Well, it is good to be back at it after a nice Christmas break with the family.  It is even better to come back to read an article like this one from CNNMoney.com.  How about this:

"We’re looking at some leading indicators on employment, and they’re all flashing green lights," said Bernard Baumohl of the Economic Outlook Group, a Princeton, N.J. research firm.

Though most economists still expect a painfully high unemployment rate of about 9% at the end of this year, Baumohl and others think that stat masks more important signs of strength.

Baumohl and some other economists forecast between 2.5 million and 3 million jobs being added to U.S. payrolls in 2011, about triple the gains likely to recorded in 2010 and what would be the best one-year jump since the white hot labor market of 1999.

I am hopeful that these economists are correct.  If you would like an odd indicator, try this one:

Baumohl says another non-traditional employment indicator, the number of day-care workers, which has been edging up for four months and is now about 2% higher than a year ago. "People need more day care when they’ve got jobs to go to," he said.

Odd, but it seems logical.  The hole we are in is far greater than 3 million jobs as you can read in the article.  This would be a good start, but it is going to take years to recover.  In that light, a “hiring boom” may be overstating things.

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