Job Searches in 2003 the Longest in 20 Years

Reuters ^ | Fri January 9, 2004 03:45 PM ET | By Jonathan Nicholson

[RaceBannon]

Job Searches in 2003 the Longest in 20 Years Fri January 9, 2004 03:45 PM ET

By Jonathan Nicholson WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The year 2003 was the most difficult for U.S. job hunters since 1983, as they faced the gloomiest job market in years, according to Labor Department figures released on Friday.

The unemployment rate was the highest since 1994, and the search for a new job was the longest in two decades.

According to Labor Department data, the average spell of unemployment lasted 19.2 weeks in 2003, or almost five months. That was the longest average duration since 1983, when the U.S. economy was emerging from the worst recession since the Depression. Then the average spell was 20.0 weeks.

As a percentage of all the unemployed, the long-term jobless -- those out of work for 27 weeks or more -- made up 22.1 percent in 2003, the highest annual number since 23.9 percent in 1983.

Democrats have called for renewing a federally-funded extension of unemployment benefits offered through states to deal with the problem. They revived their attacks on Friday after a weaker-than-expected jobs report showed only 1,000 new hires in December. Measures of long-term joblessness improved slightly in the month, though.

While Bush administration officials have continually repeated that they will not be satisfied "until every American who wants a job can get one," it has yet to support a renewal of extended benefits, a move many economists say would help blunt the economic damage of the rise in long-term unemployment.

In early December, Treasury Secretary John Snow told Reuters the administration had yet to decide if it would support extending the program for a third time.

According to the liberal-leaning Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, about 80,000 to 90,000 workers will be exhausting their state-funded benefits every week by late January, after the program's eligibility ended in December.

"Unemployment is the Achilles' heel of this administration and Congressional Republicans, and they cannot continue to ignore it," said House Democratic Whip Steny Hoyer, of Maryland.

Lee Price, an economist with the Economic Policy Institute and a former Clinton-era Commerce Department official, said the long-term jobless numbers show how difficult the labor market remains.

Extending jobless benefits again would stimulate the economy by putting money in the pockets of people not getting paychecks, Price said. "Almost 100 percent of that is going to be spent," he said.

© Reuters 2004. All Rights Reserved.

[LibertyAndJusticeForAll]

"...number of workers who have "given up" - 300,000 by their count."

I heard that number too.
And the stats don't even reflect all those once well paid middle-class high tech types who are now working 2 low-wage jobs.

[LibertyAndJusticeForAll]

"Are you sure it still applies today?"

It was never intended to end up in the hands of unpatriotic greedy crooks.

"We've given you a Republic, if you can keep it." - Benjamin Franklin

[sarcasm]

There is something that I first hadn't considered with the Bush proposal, the guest worker program does not just include Mexicans it includes any foreign worker.

Sure does.

[BillM]

Funny, it doesn't say use your savings. That ought to be your first option. Everyone should live extemely frugally until they have 6 months living expenses saved up. No, eveyone else has to pony up so I can live extravagantly.

[dware]

THE PROBLEM IS YOUR ATTITUDE ABOUT IT!! JUST KEEP TELLING YOURSELF THINGS WILL GET BETTER AND THEY WILL!

My job search lasted 8 months, but I hung in there and kept at it. I finally landed a job I had wanted for 10 years, with a pay rate above the average for my area. It truly does depend on how bad you want to find a job.

[dware]

How does anyone go 6 months without a job?

My wife and I went 8 months. We wouldn't have made it if not for family & friends - and a strong will to survive.

[tm22721]

Only the paranoid survive. Change before you have to.

Have I missed any ?

BUMP

[LibertyAndJusticeForAll]

"This will be exploited by large firms offering the replacement of American workers -legally.. not having to deal with the H-1 visa program. There is no provision in Bush's proposal to prevent it."

Yikes! You have uncovered the real agenda! The new Elite Corporatism raises its snake head once again. It has been masquerading as 'free trade' and now it is masquerading as the new documented worker program.

And last Labor Day, the year hundreds of thousands of middle-class high-tech types became unemployed (but not until they trained all of their foreign replacements), Bush told America that they needed to become better trained.

A little more salt for that wound?

[Non-Sequitur]

I was unemployed for 6 full months last year, 2003, myself, so, I am not disturbed at who wrote this.

My job hunt will hit its first anniversary next Friday. Of course, I've been underemployed outside of my profession for the last 6 months so I don't count.

[TaxRelief]

This will probably start a flame war, but here goes anyway:

Every year since 1983 more women have entered the job market than the year before.

If the number of two-income households were less, there would be plenty of work for the main breadwinners in each household.

Where I live, one out of every two families buys a house big enough to require two incomes to sustain their lifestyle. Then when one adult loses their job, they start whining that they can't swing the mortgage, etc.

(I'm kidding. Honestly. I know that increased productivity increases the GNP and raises the standard of living for all.)

[OldPossum]

While Bush administration officials have continually repeated that they will not be satisfied "until every American who wants a job can get one," it has yet to support a renewal of extended benefits, a move many economists say would help blunt the economic damage of the rise in long-term unemployment.

This is harsh medicine and hard on the unemployed, but economists know that perpetual extension of unemployment benefits creates a disincentive to some people and they therefore don't actively seek jobs. This keeps the unemployment figures up, and the Bush administration surely knows this.

[Zipporah]

Yes a lot more salt. The labor statistics do not address those that are underemployed.

[Ronly Bonly Jones]

How does anyone go 6 months without a job?>>

It's called "being over forty," jack.

[Lael]

This is harsh medicine and hard on the unemployed, but economists know that perpetual extension of unemployment benefits creates a disincentive to some people

I notice they only quote EMPLOYED Economists.

BTW, the Hedonically Cooked GDP numbers are beginning to distort the views of the Japanese Economy as well...Japanese Gov't claims it is ALL going swimmingly...yet the Bank of Japan has numbers that are absolutely DREADFUL!

[Ronly Bonly Jones]

Where are you located?

I'm in the industrial Northeast.

[Lael]

Make sure you keep repeating the mantra!

LOL!!!

Clinton shill Lanny Davis said yesterday that all he wants the eventual Democrat nominee to say is..."Are you better off today than you were four years ago???

Look, folks, the economy hit bottom sometime in the Second to Fourth Quarter of 2003 [that's right, boys and girls, just this past year].

We will bump along with minimal job creation until "well into 2005" in the words of the Minutes of the Federal Open Market Committee.

In fact, there is an outlier forecast for the 10 year note to hit 2 1/2% this year in a last [for this cycle] Flight to Quality.

Bush is STILL skating on thin ice.

He shouldn't be playing footsie with VINCENTE Fox.

[vannrox]

.

AMEN.

The profile of the hardest hit:

• Age > 40 years.
• Occupation: Technical
• Education: BS+ Engineering

The profile of the Jobs being created:

• Age: ANY
• Occupation: Service
• Education: High School

The average time for a person to realize that they have been LIFESIZED DOWNWARD:

• 3 sigma at 18 months
• Subtract 3 months per dependent supported by breadwinner.

.

[vannrox]

.

JOB MARKET

UNEMPLOYMENT AT RECORD HIGH

This year, 3.7% of ACS members are out of work and looking for jobs

Volume 81, Number 25
CENEAR 81 25 p. 12
ISSN 0009-2347

The Chemical & Engineering News

MIKE HEYLIN

Initial results from the latest American Chemical Society survey of the employment status and salaries of its core membership?those in the domestic workforce?confirm that times are becoming very tough for the chemical profession. The jobless rate of 3.7% that the ACS survey reveals as of March 1 this year is up from 3.3% one year ago. It also exceeds the earlier all-time high of 3.2% set in 1972, the first year of this annual survey. ACS defines the chemical workforce as those with full- or part-time jobs, on postdocs, or unemployed but seeking employment

Industrial chemists have been hit particularly hard. For those in manufacturing, unemployment is at 4.9%. For those with nonmanufacturing firms, it is 4.8%. Academic chemists, with their at least partial protection of tenure, are seeing unemployment in their ranks remain low at 1.1%, almost as low as the 1.0% among government-employed chemists.

As is usual, unemployment among chemists increases with age: this year, from 2.0% for those up to 44 years old to 4.7% for those over 45.

The salaries of ACS chemists with full-time jobs have held up quite well. The median annual increase for individual chemists of 4.2% is slightly down from 4.8% last year. But it is still well ahead of inflation, which is at about 2%. Women have done slightly better than men: 4.4% compared with 4.1%. Increases decline with age, from 6.3% for those in their 20s to 3.5% for those in their 60s.

This year?s survey is based on responses to 23,000 questionnaires sent to a random sample of about 89,500 full-dues-paying domestic ACS members. The total response was 9,492. Of respondents, 701 were not chemists, and 448 of those who were chemists were not in the workforce. This left a sample of 8,343 workforce chemists.

Since 1996, these salary and employment surveys have been conducted by Mary W. Jordan, specialist in workforce programs, ACS Department of Career Services.

The change for ACS members from essentially full employment two years ago, when unemployment was at 1.5%, to the high unemployment level of today parallels what has been happening throughout the economy. In May, overall U.S. unemployment was at 6.1%, the highest in nine years.

The number of persons on nonfarm payrolls has been declining since it peaked in February 2001. And with no sharp upturn in sight, there is a growing possibility that the current Administration could be the first since World War II to witness an actual decline in payrolls. An annual job creation of more than 2 million is needed just to keep up with the natural growth of the workforce.

.

[vannrox]

November 24, 2003
Volume 81, Number 47
CENEAR 81 47 pp. 33-34
ISSN 0009-2347

SLUMP CONTINUES FOR CHEMISTS
Unemployment is at a record high, but opportunities exist for the well prepared

LINDA R. RABER, C&EN WASHINGTON

These are difficult times for the U.S. economy, and chemical scientists have not been spared the fallout. Unemployment for chemists--as measured by unemployment of American Chemical Society members--is at a record high. C&EN Editor-at-Large Michael Heylin reports that the jobless rate of 3.5% that the most recent ACS Salary Survey reveals as of March 1 this year is up from 3.3% a year earlier. It also exceeds the earlier all-time high of 3.2% set in 1972, the first year of this annual survey.

	LUBRIZOL PHOTO

Industrial chemists have been hit particularly hard. For those in manufacturing, unemployment is at 4.9%. For those with nonmanufacturing firms, it is 4.8%. However, among academic chemists, unemployment remains negligible at 1.1%, and government-employed chemists are essentially fully employed with an unemployment level of 1.0%.

Chemists over 45 years old have been hit especially hard because unemployment among chemists increases with age: This year, the survey found an unemployment rate of 2.0% for those younger than 44 and 4.7% for those over 45. This pattern is not encouraging news for recently unemployed scientists expecting these to be their prime earnings years.

Despite the gloom, Heylin notes that salaries of ACS-surveyed chemists with full-time jobs have held up reasonably well. The median annual salary increase for individual chemists of 4.2% is slightly down from 4.8% last year, but it is still well ahead of inflation, which is running at about 2%.

When asked by C&EN Assistant Editor Aalok Mehta to evaluate their 2003–04 hiring plans, many recruiters said that the demand outlook for chemists is essentially unchanged from last year. As always, companies are looking for chemists with top credentials, and competition is stiff. Mehta reports that they would be hiring to fill vacancies occasioned by retirements and maybe a few additional positions.

For those applicants seeking their first industrial position, C&EN Associate Editor Susan Morrissey reports that to really stand out to employers, job candidates need to have the appropriate combination of scientific and communications skills.

One area that may well be attractive to chemical scientists--particularly those with advanced degrees who are starting second (or third) careers--is teaching at the high school level. C&EN Associate Editor Celia Henry reports that the most important characteristic of scientists turning to teaching is that they like students in their teens. Demand for well-qualified chemistry teachers at the secondary level is expected to soar over the next few years as many current teachers reach retirement age.

C&EN Online Editor Melody Voith has compiled the magazine's annual listing of resources for job seekers. Voith concentrates on online resources that aim to help scientists find jobs. Prominent among these is cen-chemjobs.org, the C&EN full-service recruiting site. She reports that ACS stands ready to help its members and student affiliates hone their interviewing skills and polish their résumés. At national and regional meetings, employment clearinghouses bring recruiters and job seekers together for one-on-one interviews.

An online exclusive, written by former Procter & Gamble recruiter Joel I. Shulman, aims to help foreign chemical scientists navigate the often difficult process of getting a job in the U.S.

AIR PRODUCTS PHOTO	DEMAND With the slow economy persisting yet another year, unemployment for chemical scientists is high and demand is soft. New graduates can expect a long job search and fewer offers, but some companies are hiring.
	SALARIES & EMPLOYMENT Unemployment among American Chemical Society members in the domestic workforce is 3.5%. This is a record high since the society started measuring the employment status of its members annually more than 30 years ago. Salaries continue to make steady gains.
	HIGH SCHOOL TEACHING Becoming a high school chemistry teacher is a great choice for a chemist with an advanced degree, and a few are taking that option, sometimes as a second career. These workers can help fill a need for qualified science teachers that is expected to skyrocket with impending retirements.
	FIRST JOB IN INDUSTRY Graduate students, freshly minted Ph.D.s, and postdoctoral fellows are all vying for the few open positions in industry. Find out what industrial employers are looking for and how applicants can get noticed.
	CAREER PLANNING RESOURCES A guide to sources of job and career information designed for those in chemical and related sciences who are seeking industrial, academic, or government positions or looking to change careers. Online resources for scientists are highlighted, as are American Chemical Society career services. RESOURCES FOR FOREIGN NATIONALS

[sarcasm]

The jobs market "is now much slower to react to the performance of the economy," which is undergoing structural changes through technology, productivity and increased outsourcing overseas, said John Challenger, chief executive officer of Challenger, Gray and Christmas, an employment research and recruiting firm.
He doesn't think another hiring boom will occur until the next economic cycle, sometime near 2008.