City Services Impacted by Gloomy Economic Forecast

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by Lesley R. Chinn

With the economy taking centerstage in American politics, the unemploymentrate hit a record high infive years at 6.1 percent, accordingto a U.S. Labor Department reportreleased last Friday.

Last month, U.S. employers slashedmore than 150,000 jobs, making thisthe ninth consecutive month payrollstook a dive. For Blacks, the unemploymentrate shot up to 11.4 percent,the highest since late 2003.

The manufacturing sector lost51,000 jobs last month, bringing thedecline in factory jobs to 442,000over the past 12 months. About18,000 jobs were lost in the auto sector,an industry that has takena beatingdue to low consumer sales. Thetroubled financial sector cut 17,000jobs in September with nearly half ofthe decline occurring in securitiesand investment firms.

Overall, the report indicated that thefinancial sector has lost more than172,000 jobs since December 2006.Mounting job losses, shrinking nesteggs and rising foreclosures, have allweighed heavily on American voters,with the economy being a top concern.An Associated Press-GfK pollreleased recently showed that likelyvoters now believe Senator BarackObama is better suited to lead thecountry through turbulent economictimes by 48 percent, compared toSenator John McCains 41 percent.

Although foreign policy was supposedto be the focus of the last presidentialdebate in Mississippi, thetwo presidential candidates spent thefirst 30 minutes on the economyinstead. While McCain said hewould consider a spending freezeon everything but defense, veteransaffairs and entitlement programs inorder to cut back on governmentspending, Obama responded in thedebate by saying, The problem isyoure using a hatchet where youneed a scalpel.There are some programs that arevery important that are currentlyunder funded. Although Obamaagreed the government should cutspending in some areas, he addedother programs, like early childhoodeducation, require more funding.Although Congress passed legislationfor an unprecedented $700 billionfinancial bailout, the falteringeconomy and the jobs market willprobably get worse. The unemploymentrate could hit 7 or 7.5 percentby late 2009. If that happens, itwould be the highest since the 1990-1991 recession.

In Chicago, city workers are feelingthe crunch as labor leaders bracethemselves for layoffs announced byMayor Richard M. Daley last week.Ruling out tax increases to close a$420 million dollar budget deficit,more than 3,000 vacant positionswill not be filled and 1,000 cityemployees will be laid off, theMayor said. More details on the layoffswill follow on October 15thwhen the Mayor unveils his 2009budget, but city services will beimpacted in the process. TheLaborers Union Local 1001 will feelthe pinch when their members fromthe Streets and SanitationDepartment will be hit with 300 layoffs.Crew sizes will be reduced andthe time between pickups will beonce a week in most neighborhoodsand twice a week in congested areas.Annual budget hearings will beginin a few weeks at City Hall. This isa huge crisis. Theyre doing everythingpossible to stop the slipperyslope going down, and nobodyknows if theyve hit bottom yet, theMayor told reporters recently. The1,000 layoffs are expected to save$100 million. They represent thebiggest purge of Daleys nearly 20-year reign. Roughly 265 of thosefired are expected to be middle-anagers.The 3,000 vacancies include329 sworn Chicago police officers;424 non-sworn police employees; 12sworn firefighters and 10 non-swornfire employees.

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