In honor of the contributions that working men and women have made to the United States, Labor Secretary Solis has shared a Labor Day message.
In her message she shared the progress that has been made since President Obama was elected. Up until that point the country was losing 750,000 jobs a month for a total loss of 8 million before President Obama took office. Since then 2.2 million jobs have been created. Her message about taking care of the unemployed and creating new jobs was hopeful about the future.
Hopefully, hope will turn into action and the President's jobs plan, to be announced next week, will work. That's important because those 2.2 million jobs mentioned by Secretary Solis, while a turn in the right direction for the job market, aren't enough.
Millions of workers have run out of unemployment benefits and this is the most difficult job market in memory. Unemployment remains at over 9% with zero job growth in August. The economy needs 250,000 new jobs a month to grow the economy and cut unemployment.
That's dismal news, especially for the workers who have run out or are going to run out of unemployment benefits, who have lost the COBRA health insurance subsidy which has expired, and who are facing the loss of no more extended benefits when the federal unemployment extensions expire at the of the year.
It's easier to look at the statistics, I think, than it is to consider the very real impact the recession and the lack of jobs has had on real people. People whose working lives have been cut short, people who have lost everything, and people who have done all the right things but haven't found another job.
In honor of each and every one of America's workers, both those who are gainfully employed and those who wish and hope they will be, here are just a few of the thousands of unemployment stories About.com readers have graciously shared with us.
Unemployment Stories
- Afraid We Are Going To Lose Everything!
- Former Executive Director Faces Bankruptcy
- I Haven't Began Life Since I Graduated High School
- It's Hard for a Woman to Live on the Streets
- Unemployment Runs Out for Heart Transplant Patient
To read more about what it's like being unemployed here are listings that include all the stories: