Unemployment in New York City jumped from 5.7 percent in 2000 to 8.2 percent last year. In the August-December period alone bosses eliminated 41,000 jobs.

The New York-based Community Service Society (CSS) reported in February that one out of five unemployed workers in the city had been out of work for more than nine months in 2002.

In 2000, some 59 percent of the unemployed in New York City were out of work for less than 13 weeks. Last year that percentage declined to 47 percent, while the number of longer-term unemployed rose.

The CSS report illustrates that—contrary to claims that the current economic slump is a “white collar” recession, resulting from a “dot-com collapse”—job cuts came largely from manufacturing, construction, and other industrial jobs, as well as retail businesses and repair services.

Workers in New York who are Black and Latino have been affected disproportionately by the economic slump. While they are slightly less than half of the city’s workforce, they account for nearly 60 percent of the unemployed.

Likewise, younger workers are the hardest hit by the job squeeze. Workers aged 16-24 make up 13.4 percent of the city’s labor force but comprise 29 percent of the unemployed.

All these figures underreport the real picture, since the government does not count as unemployed those who have stopped seeking work.

Under these depression conditions, working people are bumping into the restrictions on unemployment insurance that capitalist politicians have instituted.

According to a report by the National Employment Law Project, government statistics show that 357,000 New York workers have run out of state unemployment benefits in the past 12 months—double the figure for 2000.

More than half of New York’s unemployed have exhausted all 26 weeks of state benefits, the limit. Payments average $276 a week.

Nationwide, more than 1 million people have already exhausted both their 26 weeks of regular unemployment insurance and the 13 weeks of extended federal benefits. Another 900,000 will exhaust this extension by the end of May.

Jobless benefits are routinely denied to many workers because of “an insufficient work history” or countless other bureaucratic obstacles. As a result, less than half of unemployed workers in New York City actually collect unemployment benefits. Largely because of these obstacles, only 58 percent of the jobless apply for benefits.  
 
 
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