How Many People Share Our World?

[Evo]

Whenever I've been unemployed, Evo, there were no trickle-down anything. They only thing that put food on my table was my resourcefulness.

It worked, so why are you saying that's not the answer?

For society as a whole, no it's not.

This is an old report and the figures are irrelevant, the only portion I am referring to is this.

II. The Costs of Unemployment

We know that high unemployment is not a good thing, but you may not be aware of all of the reasons. Unemployment clearly has costs for the person who is jobless, but the true costs extend beyond the individual or the family affected.

Unemployment costs the economy as a whole. If we are experiencing unemployment, then we are not using all of our labor resources. This means we are at a point INSIDE the production possibilities curve. This lost output is gone forever. The relationship between unemployment and production is known as Okun's Law: An increase of unemployment by 1 percentage point will cause real GDP to decrease by 2 percentage points.

Unemployment has a domino effect as well: As people lose their jobs, they cut back on spending, which causes other workers to lose their jobs. Unemployed people will likely postpone the purchase of a new car, and not go out to eat. This may cause auto workers and waiters to lose their jobs as well.

Unemployment increases government expenditures on unemployment benefits, food stamps, etc., while decreasing income tax revenue, potentially creating a budget deficit.

Probably the most serious and most difficult to quantify are the personal costs. Higher unemployment is associated with increasing rates of suicide, domestic violence, drug abuse, and health problems.

http://www.oswego.edu/~edunne/200ch6.html

 

[DaveC426913]

Higher unemployment is associated with increasing rates of suicide...

See now, there's a silver lining. Unemployment in small part aids to mitigate the overpopulation problem.

What? What??

 

[Evo]

See now, there's a silver lining. Unemployment in small part aids to mitigate the overpopulation problem.

What? What??

You Pollyanna, you.