Huge Job Losses Set Off Recession Alarms

Biggest Job Loss in 5 Years Sets Off Recession Alarms; Nearly Quarter-Million Gone in 3 Months

WASHINGTON (AP) -- It's no longer a question of recession or not. Now it's how deep and how long.
Workers' pink slips stacked ever higher in March as jittery employers slashed 80,000 jobs, the most in five years, and the national unemployment rate climbed to 5.1 percent. Job losses are nearing the staggering level of a quarter-million this year in just three months.
For the third month in a row total U.S. employment rolls shrank -- often a telltale sign that the economy has jolted dangerously into reverse.
At the same time, the jobless rate rose three-tenths of a percentage point, a sharp increase usually associated with times of deep economic stress.
The grim picture described by the Labor Department on Friday provided stark evidence of just how much the jobs market has buckled under the weight of the housing, credit and financial crises. Businesses and jobseekers alike are feeling the pain.
"It is now very clear that the fat lady has sung for the economic expansion. The country has slipped into a recession," said Stuart Hoffman, chief economist at PNC Financial Services Group. Indeed, there is widening agreement that the first recession since 2001 has arrived. Even Ben Bernanke, in a rare public utterance for a Federal Reserve chairman, used the "r" word, acknowledging for the first time this week that a recession was possible.
Job losses were widespread last month, hitting workers at factories, construction companies, retailers, banks, real-estate firms and even temporary-help agencies. Also mortgage brokers, hotels, computer design shops, accounting firms, architecture and engineering companies, legal services, airlines and other transportation as well as telecommunications companies.
Those cuts swamped employment gains elsewhere, including at hospitals and other heath-care sites, educational services, child day-care providers, bars and restaurants, insurance companies, museums, zoos and parks. And the government, which is almost always up.
In fact, private employers have shed jobs for four straight months, though December showed an overall gain for the economy because the government increase outweighed the private loss.
March's losses were the most since the same month in 2003, when companies were still struggling to recover from the last recession. Adding to the angst: Revised figures showed losses were actually deeper than first reported for both January and February.
All told, the economy now has lost 232,000 jobs in the first three months of this year.
On Wall Street, investors took the weak employment figures in stride. The Dow Jones industrials lost just 16.61 points, while other indexes edged higher.
All the economy's problems are forcing people and businesses to hunker down, crimping spending and hiring, a vicious cycle.
"Across the board, businesses have become very, very conservative," said Joel Naroff, president of Naroff Economic Advisors. More downbeat about their own sales prospects because of cautious consumers, employers are cutting back. "It only makes sense for them to run leaner if we are going into a recession or already in one" as Naroff now believes.
The new employment figures were much weaker than economists were expecting. They were anticipating a drop of 50,000 payroll jobs.
Michael Gregory, senior economist at BMO Capital Markets Economics, said the employment report was "emitting recession signals."
The national unemployment rate of 5.1 percent, relatively modest by historical standards, is nonetheless the highest since September 2005, following the devastating blows of the Gulf Coast hurricanes.
Some groups are feeling more of the strains from the economy's current woes. The unemployment rate for Hispanics, for instance, jumped to 6.9 percent in March, the highest in over four years. The rate for blacks climbed to 9 percent, a two-month high.
With the public on edge, Congress, the White House and presidential contenders are scrambling to come up with their own relief plans to stem record-high home foreclosures and stabilize housing -- even as they engage in a political blame game.
Democrats want more economic assistance, including extending unemployment benefits. The Bush administration has resisted, saying the government's $168 billion stimulus package of tax rebates for people and tax breaks for businesses will be sufficient once it kicks in.
"We don't like to see one job lost, let alone 80,000," Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez said in an interview with The Associated Press. "These are challenging times," he said. Gutierrez was hopeful the economy would turn around in the second half of this year, given the relief efforts by the government and the Federal Reserve. "We'll get through this."
Democrats were skeptical of the administration's efforts.
"Our economy is spiraling downward," said presidential contender Hillary Rodham Clinton. "It is time for this administration to put ideology aside and get serious about stemming this crisis."
Barack Obama said, "Instead of doing nothing for out-of-work Americans, we need a second stimulus that extends unemployment insurance and helps communities that have been hit hard by this recession."
Republican John McCain said the unemployment news "underlines the need to focus on innovation, which grows the economy and creates an urgent need for effective worker retraining."
Given the worsening employment situation, the Federal Reserve probably will lower a key interest rate, now at 2.25 percent, later this month.
The Fed has taken a number of extraordinary actions recently -- slashing interest rates, providing financial backing to JP Morgan's takeover of troubled Bear Stearns and opening an emergency lending program for big investment houses. All the actions were aimed at limiting damage to the national economy.
With the pace of hiring slowing, the number of unemployed people increased to 7.8 million in March.
Workers with jobs saw modest wage gains. Average hourly earnings for jobholders rose to $17.86 in March and are up 3.6 percent over the past 12 months. With lofty energy and food prices, workers may feel like their paychecks are shrinking. If the job market continues to falter, wage growth probably will slow, too, making consumers even less inclined to spend, which would further hurt the economy.
Many analysts believe the economy shrank in the first three months of this year and could still be ebbing now. The government will release its estimate of first-quarter economic growth later this month. Under one rough rule, if the economy contracts for six straight months it is considered in a recession. When a determination is made by a panel of experts about when a recession has started and ended -- it is usually done well after the fact.
Bernanke and the Bush administration are hopeful the economy will improve in the second half of this year. Even so, Bernanke predicted this week that the unemployment rate would rise further. Some analysts say it could climb to 5.75 percent or higher this year.
Advises Hoffman: "If you've got a job, hang on to it the best you can."

81% in Poll Say Nation Is Headed on Wrong Track

Americans are more dissatisfied with the country’s direction than at any time since the New York Times/CBS News poll began asking about the subject in the early 1990s, according to the latest poll.
In the poll, 81 percent of respondents said they believed “things have pretty seriously gotten off on the wrong track,” up from 69 percent a year ago and 35 percent in early 2002.
Although the public mood has been darkening since the early days of the war in Iraq, it has taken a new turn for the worse in the last few months, as the economy has seemed to slip into recession. There is now nearly a national consensus that the country faces significant problems.
A majority of nearly every demographic and political group — Democrats and Republicans, men and women, residents of cities and rural areas, college graduates and those who finished only high school — say the United States is headed in the wrong direction. Seventy-eight percent of respondents said the country was worse off than five years ago; just 4 percent said it was better off.
The dissatisfaction is especially striking because public opinion usually hits its low point only in the months and years after an economic downturn, not at the beginning of one. Today, however, Americans report being deeply worried about the country even though many say their own personal finances are still in fairly good shape.
Only 21 percent of respondents said the overall economy was in good condition, the lowest such number since late 1992, when the recession that began in the summer of 1990 had already been over for more than a year. In the latest poll, two in three people said they believed the economy was in recession today.
The unhappiness presents clear risks for Republicans in this year’s elections, given the continued unpopularity of President Bush. Twenty-eight percent of respondents said they approved of the job he was doing, a number that has barely changed since last summer. But Democrats, who have controlled the House and Senate since last year, also face the risk that unhappy voters will punish Congressional incumbents.
Mr. Bush and leaders of both parties on Capitol Hill have moved in recent weeks to react to the economic slowdown, first by passing a stimulus bill that will send checks of up to $1,200 to many couples this spring. They are now negotiating over proposals to overhaul financial regulations, blunt the effects of a likely wave of home foreclosures and otherwise respond to the real estate slump and related crisis on Wall Street.
The poll found that Americans blame government officials for the crisis more than banks or home buyers and other borrowers. Forty percent of respondents said regulators were mostly to blame, while 28 percent named lenders and 14 percent named borrowers.
In assessing possible responses to the mortgage crisis, Americans displayed a populist streak, favoring help for individuals but not for financial institutions. A clear majority said they did not want the government to lend a hand to banks, even if the measures would help limit the depth of a recession.
“What I learned from economics is that the market is not always going to be a happy place,” Sandi Heller, who works at the University of Colorado and is also studying for a master’s degree in business there, said in a follow-up interview. If the government steps in to help out, said Ms. Heller, 43, it could encourage banks to take more foolish risks.
“There are a million and one better ways for the government to spend that money,” she said.
Respondents were considerably more open to government help for home owners at risk of foreclosure. Fifty-three percent said they believed the government should help those whose interest rates were rising, while 41 percent said they opposed such a move.
The nationwide telephone survey of 1,368 adults was conducted from March 28 to April 2. The margin of sampling error was plus or minus 3 percentage points.
When the presidential campaign began last year, the war in Iraq and terrorism easily topped Americans’ list of concerns. Almost 30 percent of people in a December poll said that one of those issues was the country’s most pressing problem. About half as many named the economy or jobs.
But the issues have switched places in just a few months’ time. In the latest poll, 17 percent named terrorism or the war, while 37 percent named the economy or the job market. When looking at the current state of their own finances, Americans remain relatively sanguine. More than 70 percent said their financial situation was fairly good or very good, a number that has dropped only modestly since 2006.
Yet many say they are merely managing to stay in place, rather than get ahead. This view is consistent with the income statistics of the past five years, which suggest that median household income has still not returned to the inflation-adjusted peak it hit in 1999. Since the Census Bureau began keeping records in the 1960s, there has never been an extended economic expansion that ended without setting a new record for household income.
Economists cite a variety of factors for the sluggish income growth, including technology and globalization, and it clearly seems to have made Americans anxious about the future. Fewer than half of parents — 46 percent — said they expected their children to enjoy a better standard of living than they themselves do, down from 56 percent in 2005.
Respondents were more pessimistic when asked in general terms about the next generation, with only a third saying it would live better than people do today. (Polls usually find people more upbeat about their personal situation than about the state of society, but the gap is now larger than usual.)
Charles Parrish, a 56-year-old retired fireman in Evans, Ga., who now works a maintenance job for the local school system, said he was worried the country was not preparing children for the high-technology economy of the future. Instead, the government passed a stimulus package that simply sends checks to taxpayers and worsens the deficit in the process.
“Who’s going to pay back the money?” Mr. Parrish, an independent, said. “We are. They are giving me money, except I’m going to have to pay interest on it.”
Democrats have asserted recently that the lack of wage growth has made people more open to government intervention in the economy than in the past, and the poll found mixed results on this score.
Fifty-eight percent of respondents said they would support raising taxes on households making more than $250,000 to pay for tax cuts or government programs for people making less than that amount. Only 38 percent called it a bad idea. Both Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton and Senator Barack Obama, the Democratic presidential candidates, have made proposals along these lines.
More broadly, 43 percent of those surveyed said they would prefer a larger government that provided more services, which is tied for the highest such number since The Times and CBS News began asking the question in 1991. But an identical 43 percent said they wanted a smaller government that provided fewer services.
And although both Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Obama have blamed trade with other countries for some of the economy’s problems, Americans say they continue to favor trade — if not quite as strongly as in the past. Fifty-eight percent called it good for the economy; 32 percent called it bad, up from 17 percent in 1996.
At the same time, 68 percent said they favored trade restrictions to protect domestic industries, instead of allowing unrestrained trade. In early 1996, 55 percent favored such restrictions.

Jobs slashed, pointing to recession

WASHINGTON - Employers buffeted by talk of recession slashed 80,000 jobs in March, the most in five years and the third straight month of losses.
At the same time, the national unemployment rate rose from 4.8 percent to 5.1 percent, the clearest signal yet that the economy might already be shrinking.
The new snapshot of the job market, released by the Labor Department Friday, underscored the damage that a trio of crises _in the housing, credit and financial sectors — has inflicted on companies, jobseekers and the economy as a whole.
"The labor market has indeed turned south," said Joel Naroff, president of Naroff Economic Advisors. "That was the one last bastion of hope to stay out of a recession. Now the question is how deep and how long will it last?"
The unemployment rate was the highest since September 2005, when significant job losses followed the devastating blows of Gulf Coast hurricanes.
Job losses were widespread in March. Construction, manufacturing, retailing, financial services and various business services all racked up losses. That overwhelmed gains elsewhere, including in education and health care, leisure and hospitality as well as in government.
On Wall Street, stocks fell, with the Dow Jones industrials down more than 30 points in morning trading.
The new employment figures were much weaker than economists were expecting. They were anticipating a drop of 50,000 payroll jobs and the unemployment rate to rise to 5 percent.
The 5.1 percent rate, while relatively modest by historical standards, was the highest in 2 1/2 years.
Job cuts in both January and February turned out to be even deeper. Employers got rid of 76,000 in each month. The elimination of 80,000 jobs in March was the most since March 2003, when the labor market was still struggling to recover from the 2001 recession.
"We don't like to see one job lost, let alone 80,000," Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez said in an interview with The Associated Press. "These are challenging times," he said. Gutierrez was hopeful that economy would turn around in the second half of this year given relief efforts by the government and the Federal Reserve. "We'll get through this."
The economy is suffering the effects of a housing collapse, a credit crunch and a financial system in turmoil. That's causing people and businesses to hunker down, crimping spending, capital investment and hiring. Those things in turn further weaken the economy in what has become a vicious cycle.
For the first time, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke acknowledged Wednesday that the country could be heading toward a recession, saying federal policymakers are "fighting against the wind" in combating it. Many other economists and the public believe the recession already has arrived.
Bernanke wouldn't tip his hand about the Fed's next move. However, many economists believe the central bank will lower interest rates again when they meet later this month, and they said Friday's employment report would justify another reduction perhaps by half a point.
The Fed has taken a number of extraordinary actions recently — slashing interest rates, providing financial backing to JP Morgan's takeover of troubled Bear Stearns and opening an emergency lending program for big investment houses. All the actions are ultimately aimed at limiting damage to the national economy.
With a public on edge, Congress, the White House and presidential contenders are scrambling to come up with their own relief plans even as they engage in a political blame game.
In March, construction companies cut 51,000 jobs, factories eliminated 48,000 positions, retailers cut payrolls by more than 12,000. Professional and businesses services lost 35,000 jobs and temporary help firms cut nearly 22,000 jobs. Financial firms chopped 5,000 jobs.
When government hiring was removed, the numbers looked even worse. Private employers shed 98,000 jobs in March.
With the pace of hiring slowing down, the number of unemployed people increased to 7.8 million in March; workers with jobs saw only modest wage gains at the same time.
Average hourly earnings for jobholders rose to $17.86 in March, a 0.3 percent increase from the previous month. That matched economists' forecasts. Over the past 12 months, wages grew 3.6 percent. With lofty energy and food prices, workers may feel like their paychecks are shrinking.
Many analysts believe the economy shrank in the first three months of this year and could still be ebbing now. The government will release its estimate of first-quarter economic growth later this month. Under one rough rule, if the economy contracts for six straight months it is considered in a recession.
Bernanke and the Bush administration, however, are hopeful the economy will improve in the second half of this year, helped by the government's $168 billion stimulus package of tax rebates for people and tax breaks for businesses, as well as the Fed's rate reductions.
Still, even Bernanke predicted this week that the unemployment rate would rise in the months ahead. Some analysts say it could climb to 5.5 percent or higher by year's end

2008 Job Outlook for New Grads and Others

You're about to earn your degree -- now you're ready to earn the paycheck to match. According to a report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 14 million job openings are projected to spring up for degree-wielding professionals between 2004 and 2014, 6.9 million of which are expected to be open to new college graduates. These "pure-college" professions require at least a bachelor's degree and thus give college grads an edge over the competition.
It's no surprise that medicine and law fall into this category. But while those fields are notoriously competitive, opportunities abound in other areas. Accounting and IT are joining the roster of vocations that require a college degree -- and along with education, they comprise the fields expected to outpace all other pure-college occupations. Apply for one of these positions, and your degree could make all the difference.
1. Accountants and Auditors
Of the "pure college" professions, accounting has the most opportunities for non-grads, as 25 percent of workers in the field do not have a bachelor's degree. Although some entry-level positions may not require a degree, "if you're looking for growth in your career, you absolutely have to have a degree," according to Ralph Diaz, a senior recruiter with Accountants One, an accounting and financial placement team in Atlanta. But, he adds, "If you're looking for growth in your career, you absolutely have to have a degree."
This is especially true for certified public accountants, since aspiring CPAs are required to complete 150 college credits before even taking the exam. The payoff is that job opportunities in accounting far outnumber other business and finance positions.
EXPECTED OPENINGS: 486,000MEDIAN INCOME: $50,770
2. Computer Applications Software Engineers
Innovations in computer software have made computer applications software engineering one of the fastest growing fields in the job market. But although the occasional college dropout might land an enviable position (ahem, Bill Gates), most software engineers will need to complete a four-year curriculum.
"To get a position in the software field without a degree, you'd have to be a genius," said Dean Clairmont, a project manager with EES, an engineering executive search firm based in San Diego. "The bachelor's degree barely gets you in the door; you really want to pursue at least a master's in computer science."
EXPECTED OPENINGS: 268,000MEDIAN INCOME: $74,980
3. Elementary School Teachers
A key component of the No Child Left Behind Act requires schools that receive federal funding under the Act to hire new teachers with bachelor's degrees and certification and to ensure that all teachers of core academic subjects have bachelor's degrees, certification, and competency in their fields. Currently, approximately 92 percent of elementary school teachers hold a bachelor's degree or higher. And teachers have plenty of incentive to further their education. Those who hold a master's degree in education often qualify for a higher salary, and many schools allow working teachers to pursue postgraduate degrees while still actively employed.
EXPECTED OPENINGS: 587,000MEDIAN INCOME: $43,160
4. Secondary School Teachers
Approximately 95 percent of secondary teachers have completed a bachelor's degree; teachers are typically encouraged to pursue a degree in the subject they wish to teach before completing their required education courses and certification program.
Want to improve your chances of landing a position? Earn your degree in one of the most sought-after areas of expertise -- math, science or bilingual studies.
EXPECTED OPENINGS: 436,000MEDIAN INCOME: $45,650
5. Postsecondary Teachers
As college degrees become increasingly essential, so do college professors. The field of postsecondary education is expected to grow at twice the national average -- and offer more job opportunities than any other pure-college occupation.
A degree is required for anyone who wants to take advantage. Kristina Quay, an instructor at Sampson Community College in North Carolina, attests that her master's degree in education was vital to her attaining a faculty position: "There's no way you'll get hired without it," she says.
EXPECTED OPENINGS: 892,000MEDIAN INCOME: $51,800

Five Tips on Finding a New Job

The jury's still out on where the job market is heading, but one thing is certain: Employers have put the brakes on hiring. Job creation fell by 17,000 in January, the first month of decline in more than four years. Hard-hit industries like banking and real estate are already seeing layoffs and hiring freezes, and that means more qualified applicants are chasing fewer job openings.
Given that backdrop, job seekers should be prepared to dig a little deeper, says Cheryl Lynch Simpson, career coach with Ricklin-Echikson Associates. "The quality of your job search skills becomes more critical in an uncertain economic climate," Simpson says. "In a nutshell, your skills need to be better, you need to be more aware of career branding, and you must be more strategic about approaching employers." Here are five tips from the pros on how to land a job in this turbulent market:
More From U.S. News & World Report: • Careers for Changing Job Landscapes • Using the Web to Search for a Job • Best Careers 2008
Don't count on the job boards. Online search engines and résumé banks are seductive in their promises to connect job seekers with dozens of potential employers. Some career advisers call these sites "résumé black holes," which may be a stretch, but job boards do have significant limitations.
For one, many companies prescreen résumés using software that hunts for key words relating to skills, training, degrees, and experience. Even if you are a perfect match for the job, "your résumé may never get to someone who could decipher your potential value," says Debra Feldman of JobWhiz, an executive job search consultant.
An even bigger issue is that the vast majority of jobs are never advertised—online or anywhere. Says Feldman: "That's why you should put almost all of your job energy into networking and proportionally very little time submitting résumés online."
Tap your network. Ideally, you already keep in touch with an assortment of former colleagues and industry peers who will notify you about job leads before they go public. "More important than what you know is who knows what you know," Feldman says. "Make sure you're on the radar of people who have access to the kind of job leads you want."
If you're looking to work for a specific company, the key is to connect with a current employee. That might mean asking contacts in your network to leverage their network. An easy way to accomplish this is through a networking site like LinkedIn.com, where you can essentially connect with your friends' friends. "First, ask for an introduction," says Penelope Trunk, author of Brazen Careerist: The New Rules for Success. "Then, if you're at a lower level, the social etiquette is to say you want an informational interview. If you're at a high level, say you want to talk about the market and where the industry is going."
Offer to help others. Stay in regular contact with your network so you're not asking for a favor once every couple of years, Simpson says. "Periodically pass along a tip or an article," she says. "Think of it as putting money in the bank."
If you must contact someone out of the blue, offer something in return, such as an invitation to a lecture or a link to a website that might be of interest, Feldman says. "Chances are, if you had a warm relationship, people are happy to rekindle it," she says. "If you never had one at all, they might be startled, but they'll also likely be flattered."
Leverage the blogosphere. Find blogs relevant to your industry that are written by professionals at the top of their career, says Trunk, and become a regular commenter. "The great thing about the blogosphere is that it rewards ideas and passion, so you're not judged based on your résumé," she says. Once you've developed rapport with a blogger, ask about career advice and job leads.
Promote your brand. Forget modesty: Establish yourself as an expert in your industry. This might be as simple as volunteering your skills for a community project, participating in an online forum, creating a website, or—you guessed it—blogging. You could also try your hand at writing for an industry trade journal or an alumni newsletter. "Almost everyone can be a published author," Feldman says. The idea is to build credibility in your field and set yourself apart from the competition.