Monday, March 01, 2004

Here's something for those who think that the war on terror is no longer the nation's top priority (as if we needed more proof.)

Before anyone starts in about "exporting jobs," take a look at this data from the Department of Labor: (Hat tip to Neal Boortz @ boortz.com)

The peak unemployment rate during the recession that began in Clinton's term was 6.4 percent.  The current unemployment rate is 5.6 percent.

In the last year more than 2,000,000 new jobs have been added in the United States. 

Between 1983 and 2003 outsourcing went from 6.5 million jobs to about 10 million jobs. 

Between 1983 and 2002 jobs in-sourcing -- jobs coming TO the United States -- went from 2.5 million to 6.5 million.

If you subtract the jobs coming to the United States every year from the jobs going out every year you come up with a "net" figure.  The net outsourced jobs reached its peak in the early 1980's; a peak of about 4 million jobs.  In other words, things were worse at the end of the Carter Administration then they are right now.

During this same period ... from '83 to '03 a total of 38 million jobs have been created by private businesses in the United States.  No other industrialized country in the world has matched this number.

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