I’m beginning to think we are becoming immune to employment reporting.  A sentence from the beginning and end of a CNNMoney.com article (emphasis mine):

The good news: Overall employers announced fewer planned job cuts.

…

Economists are expecting the report to show there were 120,000 jobs lost in August, an improvement over July’s 131,000 job loss.

In a prolonged recession, I guess these pieces of information are uplifting.

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You know this entire GDP reporting process is an absolute joke.  This AP article indicates that the Q2 GDP is going to be revised down…a LOT:

The government is about to confirm what many people have felt for some time: The economy barely has a pulse.

The Commerce Department on Friday will revise its estimate for economic growth in the April-to-June period and Wall Street economists forecast it will be cut almost in half, to a 1.4 percent annual rate from 2.4 percent

Honestly, if a publicly-traded company were to do this, executives would be incarcerated.  How the government gets away with this propaganda is beyond me.

But if you want to get to the crux of the problem, you need read a bit further into the article (emphasis mine):

Consumers can’t be sure their jobs are safe, with unemployment so high. Business executives don’t know if sales and profits will grow enough to justify adding jobs. And potential changes to tax laws at the end of this year and other policy reforms also make it hard to plan ahead, economists say.

“People have been overwhelmed by uncertainty,” said Ethan Harris, an economist at Bank of America Merrill Lynch.

Uncertainty stalls business growth.

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Take a look at this headline from Twin Cities Business:

MN June Unemployment Rate Drops, Sheds 3,700 Jobs

Jobs are lost and the unemployment rate decreases…how can this be?  It is a question that begs an answer, yet you won’t find it in this article.  The closest it comes:

Minnesota’s unemployment rate dropped 0.2 percent in June to a seasonally adjusted 6.8 percent even though employers cut 3,700 jobs during the month, the Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic Development (DEED) said on Thursday.

Clearly workers had to leave the workforce or unemployment benefits expired for many Minnesotans.  It is probably a combination of both factors.  This is a critical flaw in the unemployment number.  The better approach here would be to track how many people are actually working.

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Ok, I know it isn’t an exotic port of call, but North Dakota does have one very interesting fact – 3.3% unemployment.  From our local Pioneer Planet newspaper:

Ziesch says the state had the lowest unemployment rate in the nation in June at 3.3 percent. He says North Dakota has about 10,700 unfilled jobs.

Yes, it is a sparsely populated state, but they definitely have demand.  This time of year is the right time to visit, too.  6 months from now and you will be crying through blizzards the like you have never seen.

Nonetheless, count me as a fan of North Dakota.

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shove it…apparently.  The Herman Trend offers up some stats that may catch you by surprise (emphasis mine):

It is interesting to note that in the United States more people quit their jobs in the last three months than those who lost their jobs. After 15 straight months of time in which layoffs exceeded voluntary departures, it appears that the job market is finally shifting.

…

In a related development, one-quarter of our business community’s most promising employees are increasingly disengaged and many are actively seeking new employment opportunities. A recent study on employee engagement, conducted by the Corporate Executive Board’s Corporate Leadership Council (CLC), found that 25 percent of the “employer-identified, high-potential employees” plan to leave their current companies within the next year. Compare that figure to the one from 2006 and we have seen an increase of 250 percent.

Moreover, 21 percent of today’s employees identified themselves as “highly disengaged”. This group has increased nearly 300 percent since 2007.

The mass movement of employees is on the horizon, but I think there will be limited movement until the economy rebounds.  In spite of what the government says, the economic situation is still tenuous at best.

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The latest employment numbers are out and it doesn’t look good (emphasis mine).

US employers added 430,000 jobs to nonfarm payrolls in May, but 411,000 of those were temporary census workers. That number was also well short of the more than 500,000 economists had expected. The unemployment rate, however, fell to 9.7 percent from 9.9 percent in April.

I still don’t expect to see significant hiring gains until Q4 of this year at the earliest.  My highly non-scientific polling (talking to customers) shows that most are still in a tentative mode.  Perhaps some more enlightened analysis will surface later today.

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I do think there is an impending, colossal jump of sales talent in the very near future.  The Herman Trend Alert speaks to this potential in their latest report:

According to a new CareerBuilder survey, more than one-quarter (28 percent) of sales employers are concerned about losing their high performing workers in the second quarter, while more than one-third (35 percent) of sales workers said it is likely they will start looking for a new job when the economy picks up.

And here is why:

Increased workloads, longer hours and fewer resources related to the recession may be contributing to job dissatisfaction. Looking at key factors that influence job satisfaction and company loyalty, sales workers reported the following:

•Pay – More than one-third (35 percent) of sales workers said they are dissatisfied with their pay.

•Work/life balance – One-in-five (20 percent) sales workers said they are dissatisfied with their work/life balance.

•Career progress – One-in-five (21 percent) of sales workers said they are dissatisfied with the career advancement opportunities provided by their current employers.

I’m a bit jaded here in that I think pay is probably much higher then what is normally reported in these surveys.  Nonetheless, I have talked to a handful of salespeople recently who are starting to put their ears to the tracks regarding new opportunities.  I still believe the hiring landscape will be slow this year, but will begin to ramp up in Q4.  A year from now may be one of the largest retention struggles we have seen in quite some time.

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Here is an interesting poll from Gallup – the Job Creation Index.  I was not familiar with this one until seeing it on Drudge.  I always have a tinge of skepticism for any poll, but this one has a staggering finding (emphasis mine):

Gallup’s Job Creation Index clearly indicates that state and local governments are in the midst of significant downsizing, no doubt reflecting budgetary issues resulting from recessionary pressures on the tax (and other) revenue that funds these governments.

Hiring at the federal level has apparently to date escaped these same fiscal pressures. Indeed, the federal government appears to be significantly outpacing the private sector in terms of the relative number of jobs created.

How long this pattern will continue is difficult to project. The federal budget deficit is likely to become a prominent element of political debate in the months and years ahead, thus opening up the possibility of increased employment pressures at the federal level. At the moment, however, the federal government is one of the brightest spots in the nation’s hiring picture.

Never a good sign.

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As is so often the case in this economy, the market is sending mixed signals.  From one article on abcnews.com:

The economic strength, both in U.S. and international markets, plus cost cuts, higher rates and fuel surcharges led to a 33 percent increase in first-quarter profit. UPS boosted its full-year outlook when it pre-released its earnings two weeks ago.

And one paragraph later:

UPS Inc., also known as United Parcel Service, restructured its business over the last 18 months, cutting jobs in the process. The shipper doesn’t plan any significant hiring anytime soon, at least until the recovery is on more solid footing.

Jobless recovery anyone?  The difficulty is that hiring is a lagging indicator and it does appear that 2010 will be a slow hiring period in spite of a potential recovery in process.

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From the indeed.com blog:

For the first time in 2010, our Job Market Competition report shows all major metropolitan areas have fewer than 10 unemployed persons per job posting – a notable lessening of job competition since our last report.

Washington D.C. has only one unemployed per job posting, maintaining its first place position as the city with the least competition for jobs.  At the other end of the scale, Detroit moved up one place from the bottom position: it now has nine unemployed per job posting, an improvement from 13 earlier this year.

The post contains the top 5 and bottom 5 metro markets based on number of unemployed per job posting.  No surprise that D.C. is number 1 considering the ever-expanding government.  Did you ever think we would be at a point where moving below 10 unemployed people per opening was improvement?

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