Bush's future at risk in executive suites - Newsweek's Samuelson

[question everything]

This election may be settled less in voting booths than in countless executive suites where hiring decisions are made. The irony is inescapable. An administration accused of being rabidly pro-business stands threatened by business – more precisely, firms' reluctance to add jobs.

(snip)


Few economists predicted the poor job growth. Theories abound. It's said that companies have become more productive by mastering new technologies. CEOs won't hire until they're convinced the recovery will continue. Efficient firms displace the inefficient.

"Offshoring" is the latest villain. Hordes of high-paying software and service jobs have supposedly left for India. The news coverage of this has been a bit on the sensational side. A New York Times headline warned: "No job is safe, unless it's at the nursing station." (The story didn't justify the headline.)

(snip)

Politically, little of this matters. In recent polls, "job loss" ranks with "terrorism" as the nation's most-important problem, says Andrew Kohut, director of the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press. Worse for Bush, he says, the anxiety seems greater than justified by the unemployment rate, which was 5.6 percent in February. In late 1983, the unemployment rate was still 9 percent but consumer confidence was about where it is today. What explains the exceptional worry?

Possibly age – those graying baby boomers. The median age of the labor force is now about 40; it was 35 in 1982 and 37 in the 1990-91 recession. Older workers have more obligations (children, mortgages) and less flexibility. Their job skills, though more developed, may limit their choices. Even people with jobs may worry more about losing them. Compounding their anxiety is this: in 1982, about one-fifth of the unemployed were on temporary layoff; they didn't have to find a new job. Now, only about one in eight is on temporary layoff.

(snip)


Find this article at:
http://www.signonsandiego.com/uniontrib/20040310/news_1e10samuels.html