[Congressional Record Volume 150, Number 43 (Wednesday, March 31, 2004)]
[House]
[Page H1745]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                           MANUFACTURING JOBS

  (Mr. SHIMKUS asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. SHIMKUS. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to bring attention to the 
current status of manufacturing jobs in this country.
  Last week, there was an article in the Boston Globe entitled, ``What 
the Jobless Statistics Do Not Reveal,'' written by Paul E. Harrington 
and Andrew Sum. The article focused on the debate of when job creation 
will begin and why there is a huge difference in the report of job 
growth between two surveys, the payroll survey and the household 
survey.
  The payroll survey is the corporate survey, which indicates a 
decreased loss of 620,000 jobs. However, the household survey says 
there is a 2.3 million increase in employment during this same period 
of time. Why the disparity?
  Well, the household survey counts self-employed and contractors. If 
you are self-employed like a farmer in my district, you are not counted 
as being an employee under the payroll survey reports. The authors 
point out that the disparity is due to the fact that it has become so 
expensive to add new workers to payroll due to high cost of health 
insurance, unemployment insurance, worker compensation, payroll taxes, 
and it is easier and cheaper to hire and pay overtime.
  If we want to stem the loss of manufacturing in the corporate sector, 
our legislative response is clear. We are going to have to address 
these issues of high cost.

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