[PRCo] Re: Lease back financing

[Schneider Fred]

Early 1993 was in the low sevens .... it rose to 6.7 from 6.4 between  
October and November 2008.
Here is the link to the BLS unemployment page.   By inserting the  
year you want, you can adjust the table and the chart back to 1948.

http://data.bls.gov/PDQ/servlet/SurveyOutputServlet

Unemployment reach 10 percent in 1982.

We don't have really good data for the Depression because the Bureau  
of Labor Statistics programs resulted from not having data in the  
Depression.   The only reasonably good counts that we got came from  
the U. S. census in 1930 and 1940.   We have reason to believe it was  
as high as one third of the labor force in some industrial area in  
1932.  The national data program came first followed by the federal  
government directing the states to provide data for standard  
metropolitan statistical areas about 1950.  So the first good monthly  
data you have to Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, Lancaster, Harrisburg,  
Johnstown, Altoona, Erie, Scranton and Wilkes-Barre is 1950.   Some  
states, and Pennsylvania is one of them, actually voluntarily  
financed data for smaller labor market areas.   We did it starting in  
the 1950s, at which time every county that was not part of a  
nationally designated SMSA (now MSA) became a stand-alone labor  
market area.

So estimates for the depression are essentially guesstimates and  
probably not much better that wild assed ones at that ... we think it  
might be two in ten, or two in twelve or one in three workers.   But  
we really don't know.  We do know that the industrial areas like  
Buffalo and Pittsburgh (both steel) and Detroit (autos )were a lot  
worse off than places like Lancaster, Pennsylvania.   Here in  
Lancaster at that time we had dominantly soft goods economy ...  
heavily into garments and textiles.   A lot of the girls took work  
home.  They may just have taken less home.  Jim Shuman squawked that  
he was forced to hold down three part-time jobs at one point in the  
middle of the depression just to earn $22 a week.   Hey guys, the  
average weekly wage in the middle of the depression was about $20 o  
$25 a week.  And he had work.  He just went to different places to  
get it.   Milton Hershey was funding his own capital improvement  
program in Hershey ... my former boss said that town had no clue what  
the Depression was because he paid to keep building projects going on  
all through the 1930s ... building the Theater, the Hotel Hershey,  
the Arena, the Museum and possibly expanding the chocolate plant and  
the amusement park.   Everyone else was abandoning trolleys and  
Milton made sure there was plenty of crushed rock under the ties of  
his trolley lines in Hershey.    But I've seen figures from the  
census as late as 1940 in western Pennsylvania that still showed  
something like 30% out of work.    That may suggest why your father  
had a desire to go to Canada and enlist in their military rather than  
hang around Pittsburgh; their military was hiring.

Berskshire Mall?   Crowds?   John where are we in the U. S.   What  
are conditions like here?   How do they compare to the rest of the  
United States?   Do you ever pick up the Lancaster New Era and read  
the monthly unemployment news release?   Jab Jab Jab.   Lancaster  
County for 50 years has had the lowest or second lowest unemployment  
in Pennsylvania.   Notice that you are living in a county equivalent,  
John, to the seventh best of 50 states in the United States.    
Certainly you don't see the panic here.  But it is here in subtle  
ways.   I bought my Christmas cards last night at 50% off ... the  
vendor said he was forced to do it because the competitors are doing  
it.   Some of my favorite restaurants are not quite as busy as they  
were.   Maybe that has to do with both going from 3 percent to 4  
percent unemployment and people worrying about the next shoe dropping.

And if you want to look for the pretty rose ... don't fret about  
Puerto Rico's unemployment.   It was 10 or 11 percent when the nation  
was 3 percent.    I understand the 9.3 in Michigan.   I'm not  
concerned with 9.3 in Rhode Island ... to small to bother me.  But  
8.2 in California when that is ten percent of the U. S. population  
and I don't know why it is up to almost double digits bothers the  
analyst in me.  They've gone from 5.7 to 8.2 percent in a year and  
all I can see a loss of 30,000 factory jobs mostly in durables and  
they're not disclosing any more than that.   When I graduated from  
college, California unemployment was down around 2 percent.   Life  
was good.  (And, by the way, it is a big enough state to use the BLS  
household sample directly for unemployment ... the data are reliable.)

OCTOBER 2008 UNEMPLOYMENT
RANKED BY RATE
Puerto Rico	12.0
Michigan	9.3
Rhode Island	9.3
California	8.2
South Carolina	8.0
Nevada	7.6
      Las Vegas MSA	7.3
Alaska	7.4
D.C.	7.4
Illinois	7.3
      Chicago MSA	6.4
Ohio	7.3
      Cleveland MSA	6.3
Oregon	7.3
Mississippi	7.2
Florida	7.0
      Jacksonv. MSA	6.6
Georgia	7.0
North Carolina	7.0
Tennessee	7.0
Kentucky	6.8
UNITED STATES	6.7
Connecticut	6.5
Missouri	6.5
Indiana	6.4
Washington	6.3
Arizona	6.1
Minnesota	6.0
New Jersey	6.0
PENNSYLVANIA	5.8
      Lancaster	4.3
      Philadelp'a MSA	5.6
      Pittsburgh MSA	5.0
Colorado	5.7
Maine	5.7
New York	5.7
Alabama	5.6
Texas	5.6
Arkansas	5.5
Louisiana	5.5
Massachusetts	5.5
Delaware	5.4
Idaho	5.3
Vermont	5.2
Wisconsin	5.1
Maryland	5.0
Kansas	4.9
Montana	4.8
West Virginia	4.7
Hawaii	4.5
Iowa	4.4
New Mexico	4.4
Virginia	4.4
Oklahoma	4.3
New Hampshire	4.1
Nebraska	3.6
Utah	3.5
North Dakota	3.4
South Dakota	3.3
Wyoming	3.3


On Dec 13, 2008, at 8:41 PM, John Swindler wrote:

>
>
> I didn't say it was the first victim of any great depression, of  
> which there hasn't been one since 1930s.  What was unemployment in  
> 1993 and what is it today?  And what about 1982?  And what about  
> 1933?  Wasn't it around 24% then?
>
> But the SEPTA instructor commented that they had a guy in Philly  
> recently took a hike off the 33rd floor of a downtown building.   
> (perhaps Rich Allman could verify the authenticity)  But he also  
> commented that it was a change from the usual college student  
> testing out the 600 volts, which is the more typical suicide.  So  
> lets not blow up a single incident.
>
> We just got back from Berkshire Mall area.  If there is a  
> depression, why did all the check-out lines at Wal-mart have long  
> lines, why was the mall parking lot filled almost to capacity and  
> stores crowded, and why were there long waiting lines at Red  
> Lobster and Applebees?  My wife commented that Bonton and Boscov  
> had clothing priced at 75% and more off (list price is fictious  
> anyway) and customers were cleaning out the inventory.  Makes me  
> wonder if merchents are fearing tales of gloom and doom, and  
> discounting too much.
>
> But the experience today is the other side.  Fred and I were  
> recently at dinner when the third party mentioned that his 401k is  
> now a 200 and a half.  And there are plenty of stories of layoffs  
> and business closings to fill up the newspaper.
>> From: fwschneider at comcast.net> Subject: [PRCo] Re: Lease back  
>> financing> Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2008 16:34:49 -0500> To: pittsburgh- 
>> railways at dementia.org> > Someone, and it may have been John  
>> Swindler in a phone call, said we > had our first victim of the  
>> Great Depression of 2008 jumping of a > building.> > I think a lot  
>> of people are going to get bitten in the behind.> > On Dec 13,  
>> 2008, at 4:21 PM, Phillip Clark Campbell wrote:> > > Mr.Swindler;>  
>> >> >> > If what you infer about tobacco is true then it probably  
>> doesn't > > stop there does it.> > How many other places were such  
>> financing 'deals' made that will > > come back to> > bite us  
>> within the next decade? For obvious reasons these 'deals' > > may  
>> not affect> > us directly but what about our families? How could  
>> we speak up now > > to expose> > and hopefully 'correct' these  
>> situations? Do we need grand jury > > investigations at> > all  
>> levels?> >> >> > Phil> >> >> >> >> >> > ----- Original Message ---- 
>> > >> From: John Swindl!
>  er <j_swindler at hotmail.com>> >> To: pittsburgh- 
> railways at dementia.org> >> Sent: Saturday, December 13, 2008 5:32:10  
> AM> >> Subject: [PRCo] Re: Lease back financing> >>> >>> >>> >>  
> There's about 30 some transit agencies affected. Perhaps it is > >>  
> not so much AIG> >> and the transit systems - it is the brokers  
> that received hefty > >> commissions for> >> putting these  
> agreements together. That's where the real money is > >> made and>  
> >> decisions are made - at the individual level.> >>> >> Do you  
> remember those multi billion dollar tobacco settlements > >>  
> between the> >> tobacco companies and various states about ten  
> years ago? The > >> tobacco companies> >> agreed to make payments  
> over several decades. Guess what your > >> state politicians> >>  
> have been doing over past few years and who is now 'on the hook' >  
> >> if tobacco> >> consumption declines?> >>> >> John> >> >> >> >>  
> >> >> >
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