Economic trouble-shooting

Things are getting better. Slowly but surely, the unemployment rate is heading south.
The most recent numbers are held from the previous month. Unemployment is at 9.7 percent. Another encouraging sign is that an additional 200,000 Americans are looking for work.
That means that Americans are becoming more encouraged to look for work because companies are starting to rehire workers, according to the Economic Policy Institute. As far as new jobs being created, it was the largest monthly increase in three years, at 162,000 new jobs.
Of course, that isn't enough jobs for the unemployed, but it is only the first step. The other important thing to remember is that the unemployment rate is not a crystal clear way to understand what is occurring in the overall economy.
For example, the unemployment rate doesn't count discouraged workers, defined as Americans who are not actively seeking work. If many of the unemployed stop looking for work, the rate can be artificially deflated. Likewise, resuming the search can inflate it.
According to Christina Romer, chairman of the President's Economic Council, "Over the last three months, we've added more than a million people to the labor force. And that's actually … a great sign. That is a sign that people who may have … dropped out because of the terrible recession have started to have some hope again and are looking for work."
So what does this mean for the average American?
Patience must be practiced. The fact is, things are getting better, but slowly. Americans must be flexible and adapt to any working environment. This is not the time to be picky or live outside means in the short term.
For the long run, emphasis must be put on developing and marketing new innovations rather than manufacturing them.
Many politicians and economic experts are worried about the lack of manufacturing done in the United States. However, manufacturing jobs don't exist in America anymore because it is too expensive to make products in this country.
Don't fear, though.
Try this: imagine the shape for the life of a new product is a U-shaped curve. The first stage is development of new products.
The United States holds more patents in new technologies than any other country in the world. In fact, the United States invests more money in new technologies like nano-technology or biotechnologies then any other country combined.
The next part of the curve is the bottom, which is the actual manufacturing of these products. It is also the cheapest part of the production process. For example, Apple makes an iPod nano for about $90, but sells that same iPod for $150.
The last part of the U-shaped curve is the marketing and sales of the product. Take the example from before: Apple makes roughly $60 of profit from every iPod sold. That is where the money is – in the development and sales of a product, not the actual manufacturing of it.
America will only continue to dominate these areas if it continues to come up with innovative ideas. Hence the reason why green technology has been so widely discussed – because it can generate huge revenues.
But it isn't just green technology, it's biomedical research and nano-technology that will allow the United States to be an exporter of ideas. Many have argued that Ph.D.s in this country are flowing out of the country. But remember, most of the companies who hold new technology patents are here in the United States.
To de-bunk another myth, many experts argue that nations like India turn out more engineers than the United States. According to the numbers, this is true, but what they don't say is that many of India's engineers come from schools that are equivalent to schools like ITT Tech here in America.
So in short, America, make smart decisions about money. For America to remain a dominant economic force, it must continue to export ideas in new fields, not try and fix dying industries.
The future is too important to screw up.