> BUREAU OF LABOR STATISTICS DAILY REPORT, JUNE 25, 2001:
>
> Workforce reductions in the high-tech industry have garnered many of the
> headlines and public attention this year, but layoffs in the old economy
> sectors have actually been more numerous since 1997, the outplacement firm
> Challenger, Gray & Christmas said in an analysis released June 24.
> Telecommunications, computer, electronics and e-commerce are among the top
> five job-cutting industries in 2001, according to Challenger, Gray &
> Christmas. The outplacement firm said its study of job cut data shows
> that high-tech firms reduced 267,907 jobs, accounting for 41 percent of
> the total cuts nationwide this year. However, while technology-related
> companies lead in job cuts for 2001, they constitute only one-fifth of the
> total layoffs announce since 1997. The firm said it analyzed more than 3
> million job reductions from 1997 to May 2001, finding that the retail
> industry was the top job-cutting sector in that time with 285,846
> positions eliminated. The automotive, industrial goods, financial and
> computer businesses round out the top five job-cutting industries over
> that span (Daily Labor Report, page A-8).
>
> The Wall Street Journal feature "Tracking the Economy" (page A8) indicates
> that the chain weighted price index for the first quarter, to be released
> by the Department of Commerce Friday, will be unchanged at a 3.2 percent
> increase, according to the Consensus Global Forecast.
>
> It is getting easier for people age 50 and older to find meaningful jobs,
> according to one placement agency that focuses on them. But there are big
> ifs. The biggest one is whether you can shed any anger you still hold
> against the employer who downsized or otherwise forced you into early
> retirement, says a man who has devoted the last 9 years to finding work
> for "mature workers". Job prospects are better for people who know
> Microsoft's Windows operating system. And it is important to have decent
> skills using the Internet and word-processing spreadsheet,
> relational-database and presentation software.
>
> In another sign of the weakening economy, more debt-laden Americans are
> losing their homes. In the first quarter, the number of home mortgages in
> foreclosure increased 9 percent to about 142,000, according to Mortgage
> Information, a San Francisco-based mortgage research firm that tracks a
> database of about 29 million loans (USA Today, page 1B).
>
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