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Why "Recession-Proof" Jobs Are a Myth
Tweet Share on Facebook November 30, 2010 Comment (15)When President Obama proposed a federal pay freeze recently, there must have been quite a few civil servants who thought, "Whoa! This isn't supposed to happen!"
[See 20 industries where jobs are coming back.]
In private firms, pay freezes have become as common as Post-It notes. But government jobs, you'll recall, are supposed to be "recession-proof" and far less susceptible to the strains of a weak economy. The government has never said that, exactly, but lots of career experts have, and if the compact was never overt it was at least well understood: Government jobs tend to come with lower pay and prestige, but with benefits and job security that make up for it.
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4 Lessons for Washington From Europe's Debt Crisis
Tweet Share on Facebook November 29, 2010 Comment (15)Greece fell first, and now Ireland has followed. Portugal seems likely to be next—and then the dominoes get bigger. At some point in the future, the mighty United States could even be one of them.
[See 20 industries where jobs are coming back.]
For now, the European debt crisis seems to be easing, with a $90 billion bailout for Ireland providing enough financing to salvage the nation's banks and keep the Irish government afloat for the next couple of years. But global investors are far from satisfied. The stock markets, instead of surging, have drifted downward in the aftermath of the Irish bailout, a sign that the crisis is far from over. Some eventualities are predictable. It's well-known, for instance, that Portugal, Spain, Italy, Belgium, and other European countries face a combination of high debt loads and other economic problems that will force spending cuts and tax increases in coming months.
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The Curse of a Shrinking Labor Force
Tweet Share on Facebook November 23, 2010 Comment (3)We don't just have fewer jobs than we used to. We also have fewer people who even want a job.
In 2007, before the recession hit, the percentage of working-age Americans who considered themselves part of the labor force was about 66 percent. It's been falling ever since, and today, it's about 64.5 percent. As a statistical change, that might seem like a modest drop. But a shrinking pool of workers usually signals a long-term slowdown in economic growth, and that could lower living standards for millions of Americans over the next several years.
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Why Every Worker Needs New Skills
Tweet Share on Facebook November 23, 2010 Comment (8)If there's ever been doubt about the value of education, the recession erased it. The unemployment rate for people with a college degree or higher is well below 5 percent. For high school grads, it's above 9 percent, and for those without a high school diploma, it tops 14 percent. Clearly, education pays. Literally.
[See 21 Things Hiring Managers Wish You Knew.]
But getting a diploma isn't the whole solution, as the time-honored strategy of building a lifelong career around a single trade or degree no longer applies. Now it's more a matter of having the right kind of education at the right time. Fast-changing technologies can wreck old industries overnight, devaluing once-prized skills. New industries spring up, requiring knowledge that barely existed five years ago. Employers, meanwhile, have become stingier about training workers. People have to "look out for their own skill set," says Stanford University professor Robert Sutton, author of Good Boss, Bad Boss.
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How to Navigate Body Scans and Pat-Downs
Tweet Share on Facebook November 22, 2010 Comment (8)Invasive body searches. Nazi-style checkpoints. Traumatized children and their speechless parents.
[See 12 ways to stop America's decline.]
These are some of the horror stories likening America's airports to a police state, thanks to intensified new screening procedures meant to prevent airborne terrorism. Last year's "underwear bomber" and other terrorist schemes have highlighted a scary gap in traditional screening measures: They only detect metallic objects that people carry with them through a conventional scanner. Since people don't get X-rayed like carry-on bags, there's a chance that terrorists could sneak nonmetallic explosives onto a plane by hiding a small bomb on their person. Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab exploited that gap last December, when he smuggled a six-inch packet of plastic explosives, sewn into his underwear, onto a Northwest Airlines flight from Amsterdam to Detroit that was carrying 290 people. Since plastic explosives are potent—and readily available to terrorist groups—a small amount could damage or destroy a plane.
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What Bernanke Knows That You Don't
Tweet Share on Facebook November 19, 2010 Comment (16)Love him or hate him, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke is probably the most important economic official in the world right now.
[See 20 industries where jobs are coming back.]
When the Fed flexes its muscles, financial markets from Santiago to Shanghai respond as if they're wired directly to Washington. And the Fed has been flexing like an overcaffeinated gym rat. With the Fed's official interest rates as low as they can go, the Fed has now begun its second round of "quantitative easing," a plan to buy $600 billion worth of U.S. government securities through the middle of 2011. This comes after an even bigger easing program that started in April 2009 and ran for about a year. The idea, in general, is to buy up a huge amount of the safe securities investors crave during anxious times like these, forcing investors to put their money into other types of securities like stocks and commodities. That, in theory, is supposed to drive up stock prices, make investors feel better off, and help restore consumer confidence. As a bonus, it also pushes interest rates down, which should help boost home sales, and devalues the dollar, which is good for exports.
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How GM Could Become Arrogant Once Again
Tweet Share on Facebook November 18, 2010 Comment (3)Well, well. General Motors is back.
Barely a year and a half after its epic bankruptcy filing and government bailout, the shrunken automaker has taken a huge step back toward normalcy, with a public offering that begins to dispel the "government motors" stigma. By almost all accounts, GM's stock float has exceeded expectations, raising nearly $23 billion and reducing the U.S. Treasury's stake from 51 percent of the new GM to about 26 percent. It will still take a few years to sell off all the government's shares, but investor enthusiasm toward GM has restored some of the luster that disappeared over a quarter century of decline.
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Why the Irish Crisis is Going Global
Tweet Share on Facebook November 16, 2010 Comment (8)You may not have to worry about Ireland in a week, or a month. But at the moment, the Emerald Isle is causing global investors a whole lot o' anxiety.
[See 20 industries where jobs are coming back.]
On the surface, it's reminiscent of the problem Greece had with its unmanageable federal debt early this year, which shook world markets, ended a global rally in stocks and ultimately led to a $146 billion bailout by the European Union and the International Monetary Fund. Greece spent more money than it took in for years, papered over the gap, and essentially became insolvent when it could no longer borrow the money needed to finance its debt.
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4 Fresh Fears About Washington Wrecking the Economy
Tweet Share on Facebook November 16, 2010 Comment (6)It's a timeless adage: Be careful what you wish for.
The conventional wisdom prior to the midterm elections was that investors and business honchos would welcome a Republican sweep, since it would mean less regulation, leaner government, and maybe even lower taxes.
[See 20 industries where jobs are coming back.]
The Republicans did their part, of course, winning control of the House of Representatives and gaining more power in the Senate. And they've wasted no time pushing new ideas for cutting government and trimming Washington's outsized role in the economy. A few likely developments are encouraging to businesses. A divided government means there's little chance of new energy or immigration rules they'll have to sort through. A few of the new healthcare requirements passed last year could be simplified or even eliminated. And the Bush tax cuts seem likely to be extended for most taxpayers—and perhaps all, including the wealthy—either late this year or early next. All of those moves would make the economic climate more predictable, and they might lower costs for businesses.
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How the Federal Reserve Has Helped Sarah Palin
Tweet Share on Facebook November 12, 2010 Comment (11)Ben Bernanke has a tart new critic: Sarah Palin.
The conservative gadfly and former vice-presidential candidate unloaded recently on the Federal Reserve's "quantitative easing" plan, saying in a speech that the Fed should "cease and desist." Then, on her Facebook page, Palin called the Fed's plan to buy $600 billion worth of government securities a "dangerous experiment" that amounts to "printing money out of thin air." "Running the printing presses in order to avoid paying off your debts," Palin wrote, "is no way for a great nation to behave."
