re: #451 lurking faith

Most people are cutting back their discretionary spending, anywhere from a little bit to drastically. I will be very surprised if we don’t see a ripple effect of further job losses.

Besides which, I am currently on the job market, and I have never seen the like. Not even close. Not many openings, and if you aren’t absolutely perfect for them the employer won’t consider training you on the one little thing you haven’t done before. Job fairs are so crowded you can hardly even squeeze through to get to the booths you want to line up to talk to. And I am near DC, which is as close to recession-proof as a region can get.

If this keeps up, I may go back to school and get a fresh credential.

I believe job losses will continue for some time. But that’s an entirely different metric than a spike in the jobless rate. Job losses, as already noted, have flattened out considerably after a large spike in January. They are still large, but they are steady. They’ve actually turned downward in the last couple of months, but the change is marginal.