Signs of economy improving

[Van]

Norfolk Southern recently started hiring, Liebherr has had an increase in heavy truck orders from 26 last year to 38 this year and hiring people for several fields ( just toured the facility last week and saw the new model they havent listed yet including design changes that will blow CAT and Terrex out of the water ), Northrup Grumman and BAE Systems are hiring larger numbers of people. What signs of recovery are you seeing where your at?

 

[yaz96]

None.

Half of the street lights are being turned off.

No water for grass in the parks, no mowing, they took the trash cans out, so they wouldn't have to collect. Restrooms were closed last summer.

Layoffs of city employees.

The police helicopters are for sale on the Internet. The city is dumping firefighting jobs, a vice team, burglary investigators, beat cops — dozens of police and fire positions will go unfilled. The parks department removed trash cans last week, replacing them with signs urging users to pack out their own litter. Neighbors are encouraged to bring their own lawn mowers to local green spaces, because parks workers will mow them only once every two weeks. If that. Water cutbacks mean most parks will be dead, brown turf by July; the flower and fertilizer budget is zero. City recreation centers, indoor and outdoor pools, and a handful of museums will close for good March 31 unless they find private funding to stay open. Buses no longer run on evenings and weekends. The city won't pay for any street paving, relying instead on a regional authority that can meet only about 10 percent of the need.


Oh, you mean private sector..........fuhgeddaboudit!

 

[fleetfarmer]

All the people I know that have been out of work for months, and months still don't have jobs.

 

[navychop]

Can't get customers to pay their bills. Can't get new projects, or commence work authorization on jobs already awarded. Same with our competitors -at least, the ones still in business.

It's beginning to look worse, not better. I'm beginning to really get concerned.

 

[bhelms]

We have not seen bottom yet. This small "bright spot" is merely the eye of the storm. Lying ahead are hyperiinflation and/or collapse of the dollar. Then we're all in deep dookey...

 

[Rey]

nothing here.

some places are turning into ghost towns due to the large amount of foreclosures. everyone is still cutting back. went out for lunch and the places i always went to are really changing the way they prepare their food to cut back there losses. just makes it worse since now i won't be going back to a place i went for years.
on the highways the lights are being turned off and i'm finding less and less employees at stores to take care of customers. my company has never been worse. so i have yet to see any improvement in this area or even 50-60 miles either north or south from here.very sad.very depressing.

 

[Paul Wozniak]

Getting worse in the Detroit area.

 

[tigerfan33]

It will be interesting to see what the census is in my area compared to 2000. I suspect a big loss with plant and mill closings.

 

[fleetfarmer]

Can't get customers to pay their bills. Can't get new projects, or commence work authorization on jobs already awarded. Same with our competitors -at least, the ones still in business.

It's beginning to look worse, not better. I'm beginning to really get concerned.

You're just now beginning to really get concerned ?
That happened to most people about a year ago.

 

[kenny911]

Getting worse in the Detroit area.

I don't think its getting worse. I will say that it hasn't really improved much from rock bottom of last year. Pretty much everybody I know works and the real estate market is not as bad as the media makes it out to be from my personal house shopping experience. Foreclosures tend to be junk and homes that are half off, have ridiculous taxes that nobody can afford.

 

[Paul Wozniak]

I don't think its getting worse. I will say that it hasn't really improved much from rock bottom of last year. Pretty much everybody I know works and the real estate market is not as bad as the media makes it out to be from my personal house shopping experience. Foreclosures tend to be junk and homes that are half off, have ridiculous taxes that nobody can afford.

My wife lost her job a month ago, now were both unemployed, and not having any luck finding work.

 

[Van]

My wife lost her job a month ago, now were both unemployed, and not having any luck finding work.

Whats yours and hers specialties Paul? Honestly if you don't mind moving I would look here in the Virginia Beach area as well as Lincoln Nebraska or Grand Forks North Dakota due to both those places having the lowest unemployment in the nation at %4.0 and %4.1 respectfully.

 

[lakebum431]

My wife lost her job a month ago, now were both unemployed, and not having any luck finding work.

How broad is your search? Are you not able to find a job, or not able to find a job that you want to do? I've had several friends who have been laid off over the past 1.5 years, but each has gotten back to work in no more than 3 weeks. Some have taken better jobs than they had before, others have taken a step down, but they were back to work. A couple have even changed cities. If you want to work hard enough there is work out there. You just have to be willing to make a change (location, income, type of job) to find one right now.

 

[fleetfarmer]

If you want to work hard enough there is work out there. You just have to be willing to make a change (location, income, type of job) to find one right now.

Sounds easy, but not really true.

Are you currently retired lakebum ?

Maybe some unemployed people don't want to or can't afford to just move to a new city or state right now.

Maybe some people can't change their income and still pay their house payments, car payments, family expenses.

I'm sure a person that was earning $100K/year in their specific field of interest could probably get a job working at walmart stocking shelves, or at tacobell saying - Do you want nachos with that? just to have a job right now, but they probably couldn't pay their bills.

 

[LER]

I got real lucky here. The company I work for got bought by IBM. Austin is also doing reasonably well, if you are in Tech.

 

[jayn_j]

Well, it took me 4 months to find a new job. Embedded firmware designer with aircraft design certifications. However, I attribute a lot of that to being laid off at the start of the holidays. Nothing for three months and then suddenly my choice of several offers al in the same week. In tech, you learn to be ready to move as you are looking at a small number of companies spread all over the country. The exception may be if you are near DC or the Bay Area.

I came very close to coming out to visit Scott with an offer in Windsor Locks, CT, but the Milwaukee one was a better fit for family.

 

[lakebum431]

Sounds easy, but not really true.

Are you currently retired lakebum ?

Maybe some unemployed people don't want to or can't afford to just move to a new city or state right now.

Maybe some people can't change their income and still pay their house payments, car payments, family expenses.

I'm sure a person that was earning $100K/year in their specific field of interest could probably get a job working at walmart stocking shelves, or at tacobell saying - Do you want nachos with that? just to have a job right now, but they probably couldn't pay their bills.

No, not retired at all.

You say people don't want to or can't affor to just move. If they don't want to then they aren't looking at all options to find a new job. You say they can't afford to, I say they can't afford not to consider it.

Your logic doesn't make much sense. You say that people can't change their income and still pay their bills, but how are they paying their bills without a job? Unemployement is not much. Almost any job is better than that...

 

[fleetfarmer]

Your several friends that have been laid off over the past 1.5 years but got back to work within 3 weeks is great, but that's not the norm, and it also doesn't mean anyone that can't get a new job within 3 weeks isn't trying hard enough.

In most cases if it's a really good job someone is applying for it takes more than 3 weeks to decide whom the company wants to interview, conduct the interviews and make the decision about which person to offer the job to.

 

[lakebum431]

I never said you had to do it in less than 3 weeks to be "trying hard enough". What I shared was my friends' personal experiences. I am a 100% beliver in collecting unemployment as long as it is used for what it is intended (a short term solution to get you through a BRIEF period of time between jobs). I am 100% against the moochers that sit on it instead of working for a living like the rest of us.

 

[bhelms]

...In most cases if it's a really good job someone is applying for it takes more than 3 weeks to decide whom the company wants to interview, conduct the interviews and make the decision about which person to offer the job to.

So in the meantime they stock shelves at Wal*Mart to help make ends meet. And a perspective employer with a good job to offer will look very favorably on that. They see someone who is not afraid to face adversity and do whatever they can to mitigate the circumstances rather than depending completely on someone else for their subsistance.

I agree with lakebum. Unemployment compensation is there to offer a hand up, not a hand out. There should be no shame in taking it for the intended purpose. After all, we've all paid into that fund with our tax dollars. But all the while the recipient should be doing everything (s)he can to not be solely dependent on that money.

In the current economic climate the $100K jobs are increasingly scarce and only the most qualified will get them. In many cases that will be someone who is willing to relocate. Many of us (myself included) have taken significant pay cuts to remain employed and not dependent on others. That's a matter of choice. And in the meantime we continue looking for something more viable.

As for me, I have been laid off twice during my career once for almost 18 months (half of which time I was in grad school). I never took a dime of unemployment. Instead I worked as many hours as I could for a contractor making about $10 an hour. Again, a matter of choice and in my case a sense of personal pride. I'm not trying to prove anything by that, other than to hint that I didn't really NEED that money at the time and chose to leave it there for someone else more needy than me. If I had been laid off longer the situation might have been different, but as it was I had enough reserves to weather a somewhat extended period of substantially reduced income. Hopefully this current economic situation will lead others to think about the imperative of setting more aside for the proverbial rainy day. At some point the UC funds are going to run out and the gov't. won't be able to borrow any more to continue to meet the demand. Where will you be then...?