[lbo-talk] employment

[Brad DeLong]

>
>>And it does face the problem that the unemployment rate now is 
>>lower than at any time from 1980 to 1993: how is Wal-Mart 
>>accomplishing so much extra speedup now when its analogues could 
>>not do so then?
>
>Kalecki's fear of the sack. The workers' psychological unemployment 
>rate is a lot higher than 6.1%.

The *measured* unemployment rate was at 7.6% in 1992--and back then 
Bob Reich was talking about how the psychological unemployment rate 
was much higher then as well. Blue-collar and service-sector workers 
have not seen themselves as in an economy at full employment since 
the late 1970s, if then. So why has it taken 25 years?

Brad DeLong