quinta-feira, julho 02, 2009

O peso da realidade

Para os que insistem nas (caducas) grelhas de leitura económica, a retoma estava ao virar da esquina. E o arranque da economia americana iria fazer-nos regressar ao tempo da prosperidade. Tudo não passaria de um pesadelo.
Só que mais uma vez a realidade teima em desmentir as preces dos analistas financeiros do costume, os tais que continuam enxamear as páginas dos jornais e nos entram casa adentro via televisões.
Os números do desemprego nos Estados Unidos aí estão para demonstrá-lo:

The U.S. economy lost 467,000 jobs in June as the national unemployment rate rose to 9.5 percent, the government announced on Thursday morning. While that's only one-tenth of a percentage point from May, the current rate is the highest rate in 26 years.

Heidi Shierholz, an economist with the Economic Policy Institute, said that the loss of 6.5 million jobs since the start of the recession combined with the growth of the workforce means that the gains of the previous business cycle have been completely blown away.

"This is the only recession since the Great Depression to wipe out all jobs growth from the previous business cycle, a devastating benchmark for the workers of this country and a testament to both the enormity of the current crisis and to the extreme weakness of jobs growth from 2000-2007," said Shierholz in a statement.