on the Kurzarbeit plan. Another German way of softening the impact of a recession is to allow companies to keep a work-time account. Employees get paid now for a certain number of hours that they agree to work during an upturn in demand. So that for certain machine tool makers employees work 250 hours less during a downturn but still get paid and make up for this during an upturn by working overtime and still taking in regular wages. What this does is to reduce the need for new hiring during an upturn.

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The impact of increasing use of labor saving machinery on jobs.

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The U.S. economy added an average of 284,000 jobs each month for October, November and December 2015. In December 292,000 new jobs were added. The monthly rate for the first 9 months was an average of 200,000 jobs. This shows the pace accelerated by Dec. 2015. In all 2.65 million jobs were added in 2015. The unemployment rate is now at 5%. Yet the wage gains are modest, at 2.5% for 2015. The average hourly wage is at $25.24. The labor force participation rate has declined for many years and stands at 62.6%, as many people are too discouraged to look for work- this is the share of Americans having jobs or looking for work. Experts say this is like a huge shadow work force existing on the side that could explain the lack of wage gains, as the official figure of unemployment is not reflecting the discouraged workers who have dropped out of the labor market.

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Problems facing S. Africa include the high unemployment rate of 24% and the funding of social grant programs for the unemployed. As it stands today with the increase in population and the economy unable to create enough jobs, there are more people on the social grant program (similiar to welfare, disability and social security payments in the U.S.), than there are people working. Only 10% of S. Africans pay taxes which starts at 120,000 rand, or about $15,230. The numbers of people on social grant payments are growing at five times the rate of people added for income tax payments. And there is concern about the tax base's ability to sustain this in the future as population grows. The awards are now at 3% of GDP or $13.4 billion.

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P&G's plans for additional 4000 job cuts after the 1600 already planned for the 2012 fiscal year. This move and other actions including changes to its advertising budget are expected to generate cost savings of $10 billion by 2016. The nonmanufacturing workforce will be reduced by 10% by 2013 for annual savings of $800 millon by fiscal year 2014. $1 billion in savings comes from moving to digital and other forms of advertising. $6 billion in savings would be generated from less costly packaging materials and supply chain efficiency improvements. By using concentrated forms of detergent products less packaging will be needed. Anaysts say P&G's cost structure compares poorly with competitors- with 31.5% of revenue going to selling, general and administrative expenses, compared to 28.1% for household product companies. At the same time as these cuts are made, P&G plans to add 20 new plants in Brazil, China, S. Africa and Poland.