Vote Your Career!

Election Day is Tuesday, November 6^th, and I am urging you to take a moment to reflect on the facts that could affect your career and your future before casting your vote. 

Unemployment Rate

This unemployment rate can be measured in several ways.  The one that is most often released by the media is the U3 which includes the unemployed who are actively seeking employment.   Unfortunately, this does not tell the entire story.  The U6 includes those who have given up on seeking employment and part-time workers.   The U3 rate is currently 7.9% versus 14.6% for the U6.  Compare these numbers with January 2009 – U3 at 7.8 and U6 at 14.2%.   Have we made any progress since 2009?

Hiring According to SHRM

The Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) is predicting a decrease in hiring this month.

For the third consecutive month, hiring activity will decrease and job cuts will rise in the manufacturing and service sectors compared with a year earlier, according to the Society for Human Resource Management’s (SHRM) Leading Indicators of National Employment (LINE) survey for January 2012.

In addition, the report illuminates the unemployment rate:

Basically, the U.S. job market is in a holding pattern, creating roughly enough jobs each month to account for the increase in Americans in the job pool, such as through population growth. And the official unemployment rate masks some underlying issues: Many people are working part time despite wanting full-time jobs, and some unemployed people have stopped trying to find a job.

Read the full article here.

 

Is the job report really good news?

Reuters is reporting that "U.S. job growth accelerated more than expected in July as private employers stepped up hiring, easing fears the economy was sliding into a fresh recession."   But, should we get excited about what appears to be positive job news?  Not really, according to Jeff Cox of CNBC.  He writes the following in his article Beneath Jobs Report Surface Lies Some Ugly Truths:  

...the drop in the unemployment rate is fairly illusory—stick all those people [discouraged workers] back in the workforce and you wipe out the job creation and the drop in unemployment.

And the so-called “real” unemployment rate, which adds in discouraged workers and others not counted as part of the headline unemployment rate, actually pulled back one notch to 16.1 percent.

Financial Services Industry News

The finance industry is undergoing some adjustments.  Per FINS Finance Morning Coffee, hiring and firing is occurring at several companies.

Goldman may cut 1,000 workers.

Wells Fargo has let go 3,600 employees mostly in mortgage origination.

Bank of America hired 600 wealth advisors.

BNY Mellon hired around 500 new employees.

Layoffs Multiply on Wall Street, Bank of America Next?

Underemployment

We know that unemployment is holding rather steady at around 9 percent, but did you know that underemployment is over 18 percent?

Gallup reports that the percentage of unemployed with the percentage working part time but wanting full-time work, is at 18.3% in mid-July -- precisely the same as at the end of June and in mid-July 2010.  Read more...

Where can I find a job in this market?

While it may seem that any job search will be a futile task in this economy, this is not so.  Even in the worst of economies, work goes on, people retire, businesses have needs... 

Your job is to find where you fit into business needs.  It is not always an easy task.  But, with a bit of effort such as a polished resume and practiced elevator speech, you could be on your way to a job.  The goal is to always have your personal brand honed and at the ready despite whether you are currently job seeking or gainfully employed.  Then, cultivate an awareness of the job market and where hiring is taking place. 

Kaitlin Madden of the Work Buzz reviews the industries and sectors that are currently stable or growing in the article Where to find a job in a stalling market.

Job Growth Forecast

USA Today provides a one-year forecast growth by state / metro area. (Last updated 6/30/11)

Click here to view graphic.

CNN Money reports that college hiring is returning

CNN Money's July 5th article, College hiring returns after two-year lull, makes the claim that college hiring is up.  CNN quotes NACE:

Planned job offers for recent graduates are up 19.3% from 2010, according to a recent report from the National Association for Colleges and Employers. The study comes from self-reported data by hundreds of companies worldwide. Those gains are in sharp contrast to 2009, when hiring dropped more than 20% across the country from 2008.  Read more...

The Volatile U.S. Economy, Industry by Industry - Harvard Business Review

Harvard Business Review - Excellent graphic depictions that show increasing volatility in the United States economy as new players enter each industry and companies gain or lose market share.  The Volatile U.S. Economy, Industry by Industry - Harvard Business Review

U.S. News: "Why the Jobs Situation Is Worse Than It Looks"

Not an encouraging read...  U.S. News article explains why the job situation might actually be worse than commonly believed.

Today, over 14 million people are unemployed. We now have more idle men and women than at any time since the Great Depression. Nearly seven people in the labor pool compete for every job opening. Hiring announcements have plunged to 10,248 in May, down from 59,648 in April. Hiring is now 17 percent lower than the lowest level in the 2001-02 downturn. One fifth of all men of prime working age are not getting up and going to work. Equally disturbing is that the number of people unemployed for six months or longer grew 361,000 to 6.2 million, increasing their share of the unemployed to 45.1 percent. We face the specter that long-term unemployment is becoming structural and not just cyclical, raising the risk that the jobless will lose their skills and become permanently unemployable.  Read the article.

How do U.S. workers feel about their jobs?

It is becoming apparent that, if the labor market should ever expand, companies will have a problem retaining good employees.  The poor economy has served up the necessity for some companies to be lean.  But, in other instances, it has served up excuses like "people are cheap" - an attitude that good talent is on sale.  Yet, corporate profits are not largely in the tank.  It's just that job growth is occurring outside the United States. Time reports:

In the globalized labor market, companies are now using their profits to invest sparingly in high-skilled jobs in the U.S., which offers a better return on their investment, while sourcing more lower-skilled labor from abroad. Those investments still contribute to U.S. growth, but they don't do much for U.S. jobs." Read more...

Mercer's What's Working survey indicates that U.S. workers are unhappy. 

Half of all US employees are really not happy...Nearly one in three (32%) US workers is seriously considering leaving his or her organization at the present time, up sharply from 23% in 2005. Meanwhile, another 21% are not looking to leave but view their employers unfavorably and have rock-bottom scores on key measures of engagement, a term that describes a combination of an employee’s loyalty, commitment and motivation...  Read more.

In fact, some talent movement is already occurring when and where employees find it possible. FINs reports:

For the first time since 2007, more people are quitting their jobs. In the first four months of this year, 6.9 million U.S. workers voluntarily left their positions, a slight increase over last year, according todata I crunched from the Bureau of Labor Statistics...The problem seems to be pay. Only 53% of those surveyed were satisfied with their base pay, down from 58% in 2005.  Read more.

Thus, look for some major movement of talent when the economy rebounds and workers seek better opportunities. 

FINS: Finance Sector Adds Jobs in May, But Don't Get Too Excited

FINS brings us down to earth on expectations for the finance industry.

While the sector has added jobs every month since February, the industry "isn't out of the woods just yet," said Nariman Behravesh, chief economist at IHS Global Insight...There's uncertainty on the regulatory side and a weak demand for loans, he said, so because activity levels are fairly weak, he doesn't expect a huge surge in job creation.

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