The participation rate has dropped due to the economic problems of the last few years and currently stands at 64.2 percent. The norm prior to that was in the mid-66 percent range. The decline is a result of more people retiring, going on disability or simply giving up on finding a job. He notes that the number of people on Social Security Disability benefits has risen 14 percent since the recession began.

Some of the decline in the participation rate was inevitable over the next couple decades as the baby boomers began to retire, but demographers still expect the rate to go up some as the economy improves — and how far it goes up will help determine how fast the unemployment rate drops.

As I noted yesterday, if the Civilian noninstitutional population (over 16 years old) grows by about 2 million per year – and the participation rate stays flat – the economy will need to add about 100 thousand jobs per month to keep the unemployment rate steady at 8.9%.

If the population grows faster (say 2.5 million per year), and/or the participation rate rises, it could take significantly more jobs per month to hold the unemployment rate steady. As an example, if the working age population grows 2.5 million per year and the participation rate rises to 65% (from 64.2%) over the next two years, the economy will need to add 200 thousand jobs per month to hold the unemployment rate steady.

Of course, we need to do more than hold the unemployment rate steady where it currently is; we need to see that rate go down steadily. February’s jump of 192,000 jobs was a good start, but depending on what happens to the participation rate, it may not even be enough to maintain the current jobless rate.

In the week ending Feb. 26, the advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims was 368,000, a decrease of 20,000 from the previous week’s revised figure of 388,000. The 4-week moving average was 388,500, a decrease of 12,750 from the previous week’s revised average of 401,250.

Bill McBride of Calculated Risk notes that this is the first time the four-week average has dropped below 400,000 since July 2008 and says, “There is nothing magical about the 400,000 level, but breaking below 400,000 is a good sign. The sharp drop in weekly claims suggests improvement in the labor market.”

It includes changes unveiled by its Republican authors earlier this week that reinstate collective-bargaining powers for the state’s more than 300,000 firefighters, police officers, teachers and other public workers, but only on the issues of wages, hours and certain terms and conditions.

But the measure also extends a prohibition on strikes to apply to teachers. And it bans binding arbitration, giving the ultimate power to settle contract disputes with elected bodies. In the case of a city, that power would fall to the city council, and in the case of state contracts, it would fall to the General Assembly…

Union organizers and their allies said the changes don’t go far enough to give workers the ability to bargain on a wide range of contractual issues, including pensions and health benefits. Making strikes illegal for all public workers, they said, effectively neutralizes the power of collective bargaining and gives workers no incentive to come to the table.

“Not only in the bill that was originally offered, but even more in the substitute, the balance of power shifts to the managing side,” said Sen. Tom Sawyer (D). “What are the incentives for public employees to bargain with faith?”

The bill now moves to the Ohio House, where it will almost certainly pass, then to Gov. John Kasich for his signature. In Michigan, several bills are pending that would take a more piecemeal approach to eroding collective bargaining rights.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton says she is “generally supportive” of increasing American oil imports from Canada, but sidestepped questions Wednesday about whether she backs a controversial new oilsands pipeline from Alberta to Texas.

Clinton, testifying before the Senate appropriations committee, said it would be improper for her to take sides in the debate over Calgary-based TransCanada’s Keystone XL project because her department makes the decision on whether to grant a permit for its construction.

“Since my department bears the ultimate responsibility for making a recommendation on the pipeline, I am not able to express an opinion,” said Clinton.

This is in stark contrast to comments she made last October, when she said that she was “inclined” to support the project and “probably not” willing to reconsider her position.

And we have to remember the numbers are grim:

• There are 7.7 million fewer payroll jobs now than before the recession started in December 2007.
• Almost 14 million Americans are unemployed.
• Of those unemployed, 6.2 million have been unemployed for six months or more.
• Another 8.4 million are working part time for economic reasons,
• About 4 million more have left the labor force since the start of the recession (we can see this in the dramatic drop in the labor force participation rate),
• of those who have left the labor force, about 1 million are available for work, but are discouraged and have given up.

A simple calculation: If the economy is adding 125,000 jobs per month (average over two months), it would take over 5 years to add back the 7.7 million lost payroll jobs – and that doesn’t even include population growth. Grim is an understatement.

What’s been left out of the ferocious debate over the pipeline, however, is the prospect that if president Obama allows a permit for the Keystone XL to be granted, he would be handing a big victory and great financial opportunity to Charles and David Koch, his bitterest political enemies and among the most powerful opponents of his clean economy agenda…

An unknown amount of company profits — figures are unavailable as the company is privately held — come from the Pine Bend Refinery near St. Paul, Minnesota, which supplies 30 to 40 percent of Wisconsin’s transportation fuel and a large percentage of the jet fuel used at the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport.

About 80 percent of what the Koch refinery processes is heavy crude from Alberta’s oil sands, a company spokesperson told the media last year. The oil that reaches the refinery is supplied through the Koch brothers’ Flint Hills operation in Calgary, the company’s website says.

Pine Bend is capable of refining up to 320,000 barrels per day of predominantly Canadian crude oil, most of it sourced in Alberta’s oil sands. Every day, the U.S. imports about 1 million barrels of oil from Alberta’s oil sands mines, and about 2 million barrels of Canadian oil overall.

This means that the oil sands crude which reaches the Pine Bend refinery on American soil accounts for about a quarter of the total supply reaching the U.S. from Alberta’s tar sands mining operations.

Very interesting.

It still needs to drop lower — and it has to be offset even more by positive job gains — to make a serious dent in the unemployment rate for the right reasons, but the lower the number of initial jobless claims is the easier it is to offset those losses.

The report says there are a total of 9,405,527 people in the United States receiving unemployment insurance, but that number is only about half of the total number of people who are actually unemployed. The other half have already exhausted their unemployment benefits.

At this point in the 2010 election cycle, longtime Wisconsin Sen. Russ Feingold (D) seemed like a lock for re-election, but today a Republican political novice holds his seat. In neighboring Michigan, Republicans are hoping for a similar victory over two-term Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D) in 2012…

Bill Ballenger, editor of the nonpartisan newsletter Inside Michigan Politics, said Feingold’s fate should be a warning to Stabenow.

“If Russ Feingold proved to be vulnerable in Wisconsin” and ultimately lost when nobody would have thought such a thing were possible, “certainly Stabenow fits the same profile,” he said Tuesday.

The potential challengers are lining up, including former Rep. Pete Hoekstra, former Sec. of State Terri Lynn Land, former Michigan GOP chair Saul Anuzis and two businessmen, Tim Leuliette and Al Pease. Rep. Candice Miller is also a possibility.