One of my daily InterWeb stops is Dailyjobcuts.com. I do not really have a precise idea who runs the site and could not tell you how long I have been stopping by there (it has been some years), but as economic news remains salient to my life, I regularly check in.
From the general format of the site, it is likely that whomever operates the site tends more to the reddish/conservative side. That is okay, if that is not someone's cup of tea: the news is confined to the header portion; the actual information I am interested in is below.
There are three columns: Layoffs, Whose Hiring, and Closing. For each of these columns, the site is regularly updated directly to the the press releases announcing the news.
One of the things that the study of history can teach one is to look for trends. Effects are created by causes, which are themselves then in turn the catalyst for a new cycle of causes. As one wave crests and retreats, another comes after it. But it is only looking at things day after day that one can begin to see the patterns beginning to emerge.
I am not an economist and would not begin to suggest that I have any insight into the finer details of economic patterns. However, it is interesting to watch as some sense of mega-trends occur.
I think most people are familiar now with the layoffs that have occurred in high technology - many that are very big business names, but many also that are smaller (that I would never have heard of prior to this site). As those have moved on, a logical question is where is the impact to be felt. It then seems to emerge in the companies that support those sorts of businesses. Then, as those businesses are affected, the businesses that depend on people being employed and having disposable begin laying off. Then the companies that supply those business have layoffs. As they are users of technology (who is not these days) and secondary services (the first two tranches), their decrease in employment then moves back up to the top of the chain.
And so it goes.
Homes are another prime example of this trend. Mortgage rates are up; banks are beginning to layoff mortgage employees. With less homes being bought and sold, realtors and builders will be affected. That will work its way down to title firms and other secondary support firms. The restaurants they went to, the services they employed, will feel the pinch.
The hiring column also has entries, but they are a fraction of the other two columns, and the numbers that are being hired are in the hundreds, even as potentially thousands are being laid off.
It is fair to say that our economy has always had its share of "creative destruction", and that new things come out of failed enterprises. At the same time, it has been at least 14 years since we have seen anything like to sort of economic malaise we are currently facing; a whole generation has entered the work force and, like investors or real estate agents in a long running bull market, assume things will only and ever get better and go up.
When cracks appear, they usually start in the places we are not looking. Look in those places, and perhaps the future, while not being clearly seen, can at least be anticipated.
Toss a rock into a pond and watch the ripples radiate out from the impact point. Yet for many folks they don't see the rock hitting the water since it happens out of their sight and they only experience the waves washing through them and past. Friends of mine that own a neighborhood small grocery store/meat counter told me that the usual January slowdown is the worst they've seen in the seven years they've been operating. Their vendors tell them other businesses are in similar shape, people are hurting out there.
ReplyDeleteNylon12, a great deal of the pain is invisible to the national media as it happens in the nooks and crannies of America, where national media does not look. Large Tech Company laying off thousands of people gets noticed; small companies laying off tens or a hundred people does not. Both can be indicative of a failing economy and both represent an equal amount of pain - yet too often to Joe and Jane Average on the street, one is a matter of huge concern, one is invisible and therefore not impactful.
DeleteThat is why I like the site. It gives a more nuanced view of what is going on.
Very interesting website. I visited a work buddy last month and we talked for at least an hour. She's a manager of a small station. I had an email conversation with another friend at the home office a couple weeks ago. They said they hardly recognize the company they work for. The changes have been pervasive, rapid and constant.
ReplyDeleteI've been on injured reserve for 19 months now. I would be a new hire if I can make it back, even with 25 years experience.
STxAR - I think this is true of many works environments now. I have been at my company for several years now and it looks completely different in many ways from when I started.
DeleteI thought it was an interesting website too. Just perusing those three columns was rather shocking. With the current business trend toward automation, I can't imagine it will get any better.
ReplyDeleteLeigh, one of the most eye opening things for me is how many layoffs and shutdowns happen all the time that fly below the media radar. There are times I have even found businesses that closed in New Home or Old Home that I would otherwise never had known about.
DeleteI am neither a prophet nor the son of a prophet, but I can see a great wave of layoffs coming due to automation in the next 5 to 10 years. I feel as if we are on the next big technological advance that will impact whole new tranches of jobs.
I wish I had a keener sense of economic trends. I've been on the backside of trends since I graduated. I just hope I'm not on the backside of the not-working-for-pay trend I'm on now.
ReplyDeleteEd, I confess my ability to understand macro economics is not great. I do not understand many of the financial instruments that are used now ("derivatives" are a mystery to me). That said, inflation and job losses tend to make me think we are not trending in the right direction.
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