Results tagged “recession”

The unemployment rate for the District of Columbia jumped to 11.9 percent in the month of October, its highest level since the current recession began, according to figures released today by the Department of Employment Services. That number marks an increase over the previous month, September, which saw an unemployment rate of 11.4 percent. The national unemployment rate for October was 10.2 percent. Today's news comes paired with an estimate that the District actually added 10,200 jobs in October, despite the increase in unemployment figures. A news release from DOES explains these diverging trends as being due to an increase in the District's labor force, with no change in the number of employed people.

The August unemployment numbers for the District are out, courtesy the Department of Employment Services, and the news is rather dreary. After dropping slightly in July to 10.6 percent (down from 10.9 percent in June), D.C.'s unemployment rate for August was a whopping 11.1 percent, the worst number the city has seen since the recession began. The jump corresponds to an increase in jobless figures nationwide. The August national unemployment rate was 9.7 percent, compared to 9.4 percent in July. Maryland’s unemployment rate was 7.2 percent in August, unchanged from July, while Virginia posted a solid 6.5 percent rate, actually down from 6.9 percent.

And another local business bites the dust. Big Monkey Comics on 14th Street announced Monday that it will close its doors for good at the end of the month, blaming the recession.

It wasn't Galactus, Lex Luthor, or Dr. Doom that defeated us, but simple dollars and cents. The economy has adversely affected so many people, and we are the latest casualty. Last year alone Virginia last [sic] 45% of its comic book shops due to the economic downturn and we are sad to say that we now join their number.

The D.C. Mayor's Office put out the latest Department of Employment Services numbers today, and the unemployment rate in the District of Columbia decreased to 10.6 percent in July, compared to June's 10.9 percent unemployment rate. The figures are still well above the national unemployment rate for the same month, which was 9.4 percent, down slightly from 9.5 percent in June. Unemployment is a mixed bag in the larger region: Maryland's unemployment rate was 7.3 percent in July, up from 7.2 percent in June, while Virginia posted a 6.9 percent rate, down from 7.1 percent.

A few of us have been drooling over this latest All You Can Jet promotion from Jet Blue. The deal offers nearly unlimited Jet Blue flights for an entire month, from Sept. 8 to Oct. 8, for only $599, including all domestic taxes and fees (international and Puerto Rico flights are a little extra). There are a few restrictions of course, like that you have to book each ticket three days in advance, and you can only book one flight per city per day, but still, it's a pretty amazing deal. If only those pesky little things called our day jobs didn't prevent us from taking full advantage. But isn't this the most amazing gift you could give your friend or loved one who recently got laid off? Especially if you pooled together some cash between a group of mutual friends. The All You Can Jet passes are on sale through Friday, August 21, or while supplies last.

We had been hearing about the imminent demise of Cleveland Park's 7-11, located at the corner of Connecticut Ave. and Porter St. NW., for a while, but after being reminded by City Desk that the convenience store did indeed shut its doors on Thursday, joining the Starbucks and the Magruder's Market on the growing list of neighborhood retailers who are giving up rather than face increasing rents amid a bleak economy, it's still hard to fathom. Who knew 7-11's, in all their ubiquity, could even go out of business? Granted, this location was at the top, rather than the middle, of Cleveland Park's commercial corridor, perhaps making it not quite convenient enough, but still. Are people really buying fewer Slurpees, packs of gum and nutritionally questionable taquitos? And wouldn't these Cleveland Park landlords trying to raise the rent prefer to have some kind of paying tenant, rather than no tenant at all?

The unemployment news just doesn't seem to be getting better inside the District of Columbia. Monthly Department of Employment Services numbers are out once again today, and they report that the June unemployment rate was 10.9 percent, up 0.2 percent from the previous month. The District's unemployment numbers have been climbing since December, holding slightly steadier at just below 10 percent for several months before finally surpassing the figure in May. The news comes on the same day that Mayor Fenty has proposed eliminating 250 more city government jobs as part of his latest budget proposal, in addition to the roughly 1,600 he's already cut. DOES says there were 35,900 unemployed District residents in June.

It was late summer of 2007 when the old Watergate Hotel sold off all its contents amid a massive renovation effort, with plans to reopen as something fancier, newer, or at least less shabby. But then, of course, the bottom fell out of the financial markets, and it seems the long-delayed plans for construction are finally abandoned. The hotel is going on the auction block on Tuesday, the Post reports. The hotel's owner, Monument Realty, was financed mainly be Lehman Brothers, so you can guess what happened. Alex Cooper Auctioneers will start the bidding at $1 million at their Wisconsin Ave. offices.

Bad news for D.C. charter school teachers: you may not be getting paid on Friday, according to a story just posted to the Post's website. D.C. missed a $103 million payment to its 60 public charter schools this morning, thanks to some kind of tax revenue shortfall or delay, Bill Turque reports. The District is facing at least a $190 million deficit in the current fiscal year, thanks to shrinking tax revenues due to the recession. The Post story says that charter board officials are negotiating with the city to make some kind of partial payment from contingency funds to help them meet immediate payroll needs.

In case you missed the news over the weekend, the February jobs numbers are out, and predictably, things look really, really bad. D.C.'s unemployment rate jumped to 9.9 percent (up from 9.2 percent in January), which you may recall is roughly the same figure D.C. CFO Natwar Gandhi predicted back in December the city would reach sometime in 2010. Guess the economy went into the toilet a lot faster than Gandhi expected. Here's the Post's version of the story, which also includes numbers for Maryland (6.7 percent, up from 6.2 percent in January) and Virginia (6.6 percent, up from 6 percent). The national jobless figures were 8.1 percent in February, up from 7.6 percent in January. D.C.'s unemployment figures will surely go up even more in the coming months, what with Mayor Adrian Fenty's proposal to layoff over 700 city government workers.

The U.S. Senate is set to debate legislation granting the District of Columbia a voting seat in the House of Representatives on Monday, with a vote predicted for Tuesday. That would pave the way for an expected vote to endorse the legislation in the House and, at long last, something approaching voting rights for District residents. Of course, opponents of the legislation have threatened a quick legal challenge, but interestingly, The Hill reported yesterday that it doesn't seem like anyone is stepping up to the plate. Lawsuits don't file themselves, and though there are many an opponent to the measure, neither think tanks nor advocacy groups seem to be too excited to pony up the expected $750,000 to $1 million for the legal bills. Even some of the legislation's most ardent foes on the Hill seem to want to find someone else to do the heavy lifting on this one. Supporters of the legislation, on the other hand, have already started crafting a defense. Recession -- the best thing to happen to D.C. voting rights in a generation? Maybe.

Via the Wall Street Journal, it seems the National Bureau of Economic Research, the group of economists charged with deciding whether or not the country is in a recession or not, has only now decided that we are definitely in a recession. Interestingly, even though the definition of a recession is generally agreed to be two straight quarters of declining gross domestic product, the NBER have declared that our current recession began in December 2007, a full year ago. Apparently mixed employment numbers caused them to delay the official classification. But had anyone actually been hesitating calling this economic sh*t sandwich a recession over the last four months until now? For what it's worth, President Bush said he's "sorry" all this is happening.

As we mentioned before, the 2009 Washington DC/Baltimore Zagat Guide was released yesterday. While there have been numerous questions about the methodology used for ratings, the Guides still deserve a lot of respect for compiling the opinions of so many diners and venturing where no Michelin Guide would go.