Blogging into Week Three

Blogging into Week three.  I have the Wall Street Journal spread out here on the kitchen table.  On the front page is a quick blurb entitled Vital Signs with a graph showing the G-7 unemployment rate of the G-7 Nations (seven nations including U.S., Canada, Britain, France, Germany, Italy and Japan).  Last fall the rate on the graph peaked at 8.5% and today it is only down slightly.  The article compares to the early 1980’s when the rate was at 8.2% but then about nineteen years ago when today’s college freshmen being born in 1991, the rate decreased to just above 5% and then began to rise and fall again and again leading into this much higher rate. 

So what was happening in 1980?  Well, there was a U.S. led boycott of the Olympics in Moscow because of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan.  In the United States, President Jimmy Carter introduced the Carter Doctrine in his last State of the Union address in which he noted that the United States would use force if necessary to address actions in the Persian Gulf region.  The G-7 was having their sixth meeting in Italy, marred by the death of the Japanese Prime Minister who died prior to the start of the conference.  Happily, Japan was having an economic boon during 1980.  G-7 annual meetings continue now as the G-8 with a mission for these economically well off industrialized nations to meet for an international forum.  Russia entered the group in 1997 making it the G-8.  Vital Signs does not include employment statistics for that nation.  In June 2010 a quick Google search shows that the Russian unemployment rate was published at 6.80. 

Recapping the international changes from 1980 to 2010 would be much too time consuming but notably from the comments in the beginning paragraph, Afghanistan is still in flux although the Russian presence is very different.  The United States now has a presence there along with United Nations troops.  This last weekend there was an election in Afghanistan with voters being intimidated by insurgents.  It will be weeks before the results are known.