Posted on November 20th, 2008 by Tim Eavenson | No Comments »
Filed under: The Financial Crisis | 
The DOL released the new jobs numbers, and they’re more dismal than we expected, which is likely what most people expected.
The number is 542,000 – that’s how many new applications for unemployment benefits were filed last week. A week before that, the number was 515,000. That’s a 27,000-job difference in a week, which is a lot.
Economists were expecting this week’s number to be more like 505,000.
In case you get swamped in these numbers like I do, keep in mind we’re talking about over 540,000 new claims for unemployment. Which means the 515,000 from the week before aren’t included. And this number doesn’t generally count people who are laid off but don’t file for unemployment, including most employees with severance packages and those who have given up the job search altogether.
This number puts the jobless rate at its highest point in 16 years, and Federal analysts predict the unemployment rate to exceed 7% sometime in 2009, according to the AP.
HT – US News
Posted on November 19th, 2008 by Tim Eavenson | No Comments »
Filed under: Labor Law, The Financial Crisis |
Two Chicago-based DHL employees have sued the shipping giant, which recently re-tooled its US operations, claiming the company violated federal law when it layed them off. From Crain’s:
The men are seeking class-action status limited to effected DHL Express employees in the Chicago area. They want a judge to rule that DHL Express violated the federal Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act and require the company to comply with the law.
The Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act (or WARN) requires that companies with over 100 employees provide at least 60 days notice if it plans to lay off 500 employees or 33% of its workforce. The notification requirements apply to labor and management alike. Companies that don’t fit WARN’s requirements often fall into similar state laws.
Most employment attorneys have expected class actions such as this to rise with the recent spate of RIFs. As companies deal with a quickly-changing market, many are having to make hasty decisions just to stay afloat. Whether or not the employees’ suit proves effective, it will hopefully be a cautionary tale reminding executives to call their labor attorneys before making business decisions.
Posted on July 24th, 2008 by Tim Eavenson | No Comments »
Filed under: HR Issues |
The Federal minimum wage lurches up 70 cents today, from $5.85 to $6.55. As the title mentioned, that’s about 1/5 a gallon of gas at $4/gallon. By next year, the minimum wage will be at a respectable $7.25 an hour. But given the rapid deterioration of the dollar and consumer confidence in a tailspin, the idea of the MW going “up” may be a little misleading. From the AP:
Last week, the Labor Department reported the fastest inflation since 1991 — 5 percent for June compared with a year earlier. Energy costs soared nearly 25 percent. The price of food rose more than 5 percent.
So the minimum wage hike is “a drop in the bucket compared to the increases in costs, declining labor market, and declining household wealth that consumers have experienced in the past year,” Lehman Brothers economist Zach Pandl said.
The new minimum is less than the inflation-adjusted 1997 level of $7.02, and far below the inflation-adjusted level of $10.06 from 40 years ago, according to a Labor Department inflation calculator.
$10.06 in 1968?! I always wondered how those slackers bought all the doorway beads and pot.
But the new wage level isn’t just too low to help the workers. It’s too high to help small businesses. The AP again:
David Heath, owner of Tiki Tan in College Station, Texas, said the increase will force him to raise prices for his monthly tanning services by about 12 percent. Tiki Tan had been paying its employees $6 per hour.
“There just isn’t any room for profit, and so this is why prices will have to go up,” he said, citing the wage increase and higher fuel costs. “I have to recoup those costs.”
The increase in the minimum wage could push food prices even higher by rising the pay for agricultural workers, said Brian Bethune, chief U.S. economist at consulting firm Global Insight.
But he said he did not expect the change to have a major impact on the economy because recent increases in productivity, which enables companies to produce more with fewer workers, are keeping labor costs in check.
Wha? Seriously? Did the chief U.S. economist at Global Insight just say the only thing holding the economy together is unemployment? Awesome.
If anybody – anybody – out there has a solution to this, please tell me. Or just call the President. Scratch that – tell me. I want this to get done soon.
