I THINK MINING

Once more on the topic of unemployment and the role of mining in giving people jobs.  Today I received the following from the  U.S. National Mining Association, and it is an honor to be asked and to be able to comply.  Jamie Caswell writes as follows:

One of the few sectors that consistently added jobs in 2011 was U.S. minerals mining. Today, this industry supports 1.1 million American jobs nationwide and has enabled modern products such as aircrafts, medical equipment and state-of-the-art electronics to come to fruition.

Some of the fastest growing industries in America—including high tech, automotive manufacturing and renewable energy—rely on minerals to operate. In a December 2011 PricewaterhouseCoopers study, 67 percent of respondents—senior executives in these industries worldwide—said they expect their companies to be affected by minerals and metals supply scarcity in the next 5 years.

Hal Quinn, president of the National Mining Association, reflects, “If we are to foster American ingenuity, build a stable economy and create jobs in 2012 and beyond, the U.S. portfolio for growth must include a secure, domestic minerals supply. We must not allow our nation’s minerals needs to go unmet, especially when these very resources help put Americans back to work and drive our economy.”

Please help us inform your I Think Mining readers as to the importance of minerals mining by sharing the study on your site.

Thank you for your continued support.

Sincerely,

Jamie Caswell

Communications Specialist

National Mining Association

jcaswell@nma.org

(202) 463-2667

Contrast this report with the following hysterical, internally-contradictory email from a fellow, Brian Wilson, who every so often send me his diatribe.   Let me get in some of my comments on what he writes before you read what he writes. 

Those of you who regularly follow this blog know that I am no fan of politicians, either in general or specifically.  I am currently reading a 1921 book by Bernard Shaw Back to Methuselah in which he writes: “Essentially the rulers are all defective; and there is nothing worse than government by defectives who wield irresistable powers of physical coercion.  The common-place people submit, and compel the rest to submit, because they have been taught to do so as an article of religion and a point of honor.”  Even Shaw, who hated politicians, saw that the fault also lies in ourselves.

Yet I cannot accept Bill Wilson’s thesis that it is all Obama’s fault.  Wilson’s analysis would be more cogent and valuable if he took on all politicians past and present, and also those hoping to be president–as sad an pathetic a bunch of defectives as ever I have seen.  Wilson’s focus on getting rid of Obama does nothing to advance the debate or make conditions propitious for new mines. 

Wilson may have a point re repealing what he calls blue-sky laws in recalcitrant states.  But being a Canadian as well as an American, I find it hard to believe Obamacare is the cause of all America’s ills.  Or to believe that higher taxes properly applied and focussed won’t be needed to pay down the debt built up by decades of greed and profligacy. 

Enough read for yourself what he says, but be careful for it is high propaganda at its most shrill. 

Since Barack Obama assumed office, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the total population over age 16 has grown by 5.845 million to 240.5 million, and yet, since then, the civilian labor force has actually shrunk by 349,000 — from about 154.2 million to 153.8 million. 

This is a startling contradiction, and it is at the heart of why the unemployment rate is much higher than the 8.5 percent being reported.

The problem is that the measured civilian labor force participation rate has fallen from 65.7 percent to 64 percent since Jan. 2009, reflecting people who have lost hope and simply stopped looking for work.  If those people were still counted, the actual civilian labor force would be 4.176 million higher than is reported at about 158 million.

Based on this analysis, the number of unemployed is actually closer to 17 million instead of the 13 million reported jobless.  That is simply astounding.

Instead of 8.5 percent, the effective unemployment rate should be closer to 10.9 percent, and the underemployed closer to 17.4 percent, or 27.3 million.  This is what we mean when we say that the unemployment rate is no longer a valid economic indicator.

Propaganda is not going to get the real unemployed into jobs.  It’s not going to help families keep their homes.  It’s not going to help college graduates to enter the work force.  We’re nowhere near where we should be, and it’s Obama’s fault.

It’s his regulatory burdens that are being imposed through the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) carbon endangerment finding and through Obamacare.  It is he who is insisting on raising taxes on job creators, and playing class warfare to cobble together a constituency that wants to apparently take from their employers’ purses.  It is Obama who has refused to get the nation’s crushing debt load under control, where the $15.2 trillion national debt is nearly larger than the entire economy. 

To get the economy moving again, the government needs to slash corporate tax rates, which are the highest in the world of advanced economies.  It is imperative that the regulatory overkill come to an end.  The dollar needs to be strengthened to lower costs and stabilize energy and food costs.  The debt needs to be paid down and retired, and the budget balanced. Onerous federal securities laws and state-by-state blue sky laws need to be repealed that make it cost-ineffective for new businesses to raise capital.

In short, it must become competitive to do business here in America again.  And that will probably not happen so long as Obama is in office.  It is clear the nation needs new leadership that is intent on actually creating jobs and restoring hope, instead of ignoring the despair of Obama’s lost labor force.