How Are 7 Million Unemployed Men Actually Surviving? - Nicholas Eberstadt

 I've known for 15 years or longer that there was a massive number of people in the USA who have dropped off the unemployment rate radar - the official unemployment rate is fake and doesn't include those who quit looking. These are people (mostly men) who had eventually given up actively looking for a job.  Eberstadt discusses this this group.  According to him there are over 7 million persons in this group.

MANY STATE RAINY DAY FUNDS GOING THE WRONG WAY

 I wrote about the State's Rainy Day Fund and it wasn't looking so bad.  Since then and mainly due to the Wuhan Virus issue, a number of  states have drained their rainy day funds to keep things afloat.  

I thought it would be time to take a look at the funds.  The main takeaway was that the responsible states are still flush with cash with many doing better.  The irresponsible states (Illinois) completely emptied their RDF. So, what will these states do when things get REALLY BAD? I don't know, but if I were you. I wouldn't stick around much longer.

The state of West Viginia that everyone wants to parade around as one of the most impoverished states in the Union, has 68 days of money to keep the state government funded.  Talk about being responsible! I find that impressive. In fact, that number hasn't changed from 2016!

The other state to suffer (more) was Illinois.  in 2016 they had a miserable 3.7 days of money on hand. Now they have ZERO.

It looks like the state whose RDF suffered the most was Alaska.  They went from 478 days of funding down to 111 days (I'm rounding up). 

As you can see the median fund is now funded to function for 28.5 days compared to 19.1 days four years earlier.

From Pew:

Unlike the Great Recession, rainy day funds made up the bulk of states’ reserves in the year before the pandemic, accounting for 65 cents of every dollar in total balances at the end of fiscal 2019, compared with 45 cents just before the 2007-09 downturn. The contrast highlights the more prominent role of rainy day funds today in managing state fiscal uncertainty. Ending balances, which make up the remainder of total balances, were historically high before both recessions.

When things get really bad, and a state and towns runs out of funding for police, what happens?