CNN news 2012-06-06 加文本

cnn news 2012-06-06

CARL AZUZ, HOST, cnn STUDENT NEWS: And we are off and running. A big thanks to Mr. Bechsel`s (ph) class for helping us kick off our last week of the school year. I am Carl Azuz, as you heard them say. Let`s go ahead and get to some of today`s headlines.

First up, Syria`s president says his government is the target of an international conspiracy. And many world leaders have accused Syrian government forces of carrying out a massacre against civilians recently.

AZUZ (voice-over): But in a speech yesterday, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad said his government`s forces had nothing to do with it. He said, quote, "Even monsters do not do what we saw." Al-Assad blamed the violence on terrorists.

AZUZ: From the crisis in Syria, we`re heading to a country that went through a political revolution last year. We`re talking about Egypt. For nearly 30 years, that country was run by a man named Hosni Mubarak. The protest and an uprising forced Mubarak out of power. He was put on trial for ordering the killing of protesters during that revolution. He said he didn`t violate any laws.

AZUZ (voice-over): Mubarak, who`s wearing sunglasses here, was found guilty. Over the weekend, he and one of his former officials were sentenced to life in prison. That decision led to new protests. Some people were angry that Mubarak wasn`t given the death penalty. Others were upset that six other former officials were cleared of the same charges. Mubarak`s lawyer said he`s planning to appeal the verdict.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Today`s Shoutout goes out to Mr. Runion`s social studies classes at Nome-Beltz Jr.-Sr. High School in Nome, Alaska.

What part of the U.S. government collects and releases the national unemployment rate? Here we go. Is it the Commerce Department, Treasury Department, Labor Department or Interior Department? You`ve got three seconds, go.

Unemployment information is collected by a division of the Labor Department. That`s your answer, and that`s your Shoutout.

AZUZ: The Bureau of Labor Statistics, which is part of the Labor Department, releases that unemployment information every month. Last Friday, the agency put out the new numbers for May, and most analysts agree the news is not good.

AZUZ (voice-over): The national unemployment rate went up from 8.1 percent in April to 8.2 percent in May. That is the first time that this rate has increased since last June, and the economy added jobs, but only 69,000 of them last month, when economists had predicted that the number would be closer to 150,000.

The news hit Wall Street hard. After the unemployment rate came out, the stock market took a dive. Any gains that had been made so far this year were all wiped out on Friday.

AZUZ: All right. Now when you hear us talk about something like the unemployment rate, this 8.2 percent figure, you might be wondering how the government comes up with these numbers. Tom Foreman is going to break it down for us right now.

TOM FOREMAN, cnn CORRESPONDENT: Like an economic heartbeat, the unemployment rate is one of the most closely watched indicators of the country`s financial health. So how exactly is it calculated?

Out of the more than 300 million people in America, when you take out the children, retired folks and others, the Bureau of Labor Statistics says about half of us have jobs, and another 13 million or so are unemployed.

That number does not come from the number of unemployment checks being issued, as many people imagine. Instead, every month since 1940, the federal government has conducted a survey of 50,000 to 60,000 households, asking people about their income, their race, their education and what kind of jobs they do or do not hold. Everyone over 16 is classified in one of three ways: employed, meaning that person has a job; unemployed, meaning he or she is available for work and looking for a job but cannot find one; or, three, out of the workforce, meaning this person is not seeking work. The Feds then take the math from that sample, apply it to the entire population and, voila, there is the unemployment rate.

But beyond that, critics complain there are basic flaws in this system. For example, if you stop actively seeking work, you`re no longer considered unemployed. That`s a problem, because in a really bad economy, a lot of folks might just give up looking for some period of time, even though they still want jobs. That could artificially lower the unemployment rate even as actual unemployment is as bad or worse than ever.

Another problem for the government, a job is a job is a job is a job. So if somebody loses a $100,000-a-year position and is now flipping burgers for minimum wage, he`s considered just as employed as he was before.