What Job Growth?

Before everyone gets too giddy over the positive (and welcome) job growth figures, let's put them in perspective.

If jobs continue to increase at the current pace, sometime in 2014 employment will return to 2008 levels.

That would be good only if the population had stopped growing in 2008 and the number of people in the labor pool remained the same.

Therefore, moderate job growth is a positive, but it's going to take an economic tsunami to create enough jobs for real, rather than nominal, growth.

Nobody Loves Ya When You're Unemployed (And Educated)

Dorothea Lange

Breakdowns of unemployment statistics make it clear the more education you have the less likely you are to be jobless. For instance, the overall unemployment rate in November was 9.8 percent. For college grads it was 5.1 percent.

Hooray for education, right? Not if you're part of that 5.1 percent.

For one thing, the numbers show the more education you have the longer you will be unemployed. Over 45, a college grad and unemployed? The only part of that description likely to change in the near term is your age.

I recently read about a woman who demonstrated with numbers how her experience made her more productive than younger workers. Her boss said she didn't care because she could hire two new college grads to cover the same amount of work and still save money. The cash register rang and the older worker was out the door.

I've talked with small business owners who would never hire someone with a college degree for a job they perceived didn't require one. They reasoned that the over-educated employee will head out the door at the first glimpse of a job that is more engaging and pays them what they think they're worth. (They might want to rethink that: 42 percent of the jobless have been out of work for more than six months.)

The last census update reported 27 percent of Americans hold a college degree. Do the math and find 4 million literate, middle-class, unemployed people who find it harder to get a job than someone with a high school degree.

Hooray for education?

Photo: Dorothea Lange

Street Economics Q4 2010

Dorothea Lange

Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke says it could be four or five years before unemployment gets back to what we once viewed as acceptable. How are millions of unemployed people going to cope until then?

Our society isn't structured to cope with long-term unemployment at that level. Health care reform focused on broadening the availability of insurance, not how to pay for it. The unemployment insurance system is crumbling under current demand and too many lawmakers view it as welfare. It takes two W-2 wage earners to support each Social Security recipient but there are fewer people on the payroll almost every day.

When the economy crashed in the 1930s medical care was pay-to-play and if you lost your job your only hope for an income was another one. People starved to death. It's not that ugly today on a national scale because there are enough supports under the pier to prevent total collapse.

But are they adequate to handle the weight for four or five more years without some serious re-engineering?

Why Unemployment Will Remain High

Worker productivity is at an all-time high. Off the charts.

So, as our creaky, cranky economy slogs forward, companies will stretch overtime before hiring more employees. Given their increasing experience with "contingents," companies will consider contractors, consultants and temps before hiring more employees with all the burden.

How do we make a living? We stop thinking about "job" and start thinking about "work" to seize the second option.

Street Economics 2Q 2009

It's Revenge of the Parents Time for young people who assume they can move back in after graduation. Articles offering mom and dad advice on how to get rid of the kid are popping up all over the place.

Not so long ago I sneered at the extended adolescence of young people who assumed it was socially OK to live with the parents well into their 20s. Now, instead of emailing get-rid-of-the-kids stories to friends, I'm taking a more understanding tack.

After all, unemployment nationwide is at 9.4 percent and there are many states and regions with official jobless rates well into double figures. Also, multiple reports say a scant 20 percent of this year's grads have jobs lined up. Experienced workers are duking it out with them for entry level jobs. Even MBAs are taking hits in salaries and status.

So, at least until Q3, I will forgo eye-rolling when a young person ruefully admits to cohabitating with Mum or Da because it might not be their fault.

Besides, a bit of sympathy might get me a free drink.