Firings Mean Jobs Are Available; Layoffs Mean Jobs are Gone

By now, everyone who is not a plutocrat or a member of Congress knows someone who is unemployed. Was that person fired? Or was she laid off? Because it makes a difference.

Susie Madrak at Crooks and Liars:

Fred Clark from Slacktivist points out something that should be obvious to anyone with an ounce of empathy -- or intelligence:

The confused conservatives seem to mistakenly believe that during the Great Recession those 8 million workers were simply fired.

If that had been the case, the economy would have greeted those 8 million newly unemployed workers with 8 million newly vacant job openings. The relocations, retrainings and logistics of rearranging all of those workers back into the assorted job openings created by their firings would have been unpleasant in the short term, but wouldn't have created an insurmountable long-term problem for either those 8 million people or for the economy as a whole. That sort of churning and rearranging goes on all the time, which is why economists regard something like a 4 percent unemployment rate as "full employment."

If those workers had all simply been fired, the scenario would have played out as something like the economic equivalent of a Chinese fire drill -- everyone get up and find a new seat. That would have been disruptive, but still possible because there would still have been one seat for every displaced worker.

But that is not what happened during the Great Recession. Those 8 million workers were not fired, they were laid off.

Getting laid off is not the same as getting fired.

Those 8 million workers got up and their seats were taken away. They cannot find new seats because there are not nearly enough seats to go around. Those 8 million or so workers cannot simply find new jobs because there are 8 million fewer jobs to be found.

The most recent figures, if you want to be precise: 14.2 million looking for work; 3.4 million job openings. That means 10.8 million Americans right now, today, are royally, epically screwed.

That means it wouldn't matter if every unemployed American followed all the advice for what job-seekers are supposed to do. If every single one of them keeps a positive attitude while still being willing to settle for less, if each and every one of them takes classes and volunteers to keep their skills sharp, if each and every one networks furiously, gets up every morning, showers, shaves and gets dressed for the office before sending out dozens of perfect, enticingly crafted résumés all day, every day, then 10.8 million of them will still not find jobs because there are 10.8 million fewer jobs than there are job seekers.

That is the situation. That is what we are up against.

Millions of people got laid off. They weren't fired -- they were laid off. Their jobs are gone and now there aren't enough jobs.

Getting laid off is not the same as getting fired.

There are no jobs. And there will not be any jobs until Congressional rethuglicans and their enablers in the White House stop emptying the treasury to further enrich the already obscenely wealthy.

Have you talked to your Democratic neighbors today?