In today's news: joblessness remains, human remains, and a mandate from a judge telling Tacoma's teachers to call off the strike. more ›

A year into the Mayor's jobs program, McGinn updated the city on the plan's progress. With elements of the plan failing, and only 3,270 of a promised 10,000 jobs created, the Mayor remains bullish on his plans to fight unemployment. more ›

We got robbed of our space-age dreams (still not over it, NASA,) but at least we didn't actually get robbed. Today's news: cheaters, liars, and thieves, plus a guy who had 76 guns in his home. more ›

Sightline has a scary post up about the end of unemployment benefits, and how a big dip may be in the works in the economy--and rehiring--doesn't kick in soon. more ›

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Clearly, unemployment is the new black these days, as Washington's unemployment rate crept up to 9.2 percent in March. The nearly one-percent increase from February came from the 20,000 jobs lost and lack of growth in the state's major industries, making this the first time Washington surpassed the 8.5 national unemployment rate. There is hope--we aren't in the double digits and job seekers can make the best of it with Seattle Job Social, a new schmoozing (and boozing) alternative job resource. Obviously, we prefer the glass-half-full attitude. more ›

There are some up-sides to unemployment. For starters, you can sleep in a little bit and take as long as you want in the shower (at least until the hot water runs out). You can make your ramen noodles at any time of day, and you have a lot more time to psychically deal with the stresses of commenting on vicious message boards (or the Daily Weekly, which extends an official invite to now-homeless Sound Off commenters). You also don't have to fight traffic, and as the Times helpfully points out, all the laid-off people not fighting traffic makes the commutes of those still employed just that much easier. How nice for the still-employeds, you're thinking! It's especially kind of the article to highlight the venti cinnamon dolce latte one of the interviewed still-employed, still-commuting people purchases daily, an extra that costs just about as much as two week's worth of ramen. Ouch. more ›

We try to resist loading up on bad news first thing Monday morning, but let's just do this quickly and get it out of the way: Publicola records Sen. Maria Cantwell's fight to insert some accountability into the bailout of AIG and others (she was overruled, and now AIG is claiming it has to pay $165 million in bonuses with bailout money because it promised! Out of curiosity, who writes a bonus agreement that puts a company on the hook even with catastrophic losses?) And Schmudget tells us Washington unemployment is forecasted to top out at 10 percent next year. On the plus side, all those unemployed people won't have to negotiate the kind of new, transfer-ier bus system proposed by Seattle Transit Blog. So that's a tiny little win. more ›

During regular business hours today, Fed-Ex/Kinkos will make 25 black-and-white copies of your resume on high-quality paper for free. You even get to keep the copies! We love them for this almost as much as we love Krispy Kreme whenever they do a freebie day. Seattlest wishes you a happy productive job hunt--hope this helps. more ›

Sign, signs, everywhere a sign. Unemployment leads to fewer traffic jams. Glad we could help you out with that. Over in Perugia, Italy, investigators on the stand today said Amanda Knox turned cartwheels at the police station. And down in the deep blue sea there's a groovy new species of fish that a UW scientist named psychedelia. We'll smoke up to that. more ›

It's Presidents Day, and since the libraries are closed, students and unemployed workers are taking it to the Governor over the budget--which Rep. Ross Hunter is calling "horrific" for its deep cuts. Meanwhile Madrona is reacting to a fatal shooting there last night. We were just trying wipe last night's odd dream involving Ron Sims (!) from our consciousness, and then he shows up in the morning beaming about his political record. more ›

Since the only thing worse than being on the dole is being kicked off it, we're glad the feds are extending our unemployment benefits in this state. Even REI is cutting jobs. Guess that outdoorsy date scene from The Bachelor didn't help? more ›

Our state House of Representatives has passed HB 1906, known by its sexier title, the Economic Security Act of 2009. The bill will temporarily increase unemployment benefits by $45 a week, and jacks the minimum benefit from $129 per week to $155. Out of curiosity, who thinks they can get by on $620 per month? Fun fact courtesy of Chuck Taylor: a back of the envelope calculation puts Seattle's unemployment rate at 15 percent, double the state rate. We also agree that taxing UI benefits is cruel and unusual punishment. more ›

Fourth quarter wasn't good to Boeing, with a $56 million loss reported today by executives. The company expects to lay off 10,000 employees this year, 4,500 of which will be in their commercial airplanes division--and more than half of which will be local jobs down the hatch. We'd like to note for the record that we're getting tired of reporting all the layoff news from the biggest employers in our region, and once again extend our best wishes and send good financial vibes in the direction of those Seattleites who will be affected by the upcoming round of job cuts. Perhaps all the bad news signals the beginning of an era of unprecedented creativity and community building; that's what we're holding out for, anyway. In other job news, U.S. Customs is hiring. more ›

, vacancies are up to 10% and expected to reach 15% by next year. more ›

The P-I is running an AP story with the headline: "Seattle home sales plummet 41% from a year ago," (lede: "Seattle and Portland were among the top 10 metro areas in the nation with the most pronounced drop in sales") while the Seattle Times counters with "Record U.S. home-price decline in August attracts buyers." So there's an upside? "...sales are sluggish in formerly stable markets like the Pacific Northwest and Charlotte." Oh. At least we've got strong fundament--oh. Hey, sunny San Diego County real estate is ten percent cheaper than King County. Wait, is that good or bad? more ›

According to Slog, the Seattle Times is about to lay off 200 employees (at least 45 of them from the newsroom). As a friend noted, it's not entirely surprising. Print media far and wide are bowing to the evolution of demand for media. This Seattlest, for one, only ever touches a newspaper anymore if it's in a bin at our local coffeeshop. And, even then, it's to pull out the crossword. We get all our news online and reckon we're not alone. more ›