What’s a Jobless Recovery?

If you have been watching the headlines parade by in recent weeks you’d think the American economy has once again surfaced, sputtering for air. It’s been record days on Wall Street, a $1 billion quarter from Ford, as well as banks (B of A) and insurance companies (AIG) who took billions in federal subsidies recording impressive quarterly reports as well.

If however, you’ve been looking for a job the recovery may seem as if it’s happening somewhere else. The lack of jobs did make it into the headlines today, with a report that October’s unemployment figure was at 10.2%. That’s the highest figure since 1983, says the Washington Post story; moreover, “employers cut a net 190,000 jobs” during the month of October.

The upside of this particular benchmark in unemployment according to the proverbial analysts is that the gross domestic product rose 3.5% in the third quarter of 2009, accomplished in the manufacturing sector without benefit of additional employees. In other words, efficiency is up among the remaining employees so that the dollar side of the economic picture continues to improve.

Alas, the human side does not. While the net job loss doesn’t reflect economic improvement, analysts pointed to the addition of 34,000 temporary jobs to the market as a positive sign, suggesting that employers are beginning to make cautious steps towards returning to normal. Some would argue that replacing long term employees with temporary jobs, which require no provision of benefits, as a minor gain at best and the continuation of a deeply disturbing trend.

“Employers became leaner and more efficient in the third quarter. Wages, meantime, remain flat or falling. The result is that productivity — output per hour of work — jumped at the fastest pace in six years.” Productivity rose at an annual rate of 9.5 percent in the July-September quarter, according to the Labor Department.

They made that announcement yesterday, along with reporting a lower than expected number of applications for unemployment. “On Wall Street, the better-than-expected jobless claims report and an upbeat forecast from Cisco Systems Inc. buoyed investors. The Dow Jones industrial average added nearly 204 points to 10,005.96, and broader indexes also gained.”

Today the stock market isn’t doing much but it isn’t in the red either, because the unemployment rate’s move into double digits simply doesn’t have the throw-weight of big profits for big businesses. The news stories today are full of hopeful signs that can be found in these economic tea leaves if you ask the right analyst – for example, it’s considered a positive sign that job loss was less than projected. That’s like saying it’s only a cracked vertebrae and we won’t have to operate on your back.

It seems that there’s a profound disconnect here. The value of the consumer market to the nation’s economic health is more about interest payments than anything else, including employment. We are dependent on companies that are too large to be allowed to fail, rather than a workforce that has gainful employment and spends earned dollars rather than borrowed ones.

All of this suggests that those of us who have been sucked into the job market implosion should look to new careers in industries where, for better or worse, growth is inevitable. Criminal justice careers are going to grow, particularly in the Homeland Security field. Those who are interested in law enforcement can probably break in with an associate’s degree.

Many of the medical training schools are turning students away and still there are projected shortages in nursing, in medical technology of all types and for health information technicians, to name just a few. You can qualify for any of these with an associate degree and with the exception of the clinical training for RNs; you can obtain your degree online – often in less than two years.

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