June 2003 - Unemployment rises to 6.4% - where are the jobs?

Jespah, due to statistics, damn statistics and lies (or however that one actually goes...), who knows what will be reported and what will be distorted?

However, I can see, due to the aging of the population, there will be growth in health care jobs but it probably will come for the most part with more minimum wage jobs in healthcare for the elderly @ nursing homes.

Information technology may grow again due to so many recent lay-offs, but is that really a 'growth' or merely an adjustment as this area swings back and forth?

Perhaps the 'service' industries, eg the poor providing services to the upper-middle class and the rich, which will IMHO only provide minimum wage jobs to more surrogate house cleaners, dog walkers, baby sitters, etc. as well as perhaps more fast food workers ...

Hopefully, there will be some new jobs created with livable wages as well, but I am not smart enough to see what they might be at this time.

I have several friends, who recently graduated from law school and have been unable to find jobs. One recently passed the New York bar, but could not find a job in NY, so she now is studying for the California bar, so she can get an internship in law in California.

By the way, the # of unemployed is probably far greater, than that number presently being reported. Many of the unemployed have stopped looking for jobs and are not even on unemployment compensation any longer.

The one profession, which is always looking for employees is the nursing profession. Even pharmacy is starting to look a bit tight for jobs.

Oh, the # of unemployed is definitely higher than this - you're right, NH; the people who are no longer looking (or who have exhausted their benefits and are therefore no longer tracked by any agency) have fallen off the radar.

As for IT, like you said, SC, there have been a lot of adjustments there and I suspect they'll continue until some other major, quantum leap-type of tech emerges. Right now, companies are squeezing a lot of work out of their IT personnel and that seems unlikely to change. Companies bring in temps and work them like there's no tomorrow, or have people do several jobs (programmers do quality assurance, analysts do programming, etc.). But if some killer, cutting edge tech comes to the fore, there will suddenly be a big need again.

A piece of the last of these quantum leaps was in data mining/customer relations management. Data mining and CRM (this is my field) might still prove to be big - the eventual size of the National "No call" registry might spur companies to use more CRM technology, and use it better. Right now, it's generally cheaper to just dial every possible number under a given area code. As that stops being a sound business strategy, companies will probably want more bang for their buck. They'll lay off telemarketers and will be looking for a way to make every call count. So database marketing software may become the next big thing.

But I've also got no illusions (or, few illusions) - there's always growth in low-paying jobs with poor futures, so house cleaning and the like will be available. Health care will rise with the age of the population and, probably, with the better management of diseases that are currently fatal. When AIDS and cancer turn into long-term management diseases (like diabetes), there will be more of a need for visiting nurses, etc.

PS New Haven - has your friend with the NY bar admission tried the New York Law Journal?

I 'll ask her. Does this journal have jobs listed?

One problem is the fact that she's Korean, not American and she's been told by those, who've interviewed her, that her English is poor.

The NY Law Journal has lots of jobs listed - it's how I got my first law job.

I'll e-mail her right now.

The unemployment rate in Silicon Valley is 8.5 percent. One of the interesting and conflicting dynamics of this area is that the housing costs continue to rise. Another interesting dynamics here in Silicon Valley is the continued construction of office buildings at a time when vacancy rates are very high, and lease rates are going down. I'm very confused about our economic environment, because of the many contradictions we see and hear about almost daily. As mentioned earlier in this forum, nurses are in very high demand. Many hospitals in our area are providing free tuition for students intersted in completing a nursing degree. Non-benefit, part-time nurses earn $50 per hour. c.i.

Yeah, housing prices and housing starts don't seem related to employment levels in NW New Mexico, either.

As someone who has been seeking full-time since November, 1997, I know that the real rate of unemployment is much higher. Because I have never registered with the state for unemployment benefits (not eligible), I am not part of these statistics.

Recently, someone on television made the point that men in prison, who generally had jobs at the time of their convictions, are also not part of the unemployment scenario.

That said, let's remember how, back in the 1980s, talking heads on programs like Wall Street Week, predicted the turn toward a service economy. Service jobs generally do not offer the job holder financial independence.

In recent years, companies using workers with particular skills (in this case, sewing) either sent their work overseas (Oshgosh) or closed entirely (shirt manufacturer in Maine), leaving people with experience but no place to offer their skills.

Hopefully in the interim of searching for a job with a specific skill-set, job seekers are prepared to take other jobs to get by? I was out in the job-market several months ago and I applied for positions other than where my experience and skills were based. I am prepared to wash floors if I have to in order to put food on the table and pay my rent. I wonder how many job-seekers are holding out for that particular job and will not accept or look for anything other than that?

Many things can block our path but there is always a route around it if we really look.

Yup. I was a little picky when I first graduated from community college. My attitude finally had to bow to the reality of the labor market.

There's an interesting article in today's editorial pages of the San Jose Mercury News. In essense, it talks to the issue of how productivity has increased during the past several years of each worker, but they are not the beneficiaries of that increased productivity. Their pay only increased at a rate of .07 percent per year while their productivity increased at over 2.5 percent. Where is all the money going, since it's not going to the workers?

heeven,
I would love to work in publishing but publishing does not love people who are older than 30. I have worked many jobs over the past several years: substitute teaching, temping, shelving books at the public library, retail. I have not earned more than $10,000 in any year. Would gladly take something else to be able to eat more regularly and heat my home!

Yikes plainoldme - 10K a year? That's slave labor! I have no doubt that many good people like yourself are working hard at finding employment. It's those others that will not accept anything less than a particular standard that makes me shake my head. In America (and other countries I'm sure) it can be so difficult for people who want to work to actually find decent jobs. The standards are getting so high even for jobs that do not really require college degrees and the like. Then employers test and require such private information of would-be employees that it often excludes many excellent people from jobs that they are more than capable of doing. It also doesn't help that the cost of living keeps getting higher and higher, with wages not even coming close to keeping up. This is why there is needed more than one breadwinner in a household to keep body and soul together. This is also why, even though I'm on a good wage, I cannot afford to buy a home to call my own. Ah well, on we trudge ....
I wish you much luck plainoldme in finding work.

Thanks, heeven.

I am going to write my by now annual mid-year letter to high schools I am willing and able to transport myself to, seeing if there is a mid-year need for a teacher of English, history or social studies. Also found a job at the Harvard Educational Publishing Group today and will apply for that. That is a fat chance. Recently found a magazine published two towns over that I will send a resume to and another published a bit to the west. The first is a food mag and the second is a quilting mag.