On Tuesday, the House voted in favor of providing a 13-week extension for unemployment benefits in states where the unemployment rate is over 8.5%. Currently, the national rate stands at 9.7%, with many analysts expecting it to crest over 10% by 2010.

Twenty-seven states would qualify for the extension, which would become the fourth since the recession first began, writes the Associated Press. However, the legislation is still awaiting approval in the Senate where the bill has a chance to be either altered or denied.

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It’s the first Friday of September, so that means August’s unemployment numbers are in — and they aren’t pretty. The unemployment rate in August increased 0.3% to reach 9.7%, the highest level observed in 26 years. Non-farm payrolls declined by 216,000 in August, marking the 20th-straight-monthly decline, bringing the grand total since the downturn began in December of 2007 to 131.2 million.

While the monthly employment declines continue to lessen from previous months, analysts say that any signs of recovery in the job market won’t occur until hiring resumes — the loss of 216,000 jobs doesn’t signify a properly functioning economy. The slowing monthly declines are surely welcomed, but, besides the unemployment rate being most troubling, the duration of time that Americans are staying unemployed has become another added strain on the market’s ability to recover: Read the rest of this entry »

We seem to have entered a stage of the recession which HSH VP Keith Gumbinger has referred to as the “garden variety” recession. Despite still being trapped amongst inconsistent economic reports, many key indicators, in this case the employment situation, seems to be trending in the right direction.

The number of jobs lost in July has been the lowest since last August. Surprisingly, despite another 247,000 Americans losing their jobs last month, the unemployment rate actually fell by 0.1%. While the falling unemployment rate certainly has many of us encouraged, the job market is still clawing its way out of a very deep hole.

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We recently heard a story about a 57-year-old employee at one of the nation’s major newspapers who believes his job is in jeopardy (that’s certainly nothing new). This employee has already survived one round of buy outs, waves of layoffs, and is currently dealing with unpaid furloughs, a depleted staff, and the ever-present notion that his job may not be there for him and his family tomorrow.

For “older” Americans who are about to re-enter the workforce, the thought of looking for a new job can be a frightening one. Employers in today’s job market tend to be more willing to hire younger workers — even though they may lack experience — than hire older workers who are used to making a larger salary. The number of unemployed workers over age 55 is at its highest point in history: Read the rest of this entry »

There’s more than one way to interpret Friday’s unemployment report. While some market observers are grimacing over the escalating unemployment rate, others are encouraged and upbeat over the abating number of layoffs and the improvement in certain sectors like construction. On the surface, May’s report could seem confusing.

Despite the loss of 345,000 jobs in May — the smallest number on record since September — the unemployment rate increased by 0.5% to 9.4%, the highest jobless rate in 26 years.

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The unemployment stats for March are in and they’re bleak. There’s no sugarcoating the fact that over three million jobs were lost in the past five months, or that the unemployment rate has risen to 8.5% — the highest rate on record since 1983.

Despite the enormous downsizing, not all is lost for Americans, employed or not. As an alternative to layoffs, thousands of employers are increasing other strategies like furloughs, part time, and unpaid vacations that, despite hurting workers’ bottom lines, are keeping Americans working — just not as much as they would like. Employees who are involuntarily working part time increased to 9 million in March, double from a year ago.

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