DragonI

Trump's presidency burned down Obama's economy, mismanaged a pandemic that has cost 400k Americans their lives, and will go down in history as one of the worst presidents in our national history. #trumpslastday #covidmemorial #BidenHarrisInauguration #goodbyeDonnie

—  Matty Ice@MattyIceUSA

Senior Trump official embellished résumé, had face on fake Time cover

State Dept. official Mina Chang claimed to be a Harvard Business School "alumna" who ran a nonprofit that worked in 40 countries.

www.nbcnews.com

A senior Trump administration official has embellished her résumé with misleading claims about her professional background — even creating a fake Time magazine cover with her face on it — raising questions about her qualifications to hold a top position at the State Department.

An NBC News investigation found that Mina Chang, the deputy assistant secretary in the State Department's Bureau of Conflict and Stability Operations, has inflated her educational achievements and exaggerated the scope of her nonprofit's work.

Whatever her qualifications, Chang had a key connection in the Trump administration. Brian Bulatao, a top figure in the State Department and longtime friend of Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, attended a fundraiser for her nonprofit in Dallas and once donated $5,500 to her charity, according to a former colleague of Chang's.

Chang says in her official biography that she is as an "alumna" of Harvard Business School. According to the university, Chang attended a seven-week course in 2016, and does not hold a degree from the institution.

Chang, who assumed her post in April, also invented a role on a U.N. panel, claimed she had addressed both the Democratic and Republican national conventions, and implied she had testified before Congress. 

She was being considered for an even bigger government job, one with a budget of more than $1 billion, until Congress started asking questions about her résumé.

She earns a six-figure salary in a bureau with a $6 million budget

Replying to @WhiteHouse @POTUS and @realDonaldTrump 

Looking at jobs and deficits 

Reagan: 15M jobs — $79B to $159B Bush: 2M jobs — $153B to $255B  Clinton: 23M jobs — $255B to $128B surplus  Bush 1.5M jobs — $128B surplus to $1T debt   Obama 12M jobs —1.16T to $585B  Trump 5M jobs — $585B to $1.1T 

Hate for this to go viral #VoteDemocrat

— Zee Matic @ZeeMatic1

Unskilled Man Fears He Will Lose Job in Recession

The man, who has barely clung to his job for the past two and a half years, is justified in believing that an economic downturn would result in his unemployment, experts said.

www.newyorker.com

“When the economy is good, it’s possible for someone like him to hold down a job for which he is woefully unqualified,” Harland Dorrinson, a human-resources specialist, said. “But when the economy goes south, look out.”

Dorrinson said that the unskilled man’s résumé, which lists six bankruptcies and multiple business failures, could come under scrutiny in the event of a recession.

Additionally, the man’s near-total lack of education—evidenced by his inability to spell common one-syllable words or to identify the century in which the airplane was invented—could make him vulnerable to termination, the human-resources expert said.

U.S. created 500,000 fewer jobs since 2018 than previously reported, new figures show

Turns out hiring wasn’t nearly as strong in 2018 and early 2019 as the government initially reported — by about a half-million jobs.

www.marketwatch.com|Jeffry Bartash

The economy had about 501,000 fewer jobs as of March 2019 than the Bureau of Labor Statistics initially calculated in its survey of business establishments. That’s the largest revision since the waning stages of the Great Recession in 2009.

They also signal the economy is a bit weaker than previously believed and could give the Federal Reserve even greater reason to cut interest rates in September.

• George W Bush #POTUS43 created more jobs than Donald J Trump 😂
• Barrack Obama #POTUS44 created more jobs than #BenedictDonald Trump  #TRE45ON 😂

We created a timeline of official numbers from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics over the last several administrations, going all the way back to FDR in the Great Depression.

Our numbers also ignore recessions and depressions, when lots of people lose their jobs.

What has Trump achieved at half-way mark?

Donald Trump says his administration is one of the greatest ever, but do the facts back that up?

www.bbc.com

• Trump’s a loser when he goes up against Obama #POTUS44
• Check the article for Trump Shutdown and Immigration charts.

We're tracking the president's progress on his agenda and how it is received by the American public and the wider world.

And there are interesting - and surprising - comparisons with some of his predecessors.

The travel and tourism industries generate about $1.6 trillion in U.S. economic activity — one-twelfth of the economy — and one in 20 jobs, according to the Commerce Department. Macroeconomic Advisers says it now expects the economy to expand at just a 1.4 percent annual rate in the first three months of this year, down from its previous forecast of 1.6 percent, because of reduced government spending during the shutdown.

In the Washington area, including its nearby suburbs in Maryland and Virginia, hotel revenue plunged 26 percent in the second week of January compared with the same period last year, according to STR, a travel research firm. That's much steeper than the 8 percent decline that occurred nationwide. 

Delta said this week that the shutdown will cost it $25 million in January because fewer federal employees and contractors will be flying. By contrast, United Airlines, which has a substantial presence around Washington, D.C., said it hasn't felt much impact yet. 

But the airlines fear that if the shutdown doesn't end soon, more TSA agents will call in sick or quit

The TSA predicts it will screen over 8 million passengers between Friday and Monday, up 10.8 percent from last year's MLK weekend. And it will do so with fewer screeners. On Thursday, the TSA said 6.4 percent of screeners missed work — nearly double the 3.8 percent rate on the same day in 2018. 

Consumers are, in fact, taking a dimmer view of the economy, in part because of the shutdown. A measure of consumer confidence fell this month by the most in more than six years, according to the University of Michigan, which conducts the survey.

If Americans were to cut back on travel and other discretionary spending, it would weaken consumer spending, the U.S. company's primary fuel.

Jack Ma: Alibaba is no longer planning to create 1 million U.S. jobs

Jack Ma, founder and chairman of Alibaba, says the Chinese retail giant no longer promises to create 1 million U.S. jobs in the wake of an escalating trade conflict.

www.cnbc.com|Jillian D'Onfro

Ma made his original job creation pronouncement during a high-profile meeting with Donald Trump in January 2017 before Trump's inauguration as president.

"The promise was made on the premise of friendly US-China partnership and rational trade relations," Ma told Chinese news site Xinhua on Wednesday. "That premise no longer exists today, so our promise cannot be fulfilled."

"So now we will also impose import tariffs. This is basically a stupid process, the fact that we have to do this. But we have to do it. We will now impose tariffs on motorcycles, Harley Davidson, on blue jeans, Levis, on Bourbon. We can also do stupid. We also have to be this stupid,"

— European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker