> BUREAU OF LABOR STATISTICS, DAILY REPORT, AUGUST 7, 2001:
>
> RELEASED TODAY: The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported preliminary
> productivity data -- as measured by output per hour of all persons -- for
> the second quarter of 2001. The preliminary seasonally adjusted annual
> rates of productivity change in the second quarter were: 2.8 percent in
> the business sector and 2.5 percent in the nonfarm business sector. In
> the business sector, productivity growth was the result of a drop of 2.7
> percent in hours, while output showed no change. This same pattern
> occurred in nonfarm businesses, as hours fell 2.4 percent and output grew
> only 0.1 percent. In manufacturing, the preliminary productivity changes
> in the second quarter were: -0.2 percent in manufacturing, 1.0 percent in
> durable goods manufacturing, and -2.3 percent in nondurable goods
> manufacturing.
>
> American workers' productivity, a key measure of rising living standards,
> rebounded in the second quarter for its best showing in a year. However,
> revisions to prior years indicated the productivity boom has been less
> robust than previously reported. The Labor Department reported today that
> productivity -- the amount of output per hour of work - rose at an annual
> rate of 2.5 percent in the April-June quarter. A revision turned a
> negative first-quarter figure into a tiny 0.1 percent growth rate. The
> second quarter's performance was better than the 1.5 percent growth rate
> many analysts were predicting and was the biggest gain since the second
> quarter of 2000, when productivity jumped by a 6.3 percent rate (Jennine
> Aversa, Associated Press,
> http://www.latimes.com/news/la-080701economy.story;
> http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/sns-economy.story?coll=chi%2Dbusine
> ss%2Dhed; http://www.nypost.com/apstories/V2025.htm;
> http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A42204-2001Aug7.html;
> http://www.usatoday.com/money/economy/2001-08-07-prod.htm).
>
> San Jose, Calif., hit by the tech downturn, saw its unemployment rate rise
> to 4.2 percent in June from 2.2 percent a year ago, says the Bureau of
> Labor Statistics. The increase was the biggest among cities of one
> million or more ("Work Week" feature, The Wall Street Journal, page A1).
>
> Big firms plan base pay raises of more than 4 percent this year and next,
> according to a survey of 1,500 companies by William M. Mercer, Inc., New
> York. But companies may reconsider if the economic slowdown continues,
> Mercer says ("Work Week" feature, The Wall Street Journal, page A1).
>
> Job cut announcements jumped 65 percent to a record level in July, led by
> telecommunications, computer, electronic and industrial companies, a
> report by the outplacement firm of Challenger, Gray & Christmas said
> today. Announced job cuts in July hit 205,975 , up from 124,852 in June.
> July's total was more than three times the level of job cuts recorded in
> the same month last year, the report said (Reuters, The New York Times,
> page C6; Lisa Girion, Times Staff Writer,
> http://www.latimes.com/business/la-000064025aug07.story?coll=la%2Dheadline
> s%2Dbusiness;
> http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/sns-techjobs.story?coll-sns%2Dbusin
> ess%2Dheadlines; Daily Labor Report, page A-3).
>
> For the first time since the mid-1990's, American companies are cutting
> loose many of their employees -- announcing in the first half of this year
> alone plans to eliminate some 777,362 jobs, compared with 613,960 in all
> of last year. But the usual protests and anger are largely missing. In
> the first years of the 21st century, layoffs have a new character. While
> it used to be traumatic to be laid off even once, some employees can now
> expect to get a pink slip twice or even three times before they reach 50.
> Layoffs are being spread more even-handedly than in the past, hitting
> women as often as men, top executives as well as clerks and production
> workers, good performers as well as bad. "Flexibility is the most
> important ingredient of corporate success today," said the director of
> surveys at the American Management Association. "That involves a certain
> thickening of the skin on both sides of the equation. Management is more
> thick-skinned about letting people go, and workers are more accepting
> layoffs as a condition of employment." The growing practice of hiring in
> one department while paring back in another also makes layoffs less of a
> target for protest. Thirty-six percent of the 1,441 companies surveyed by
> the American Management Association in its most recent poll, conducted
> last year, engaged in simultaneous "job creation and job elimination," up
> from 31 percent in 1996. The article is illustrated with a table that
> shows that the percentage of the unemployed who left their jobs,
> involuntarily, has risen sharply this year. Charted are figures from 1965
> through 2000, and source of the data is given as the Bureau of Labor
> Statistics (Louis Uchitelle in The New York Times, "Money & Business"
> section, August 5, page 1).
>
> The dot.com downturn drove many Americans back to the Old Economy. Now
> some workers are seeking start-up success in Europe, Asia or Australia.
> These dot-commers think their experience make them more employable
> oversees where, they believe, most countries are six to 18 months behind
> the U.S. in development-- and in some cases, decline--of Internet
> businesses (The Wall Street Journal, page B8).
>
> A sample of jobs comparing median base pay levels from July 2000 to July
> 2001 shows uneven salary growth. Software engineer 1 showed a one-year
> change of 4.6 percent; database administrator, 0.0 percent, interface
> designer-web, minus 4.4 percent, midrange programmer 11, 7.7 percent,
> telecommunications technician 1, minus 3.3 percent, and telecommunications
> analyst 1, 0.5 percent. Source of the data is Salary.com, Inc.,
> Wellesley, Mass.(The Wall Street Journal, page B8).
>
> Women who earn a master's in business administration cut the salary
> disparity between themselves and their male counterparts in half, a recent
> study shows. A survey of more than 4,500 people who received MBA degrees
> last year found that women typically earned 13 cents per dollar less than
> men before an MBA and seven cents less post MBA (The Wall Street Journal,
> page B8).
>
> The Chicago metropolitan region has more high-tech jobs than any other
> urban area in the country, including Silicon Valley and other reputed
> high-tech hot spots like Seattle, according to a new study from the
> University of Minnesota. In total high-tech jobs, Chicago leads the
> nation with 347,100, according to the study. Washington, D.C. is second
> with 321,500, followed by San Jose, Calif., the capital of Silicon Valley,
> and Boston, another traditional high-tech hotbed. A mixture of Rust Belt
> and new economy cities -- New York, Philadelphia, Dallas, Seattle,
> Minnepolis-St. Paul and Houston -- rounded out the top 10 (R.C. Longworth,
> Chicago Tribune).
>
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