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San Luis Obispo County adds 2,000 jobs in February

March 25, 2011

San Luis Obispo County added 2,000 new jobs in February which dropped the unemployment rate from 10.3 percent in January to 9.8 percent in February, according to a report released Friday by the California Employment Development Department.

The numbers of jobs created last month along with other economic indicators provide signs that the county’s battered economy is on the mend. Healthcare, retail and services such as hairdressers and insurance agents saw the greatest number of new jobs.

San Luis Obispo’s largest private employer, Sierra Vista Regional Medical Center, added the most jobs and currently provides employment for 772 people, according to the report.

“Healthcare will hopefully continue to be a growth industry,” said Ron Yukelson, spokesman for Sierra Vista Regional Medical Center. “The healthcare industry in San Luis Obispo County is a huge economic engine.”

In California, nearly 100,000 jobs were added in February which dropped the unemployment rate to 12.2 percent from 12.4 percent in January. Nationally the unemployment rate dropped from 9.4 percent in January to 8.9 percent in February.


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Wow, not judgemental are you? Because someone is not a doctor or a member of the medical mafia doesn’t mean they goofed off in school or were slackers.

I can afford the doctor’s excessive charges, BUT I WILL die before I support their conspiracies in any way.

I have worked in a doctor’s office and I do know what goes on, it’s disgusting. Now I work very hard to re-teach people to take responsibility for their own lives and health and not to be deceived by the propaganda they see on tv and in the news. Drs aren’t gods, they are just people who took the time to learn to cheat people through years of school, residency and training in deception.


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Wow, ” the slackers that goofed off in school”, and you think I am lost??? Not being a doctor or in the medical mafia doesn’t make someone a slacker. We live in a household that makes around $150,000 annually and I will die before I go to the doctor and support the excessive charges, fraud, needless testing and non-compassionate care they provide because they are so put upon.

In this economy we have cut our prices, given repeat business discounts and donate heavily to charity and the unfortunate.

Drs, hospitals and insurance have raised their prices. Check out the yellow pages and compare the number of “plactic surgeons” compared to ob/gyns. Check out how many used to do legitimate medical practice and switched over to the gravy train of people’s vanity. Sorry,BTDT doctors aren’t gods in this house and the medical profession isn’t nirvana, I don’t care how many jobs they create


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You are absolutlely right on the money. It’s the biggest ripoff and more importantly it’s the worst crime morally in the country. It’s predating on the sick & dying under the guise of “care”. People get the flu,go to the Dr. get a prescription, get well and credit the Dr. They would’ve gotten well on their own.

Or get a cramp and run up a big bill sent to the ins.Co, or sent to you indirectly via your pay check deuction or your ins. premium. No wonder ins. is nuts.

My kid got charged 45 bucks for the sharpie marker used to show where to cut on his knee operation!!.

Dr.’s have worn out that old excuse of being sued if not thorough, they are the professional, why cower to lawyers?

People are just tools used to bill ins. co’s with. That’s “sick”. Fix that disease, Docs, the diesease is called greed.


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Well let me clarify a little better my slacker comment. I OBVIOUSLY, duh, wasn’t referring to someone in your stated financial situation. It was in regards to minimum wage jobs in this country, that I hear people bemoaning how people are stuck in these jobs and the evil people making all the money. In which case what you stated your income as, you would be one of. When I was growing up minimum wage jobs were ment to be an entry level job not a career. These types of jobs are easy (training required) and not much to many of them.


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Those who used to have more, now have less. Those who used to have less, have even more less now. Not an “up swing”.


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Timing in light of the circumstances is a relevant realism:

For the young, the year 2008, 2009, 2010 and 2011 is the worst time to graduate from college. If I was 16, 17, or 18-21 year old I would go to a trade school and learn a practical skill. For almost a decade, the world has produced many college graduates who cannot find jobs. Economic devastation took a very shot time in 2008 to occur and will take an estimate 10-15 years to stabilize. When feasible I would thereafter attend a University.


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You’re so right. The only degree I would pursue at the University level is in the health care field. My nephew opted for a trade school in heating and air-conditioning while his wife got her Phd in orthopedic care. They are making a killing. My niece got her masters in education and her husband got his masters in engineering, in the last 4 years, neither can find a job in their field.


If anyone is interested in an exciting time in Dubai and has their RN degree or is an MD let me know. I am currently filling jobs there starting at 150K+ with free housing, medical and excellent other benefits. The contracts are for 2 years minimum. People are having a grand time there and no one works over 40 hours.


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AT LAST, someone with open eyes!!!!! Thank the over-educated for out of control immigration, concrete jungles to house them while they pound away on computers figuring out ways to not do labor and dwell with the un-educated, they scare them.

College is the promise of creating a complicated net of confusion to lay down between you and others so that only you can weave your way through hopefully leaving the masses behind. Look at Nuke power over solar, etc. which is at the top of crap technology to the point of insanity. We spend eternity reading other peoples mental drool while the clock ticks away our lives.

Their are no jobs anymore for grads because their is no reason OR REAL NEED for their jobs. We hit the maximum need for tech. decades ago, you don’t hear that from professors, bankers, medical types or media, duh.

College is a place to learn what’s required to combat the problems that college has brought to society. Think about it.

Learn to compete and know more than the guy that graduated before you, that’s it.


Grow food, get some water on it, knock off the bugs, enjoy 1.2 kids, marvel at nature. There, your now educated.

Again, if college and education to the point of insanity is so advantageous why are the poor countries coming to kick us out of our “American dream world”?

Kids,get your flat butts out from behind that ‘puter and start figuring out how to get nature operating normally again.


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Sierra Vista Regional Medical Center

Thank you for you you are doing


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Opps typo error Sierra Vista, thank you for what you are doing (hiring).

I sure like to know the the retailers and hairdressors that have hired.

My family and I are willing to support them!


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I think it would be interesting to know how many of these hired employees replaced contract employees. I just read an article where hospitals that have been hiring traveling nurses, therapist, etc. are now going back to the hiring vs contracting method because it saves money in the long haul (because the contract agencies got greedy with their fee/benefit structures). Seems like things are just a moving target/revolving ball. Glad though, for the local people who will be hired!


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Let’s apply a bit of independent thought here, shall we?


First of all, that “health care is a huge economic engine” here indicates the reality of an aging and ailing population, something which should come as a surprise to nobody living here and fully alert and which is not a foundation upon which to build a strong and vibrant future community much less depend upon for the long hoped for but mythical “recovery”.


Second, this so-called great number is barely more than February of 2001, i.e., barely more than 10 years ago. Have you noticed that not even the most happiest of happy talkers are shameless enough to use the word “recovery” any more? I expect that since the definition of the word is “resuming a prior state” and since our economic prior state was entirely driven by fraud, greed, swindles, corruption and various and endless forms of ponzi schemes in both the public and private sector that even the most deluded amongst us are taking that possibility off the table. Now we here terms like “rebounding”, “on the mend”, and “making a come back” much like the terms you here used to describe a fighter getting tore a new one and struggling to survive right before…well you know. We all know. When we look quietly at our own and our friends and loved ones and our community, we all know matters are very very bad and our economy is a false one – even as bad as the numbers are, it is much worse as a practical matter for the 86% of us in the private sector.


And it’s going to stay that way until we realize that we are not consumers or slaves-for-the-taxman, but citizens who can with very little effort bring government at all level to its knees in order to drive home the point of just who exactly is in charge here.


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Does healthcare produce anything? Or is it really just a very high priced service industry?

Unless you are getting foreigners to come to SLO to pay for it where is the net gain?


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Healthcare is a “huge economic engine” because of the horrendous cost of healthcare, procedures, and medicine. They are the one industry that can afford to hire because they rip off the consumer by charging such things as a $27 asprin. Is it any wonder????


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I’m not happy about health care costs but to just imply it is a bunch of gready providers is a little short sighted. The fact is that malpractice insurance, lawsuits etc. don’t help in keeping down costs to end user’s.


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I am not implying that, I am stating that. Greed drives the healthcare industry. There is absolutely NO reason to charge $27 for a single aspirin. You have to get a loan to pay for the entire bottle!


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It is about greed and nothing more. If they stuck with the hypocratic oath they swore to doctors wouldn’t have so many lawsuits, therefore malpractice insurance wouldn’t be so high. It’s bad enough that healthcare costs are so outragely out of reach and the services provided are so far below expectations. The high dollars charged by medical “professionals” should be criminal and then you want to add on the cost of the malpractice is even more of an insult. When a 15 minute office visit is $80 and the patients are making minimum wage how do you justify that? It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out something is wrong here.


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Well if you factor in the life saving meds., equipment and training of the last 30 years there is some of it. Then factor in the RIDICULAS lawsuits we all see in the news and what in the hell do you think the prices are going to do? Go down?


Look at Sierra Vista as an example in this article. They are the baby hospital. They have a Neo Unit. They are saving babies that would have died years ago. Do you think that would be cheap?


It is like this in all industries. As an example construction (yes there is some greed there) but also a s**tload of regulation. I LOVE when everybody wants something from live saving drugs to live saving building standards but then think that the costs of labor and material should be borne by the company and not be past on to the consumer. If you want it then pay of it. If not then DON’T demand the changes in the first place.


You mention the $80.00 Dr. visit. O.k. so lets see he has the $12-$15 on hour receptionist, the $30-$45 an hour Nurse Practioner (in a lot of offices). Sometimes other people. Let’s see overhead of rent of what at least $2000 a month? Equipment and supplies. Lighting, gas. Workers comp. General bus. libility. Malpractice ins. oh and then last the Dr. pay. So your $80.00 visit that equates to $320.00 an hour may seem like a lot but by the time you break it down I bet there isn’t as much left as you want to think. Is it expensive. Yes. So here I stated how about you provide a solution, seeing as you think it is so easy?? Not so easy after all huh?


BTW. I am NOT in the medical field. I am a business owner that understands the costs of doing business. I get the same in my business of people thinking I am making a TON of money for what I might charge not realising that after everything is paid, I am living about the same as all my neighbors. Average joe.


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Most of what you say is true — especially regarding the costs that local GPs pay to run an office or clinic. However, the ripoffs in Health Care come from:


1. The big health insurance companies who have set up a system where they burden doctors and patients alike to justify compensation and use of treatments far more often than necessary. If they were forced to pay for the costs of justification, they would come up with a much more fair and reasonable system. They claim that these costs are forced upon them by government regulation. This may be true to a small degree but the outrageous executive salaries, policies of claim denial without real examination of the facts and the use of premiums for sleazy, high-risk, financial games makes me doubt their honesty and integrity.


2. Government regulations that are often excessive, but sometimes needed, place additional strains on doctors and patients. Despite efforts of some to make government agencies justify their paperwork demands, it happens too seldom. Most bureaucrats in public (and private) institutions don’t care about others’ costs or time — just their own convenience.


3. Fraud — whether in the form of phony claims, exaggerated claims, excessive billing or otherwise — drives up the cost of medical care for those who can and do pay. Lawsuits from exaggerated and phony claims are not nearly as common as one would think from reporting in the media. The big expense here is more in line of doctors asking for unneeded tests to defend against any possible (not reasonable) claims going to court. Excessive billing can come from pure greed but can also come from misguided attempts to recover income lost to unfair demands upon medical services such as hospitals giving un-reimbursed care to those without insurance or money to pay.


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People making $12.00 per hour, pay $1500.00 per month in rent, groceries of $100.00 per week, car insurance, clothing expenses, car payments, fuel costs, utility bills, etc., shall I go on? OOPs is there a shortage when all those figures are added up and that’s just a partial list of NECESSARY expenses. I am well enough aware of the cost of doing business, as a small business owner. One has nothing to do with the other.

Clearly a doctor making $320.00 per hour is unaffordable to someone making $12.00 per hour was my point. One trip to the hospital is all it will take to rack up a debt the size of a home purchase, is that really realistic? Where do you think the health insurance costs should come from when the above mentioned partial list eats up all the money?


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You are completely lost. You just proved my point. You look at the per hour cost of $320.00!! That isn’t his take. He has all the other costs associated with. Same as the $12.00 per hour. I didn’t include his/her personnel cost as you. My point was the pay you take home. Not what you pay after you make it. That is a totally different add up again. Shall I go on??


Also how about the eight years of school he puts in and the cost of paying it off? Or the two years of residency? They start out in the field way behind other grads that start in their fields earlier and with less costs to pay back.


This is what drives me CRAZY about where we have got in America with this class envy bulls**t!! We complain about the people that made something of themselves and the slackers that goofed off in school we pity? Why? The old saying, they made their bed now lie in it.


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Most bankruptcys are preciptated by…………………..medical bills. What’s in that “hippocritic” oath? A promise to prey upon anybody that walks in my office?


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Well how about you come over to my house and work for free? That is what you are wanting the Dr.s. to do because of the oath? It is if people don’t have the means. A lot of people do have the means but don’t get medical insurance. Instead some buy a new car.


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Been there, I’ve read your post .Their average income indicates they could payoff their average student loan balance in a couple of years if they chose.

Again, they drive more people into BK than mortgages for Christ’s sakes. That’s with medical, etc. in place

It’s a racket. Look at pharma?

You’re argument falls flat on it’s face.


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