Delay in naming Byrd’s replacement in Senate stalls unemployement extension

Unemployment extension will pass if Dems can pay for it, Grassley says

The jobs bill, which includes an extension to unemployment benefits among other provisions, could be passed if Democrats would be willing to pay for it with stimulus money and offset other spending, U.S. Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) said in…

Study: Minneapolis metro has nation’s ‘worst relative disparity’ in employment based on race

A study released by the Economic Policy Institute on Tuesday shows that the Minneapolis metropolitan area has the “worst relative disparity” in employment based on race among the country’s fifty largest metropolitan areas. The region’s black population is three…

Senators slog while unemployed suffer

A protracted partisan skirmish has left hundreds of thousands of Americans without unemployment benefits — an impasse Senate Democrats hope to break this week.

An illustrated map of the Bush years

With only a week left in the Bush presidency, The Atlantic offers a illustrated look at what the last eight years have brought. While some changes aren’t surprising — Apple profits up, Big 3 automaker profits down; electricity costs…

Could be worse: Minneapolis Fed puts unemployment at median for postwar recessions

Leave it to a state in the middle of the continent, where extremes of any kind (except weather) are frowned upon, to reassure the world that the country’s current joblessness is right where it should be — at the…

Election Signs: Tossed newspaper shows possible voter motivation

Outside North Minneapolis’ River of Life Church, an official polling place, a discarded copy of The Final Call newspaper this morning suggests one possible reason record numbers of voters, including many first-timers, are expected to hit the polls today. See…

Future earnings: Unemployment expected to climb to 7.8 percent

There’s the old adage that things will get worse before they get better, or that something must hit rock bottom before bouncing back. And pundits and economists and analysts have been sounding the alarm bell for months: The economic downturn is only in Stage 1 collapse. On Tuesday, chief economist of the Mortgage Bankers Association Jay Brinkman warned industry folks that the mortgage crisis could last well beyond 2009, and added that the MBA is forecasting unemployment will rise to 7.8 percent by early 2010 before more jobs are added.

Economy: The difference between ‘unemployed’ and jobless

Over the weekend, Floyd Norris of the NYT took a look at the seldom-mentioned difference between official government unemployment figures and the real numbers of jobless Americans. The former are for the most part those who are recently unemployed and…