> BLS DAILY REPORT, FRIDAY, MAY 18, 2001:
>
> RELEASED TODAY: Regional and state unemployment rates were generally
> stable in April. All four regions reported little change from March, and
> 41 states recorded shifts of 0.3 percentage point or less, the Bureau of
> Labor Statistics reports. The national jobless rate rose from 4.3 percent
> in March to 4.5 percent. Nonfarm employment decreased in 29 states.
>
> In another report detailing the nation's weakened labor market, the Bureau
> of Labor Statistics says both the number of extended mass layoffs and the
> number of workers involved rose in the first quarter to their highest
> levels since the agency began tracking the trends 6 years ago. Extended
> mass layoff events -- those lasting at least 31 days -- total 1,664 during
> the first quarter. These layoffs resulted in job losses for 305,227
> workers. About 47 percent of employers reporting layoffs in the first
> quarter said they expect to recall some workers, down from 58 percent a
> year earlier (Daily Labor Report, page D-4).
>
> The U.S. trade deficit widened by a record amount in March as exports of
> U.S. aircraft and other manufactured goods fell while American purchases
> of foreign consumer goods from toys to clothing soared. The Commerce
> Department said today that the trade imbalance jumped by 16.1 percent in
> March, to $31.2 billion. That represented a $4.3 billion widening from
> February's deficit of $26.9 billion, the largest one-month deterioration
> in trade on record. The overall deficit in March was the largest since a
> $33.3 billion January imbalance. Economists had been expecting the
> deficit to widen again following the unexpectedly big improvement in
> February, but not by such a large amount (Martin Crutsinger, The
> Associated Press,
> http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/businessnews/article/0,2669,ART-518
> 66,FF.html; http://www.nypost.com/apstories/V8066.htm).
>
> The Conference Board said its index of leading economic indicators rose
> 0.1 percent, to 108.7 in April after slipping a revised 0.2 percent in
> March and 0.2 percent in February. The two straight monthly declines
> signal a continuation of the economic slowdown, according to the
> Conference Board's May 17 report (Daily Labor Report, page D-1; The
> Washington Post, page E2; The Wall Street Journal, page A2).
>
> For the second straight week, new claims filed with state agencies for
> unemployment insurance benefits declined, down a modest 8,000 to 380,000
> for the week ending Mary 12, according to figures released by the Labor
> Department's Employment and Training Administration (Daily Labor Report,
> page D-2; The Wall Street Journal, page A2).
>
> Nurse's aides working in nursing homes or providing home health care are
> more than twice as likely as other workers to be receiving food stamps and
> Medicaid, the General Accounting Office says in a report to coincide with
> a Senate hearing. Speaking before the Senate Health, Education, Labor and
> Pensions Committee, GAO's director of health care issues tells the
> committee about one in five health care aides has a family income below
> the poverty level. He testified that low wages have combined with poor
> working conditions to create a "serious shortage" in nurse's aides. While
> the population or Americans over 85 years of age is expected to double for
> the next 30 years, the traditional population from which nurse's aides is
> drawn will remain unchanged, he said. Nurses aides and personal attendants
> provide 80 percent of all the care given to elderly people, according to
> the chief executive officer of Cooperative Homecare Associates, a New York
> based facility that specializes in training home health care aides (Daily
> Labor Report, page A-1).
>
> All the forces are in place for a sustained employment decline, which
> could pull down consumption and turn a slowdown into a full-fledged
> recession, says Business Week (May 21, page 36). Especially hard hit are
> college-educated workers, who make up a big share of the tech labor force.
> According to the latest numbers from BLS, unemployment workers with
> college degrees account for more than half of the rise in joblessness
> since the beginning of the year, far outpacing other groups. To an
> unprecedented degree, this is a white-collar downturn -- and since
> college-educated workers account for about half of personal income in the
> U.S. that will have a big effect on spending.
>
> There are 5.4 million women-owned businesses in the U.S., with nearly $819
> billion in annual sales, according to new data from the Census Bureau.
> But the National Foundation for Women Business Owners, the leading
> advocacy group for female entrepreneurs, says that there are 9.1 million
> women owned businesses. Why such a big gap? Because different people
> define "woman-owned" differently. The 1992 Economic Census regarded
> companies 50 percent owned by women to be "woman-owned." But the latest
> report, released in April and based on 1997 data, applied a new threshold:
> 51 percent. The NFWBO, by contrast, counts 50-50 partnerships, as well as
> companies managed by women that have gone public or sold equity to
> investors. Both sides agree on one thing: Even with the Census' new
> definition, the number of women-owned businesses soared 16 percent between
> 1992 and 1997, compared to 6 percent for all businesses (Business Week,
> May 21, small business supplement, page 12).
>
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