Jeff Duncan: “during the last 3 years, more than 1\1/2\ million people have lost their jobs due to major corporate downsizing, 1\1/2\…”

“during the last 3 years, more than 1\1/2\ million people have lost their jobs due to major corporate downsizing, 1\1/2\ million. This was before AT&T announced a reduction of 40,000 jobs, and Ford Motor Co., 6,000 jobs, and on and on. Nor does it count many thousands of employees who have lost their jobs in very small businesses which have closed due to NAFTA, GATT, and other weak trade policies. We had a trade deficit of $153 billion last year, Mr. Speaker. Most economists say that we lose at least 20,000 jobs for each $1 billion. That means we lost over 3 million jobs last year due to imports, 3 million jobs lost to other countries. We simply cannot keep letting this happen every year. We do not want a trade war, Mr. Speaker, but we seem to be in one now and we seem to be losing. We have thousands and thousands of college graduates who cannot find jobs in the fields for which they trained, so they are taking jobs as waiters and waitresses. And certainly this is honorable employment but not what they had hoped and dreamed and worked for. Or they are going to law school or medical school, fields in which there are already huge surpluses. Our unemployment rate is relatively low. We wish it was lower. But while unemployment is fairly low, our underemployment rate is terrible. {time} 2245 If we are ever going to do anything about this horrendous under employment, we have to turn this Nation around. We have to show more concern for our own people.…”