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April 30 (Bloomberg) -- FPL Group Inc. , owner of Floridas largest utility, plans to cut 300 jobs and go forward with $2 billion in upgrades to two power plants after a January rate ruling forced the company to review its spending plans.
The lenders who won Philadelphia's two major newspapers at a bankruptcy auction are assembling a board of directors and hope to preserve as many jobs as possible, the executive designated to head the newspaper group said Friday.
In an open letter this week on Apple s Web site, Steve Jobs outlined several reasons why Adobe Flash, the multimedia platform, wont be a part of his companys mobile plans going forward, something for which the Apple CEO has been sharply criticized.
Blue Green Canada to present report at Good Jobs, Green Jobs conference in Washington TORONTO , April 30 /PRNewswire/ - WHAT: A report outlining new jobs lost in Canada because of federal government inaction on clean energy. The report analyzes investments in clean energy by the Canadian and U.S. governments since President Obama came to power, and calculates - for the first time - the new jobs ...
Columbia, SC (WLTX) - Right now, part-time workers are not eligible to collect unemployment benefits, but federal stimulus incentives may persuade state lawmakers to adopt reform.
April 30 (Bloomberg) -- If youre put off by Steve Jobs s control-freakdom and Microsofts long history of buggy bloatware, you might want to spend some time with Dells line of laptops running Ubuntu , the free, consumer-oriented version of the open-source Linux operating system.
For iPhone users who've been wondering whether their devices will support Flash technology for Web video and games anytime soon, the answer is finally here, straight from Steve Jobs: No.
NEW YORK, N.Y. - For iPhone users who've been wondering whether their devices will support Flash technology for web video and games any time soon, the answer is finally here, straight from Steve Jobs: No.
More than 2,000 charities have written to the three main parties demanding assurances that they will continue a �1 billion youth jobs scheme, as a Times poll shows unemployment is young voters main concern.
Said last visit he came in a van, this time in Marine One helicopter President Obama finished a three-town tour of rural Iowa with a stop of Ottumwa Tuesday. The town has lost nearly a third of its population since the 1960s as people left when manufacturing jobs disappeared.
CINCINNATI -- Car retailer CarMax is coming to Cincinnati and looking to fill 80 positions. A new 66,200 square foot building will open on June 17 at 12105 Omniplex Court. The nation's largest used car retailer is looking to hire full-time and part-time employees.
NEW MILFORD -- One wall in David Shaffer 's office on the third-floor mathematics wing at New Milford High School is adorned with the names of 355 students who since 1992 earned the highest score on the Advanced Placement Calculus exam.
UPDATED 1: 15 P.M. DETROIT - General Motors Co. will invest $890 million at five factories to make its V-8 engines more fuel efficient, preserving or creating roughly 1,600 jobs. The automaker announced the investments today at factories in Bay City; Tonawanda, N.Y.; St. Catherines, Ontario; Bedford, Ind.; and Defiance, Ohio. The spending, which has been in the works for a long time, will help ...
As many as 1.5 million American workers moved from part-time into full-time jobs over the last month, the best showing since January, according to Gallup's latest tracking poll. Gallup estimates so-called underemployment people who want to work...
Gardaí are calling for the rule which prevents them from taking up certain part-time jobs to be abolished.
The Garda Representative Association says many rank and file gardaí are experiencing serious financial difficulties and a motion for its Annual Conference which opens today says members should be allowed to work as barmen and security guards when off duty.
Delegates will also debate whether or not to withdraw from productivity and changes in work practice already agreed under the last pay agreement, including a refusal to co-operate with the Garda Reserve.
The theme of the Garda Representative Association annual conference this year which opens in Limerick this evening is 'angry, betrayed and disillusioned', leaving no doubt as to the mood of the delegates who represent around 80% of the force.
Delegates are demanding a reversal of the pay cuts and pension levies and the right to negotiate directly with their employer and they have condemned the Minister for Justice for what they say is his failure to adequately resource the gardaí.
The GRA have also called for the regulation on civil debts which says gardaí can be sacked if they get into debt to be abolished.
They say this rule means that gardaí having trouble paying their mortgages could also lose their jobs because of the debt.
While most of the motions over the next three days deal with pay and conditions - policing is also an issue.
Gardaí in Galway want a complete review of the Garda fleet and all Garda equipment to ensure it is safe.
Meanwhile, gardaí in Dublin's south inner city are calling for new legislation to include a mandatory 12-year sentence for the specific offence of a gratuitous assault on a garda.
(April 11) -- When she learned last week that the country had actually started adding jobs instead of losing them, my friend Molly was unimpressed. She's a slim, lively 67-year-old who has been trying to find work since September.
"It doesn't do anything for me," she said. "They're looking for young people on the cheap. I'm not young and I'm not cheap."
Her timing's not so good, either. In another six or seven years, the U.S. may be eager to put people like Molly to work. A major new study holds that by 2018, there will be at least 5 million jobs going begging -- and it may be up to people of retirement age and beyond to fill them.
How is it possible for the country to go from the worst job market since the Depression to a big job surplus in a handful of years? According to Barry Bluestone, a professor of political economy at Northeastern University and author of the study, it's all about demographics.
"The baby bust generation is simply not big enough to handle all the new jobs created by an economic recovery," he told AOLNews. "If the baby boomers leave the labor market at the same age as past retirees, we'll be in real trouble."
The labor shortage would rob the economy of a potential $600 billion a year in GDP, Bluestone says. It would also squeeze health care and social services, where many of the new jobs will be created.
On the other hand, everything could work out fine if only some substantial number of the 78 million boomers opt to stay in or return to the labor market -- and there is evidence they might, with a little encouragement.
My friend Molly, for example, has some savings and could probably scrape by without a job, but retirement doesn't appeal. "I'm looking for part-time, something I'd enjoy," she said. "I want to use my talent and experience and participate in life. I want to give back."
Many boomers feel the same way: They're healthier than earlier generations and not ready to hit the rocking chair at age 65. Others expect to keep working simply because they don't have enough savings to provide for their retirement. For those who have lost their homes and/or jobs and gone deeply into debt, the economic downturn has effectively ruled out retirement.
The recession has also forced more retirees to go back to work -- 16 percent of those 65 and older now hold jobs versus 11 percent a decade ago. Many have taken low-paying entry-level posts usually filled by young people with limited education.
Bluestone expects that kind of generational competition to be gone by 2018, when there will be more than enough jobs for all.
To help make up the shortfall, he envisions a substantial increase in the labor force participation rate, the percentage of those employed or looking for employment, among older people.
Current trends will not do the job. The government projects, for example, that the participation rate for people 65 to 74 years old will be 30.5 by 2018. That figure takes into account the studies showing that many boomers plan to work longer. In his scenario for meeting the worker gap, Bluestone pushes the rate up to 33.3.
For that to happen, he acknowledges, the traditional job market will have to be turned on its head: Employers will have to find ways to entice the once-disdained elders to stay on the payroll or get back into the labor market.
Full-time jobs might be reconfigured as part-time, performed by pairs of older workers. Some tasks could be adjusted to make allowance for elders' reduced physical capacities as well as their desire to enjoy their work. Social and recreational facilities at the work site might help.
Some experts challenge the Bluestone scenario. It assumes no change in the rate of immigration, for example, and they suspect employers will lobby the government to allow many more foreign workers into the country. They also suggest that employers may export jobs overseas rather than jumping through hoops to attract older American workers. And the critics doubt that really large numbers of older boomers will delay their retirement for very long or return to the work force once they do retire.
The debate will have consequences. At some point, Washington will have to decide how the nation should prepare for the coming of age of the baby bust generation. There are all sorts of possibilities to play with. If larger numbers of older people do remain in the work force, for instance, their payments into the Social Security fund could push back that program's day of reckoning.
Meanwhile, a number of nonprofit organizations are already helping older workers and retired people find jobs.
The AARP, for example, has dozens of WorkSearch sites around the country. They provide access to skill testing and instruction as well as on-the-job training with partner companies.
New York-based ReServe places skilled retirees in part-time jobs with nonprofits or government agencies where they are paid $10 an hour. The stipend is intended to encourage both employer and employee to take their association seriously.
As it happens, Molly is trying to find work through ReServe. "I want to try something new, and I may have found it," she said. She has applied for a job in a prison. "It's in the office," she assured me.
As graduation looms near and thousands of University of Wisconsin students descend into the real world in search of a full-time job, and thousands of others scramble for a summer position, it can be hard to ignore the frighteningly high unemployment rate.
Despite the fact that Madison has been able to insulate itself from much of the recession, the unemployment rate still remains relatively high, at 6.4 percent, making the level of poverty that exists throughout the city quite daunting.
"Madison has changed to an extent," Bill Clingan, director of economic and community development for Madison, said. "Even with the recession the city has been fairly well-protected with the university and so many state employees anchoring it, but still the unemployment rate is twice what it normally is."
While many students are sometimes able to avoid falling into a poverty trap because they are in school and usually supported by governmental aid, it is not the case for everyone, especially when part-time jobs are increasingly hard to come by.
"College students are notoriously poor. In a robust economy, there are enough jobs for folks," Clingan said. "But now when employers are looking for employees, are they going to hire the person with a family, or a college student? They become pitted against one another and a change in the service sector occurs."
Although more companies are hiring across the nation compared to last year and students stand a better chance of landing a job, the recession is still present, so the traditional next step after graduation is not clear-cut.
"[Students] start contemplating grad school, or maybe doing some volunteer work and a part-time job to weather it out," Clingan said. "It's fair to say students are not going to have a lot of money while in school … It's not right or wrong, it's usually just by definition. They have limited resources as well as competition in the work force. And that's unfortunate. Poor is poor."
While many college students may struggle for money to help pay their tuition, some say it is unfair to consider them impoverished.
Tim Smeeding, director for the university's Institute for Research on Poverty, said it is hard to talk about students being impoverished at all.
"That doesn't mean that some students' families are considered poor," he said. "But a student makes a choice to go to school and they're heavily subsidized. That's very different from, for instance, someone of that age who is an unmarried mother with two kids, who isn't in school."
Chynna Haas, president of the Working Class Student Union, disagrees with Smeeding.
Haas, currently a senior preparing to graduate in May, has worked two jobs since before her freshman year of college just to make ends meet. During the school year she works at least 35 to 40 hours a week, while still maintaining a full-time class schedule. During the summer months, she has worked up to 70 hours a week to earn money for the next year's tuition costs. Her parents are not in an economic position to help financially.
"There are students who are living independently at or below the poverty level," she said. "I have peers who have applied for food stamps and are using those to get what they need."
Haas, a first-generation college student who has paid for 99 percent of her educational costs and taken out two federal-subsidized loans to do so, will graduate in a not-so-hot job market with $20,000 in debt.
And although according to Smeeding, if a student has a college degree they will find work, it still does not ease Haas' time during school.
Haas said the university should do more to prioritize financial aid.
Still, possessing a college degree puts soon-to-be graduates in a better position than those who don't. And at the very least, when the economy turns back around, college graduates will be prepared, Smeeding said.
"Low-skill wages in the service agencies have declined," Smeeding said. "But employment among people with college degrees actually went up."
The Missouri Theatre Center for the Arts is laying off its box office staff and shifting primarily to online and phone ticket purchases. The decision, effective May 1, will result in the elimination of three part-time jobs.
The box office now will only be staffed during the day of shows, said CEO Eric Staley.
"It's not an uncommon thing in theater operations these days to do, in many cases, everything online," Staley said.
"So we're kind of behind the curve that way. But certainly financial concerns are always involved in decisions like that," he said.
The decision comes only two weeks after the theater announced expanded box office hours. The box office was open 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. on weekdays. One of the employees who got the bad news this week is Eric Seat.
"I don't have any personal bad feelings," Seat said. "I understand what happened. … I enjoyed the opportunity to work there, and now I'm looking for other opportunities."
Seat, 28, an illustrator by trade who often does work for magazines and books, hopes to find work in the visual arts field.
The Missouri Theatre has had well-publicized financial difficulties and continues to look for economies as it struggles to repay the $2.5 million it owes creditors for a massive renovation completed in 2008.
Staley declined to say whether the recent layoffs would be the last. "We're looking at everything all the time," he said.
"It's bad business to be speculating about what might be, you have to deal with the facts as they come up."
Summer Internships Abroad for College Students and Recent Graduates
The job market is down. Everybody knows it, especially us soon-to-be college graduates. So where can we go? What can we do? How can we get that extra something on our resume that will really set us apart from the crowd?
An organization called AIESEC (pronounced eye-sek; stands for Association Internationale des Etudiants en Sciences Economiques et Commerciales) facilitates 5,500+ of these international internships and traineeships each year in its 107-country network; many during the summer.
AIESEC has been providing these internships to students for over 60 years. I completed an AIESEC internship in Mexico in the summer of 2008, and know lots of people who have so in many different countries. It is something I would recommend to almost anyone. And with AIESEC's goals of developing global leaders and breaking down cultural stereotypes, you are really able to make a positive impact on the world at the same time.
An overview of what the internship database looks like going into summer 2010:
The top 10 backgrounds requested by companies searching for interns are: social work, project management, bilingual and cross cultural education, linguistics / languages, training and development, introductory education, international education, introductory development studies, advertising & public relations, and market evaluation & research.
So what are some of the jobs available? Here's a list of five examples, in no particular order.
1. Teaching English - Native English speakers are in high demand all over the world to teach English at all different levels. Most times, you don't even need to speak the native language.
2. Subjects Education - Teach a subject like entrepreneurship or work in a summer camp teaching young people about your culture.
3. Developmental Internship - Work on helping communities build themselves in one area; or work for an NGO doing research, fundraising, or other tasks.
4. Managerial Internship - Use your business background to work on management, human resources, administration, marketing, advertising, or economics.
The notion that the nature of work is changing -- becoming more temporary and project-based, with workers increasingly functioning as free agents and no longer being governed by traditional long-term employer-employee relationships -- first gained momentum in the 1990s. But it has acquired new currency in this recession, especially among white-collar job seekers, as they cast about for work of any kind and companies remain cautious about permanent hiring.
In just one snapshot of what is going on, the number of people who describe themselves as self-employed but working less than 35 hours a week because they cannot find full-time work has more than doubled since the recession began, reaching 1.2 million in December 2009, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Economists who study flexible work arrangements believe that the increase has been driven in large part by independent contractors like Sinclair and other contingent workers, struggling to cobble together whatever work they can find.
As the economy continues its halting recovery and employers' confidence remains shaky, economists believe that it is likely that the ranks of these kinds of workers will continue to grow.
"To the degree there's more uncertainty coming out of this recession than in past recessions, we would expect companies to be more cautious about taking on more permanent employees," said Susan Houseman, senior economist with the W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research, who studies contingent workers. "So they'd be looking for more of these nonstandard employees to hire."
Some, like Sinclair, have embraced this lifestyle, influenced by a growing sense of just how precarious traditional employment can be and reveling in the other benefits, like flexibility and diversity.
Others, however, would vastly prefer permanent jobs. They have struggled to deal with the instability, the second-tier status often accorded contractors and other temporary workers and the usual lack of benefits. In most states, they are ineligible for unemployment insurance and worker's compensation. Indeed, it is not at all clear that the shift to these kinds of arrangements is good for workers.
Christine Reams, 45, spent a dozen years as the director of human resources at a large hospital in Columbus, Ohio, but was laid off in July 2008. After struggling for more than a year to find a permanent job, she landed a contract assignment back at her former employer in September, this time in the information services department. Initially, the position, which pays half of what she used to make, was only supposed to last six weeks, but the hospital has extended her contract several times.
Marj Kome leads a group through the wildflower walk at the Madison Heights Nature Center.
The Madison Heights Nature Center faces closure as the city seeks to bridge its $3.2 million budget gap.
City officials are working with Oakland County Parks and Recreation in hopes it will take the reins and keep the facility open.
"I'm hopeful that we will be able to come to an agreement," said City Manager Jon Austin. "They've indicated interest."
The Red Oaks Waterpark and Red Oaks golf course on 13 Mile Road are both owned by Oakland County Parks and Recreation, which is considering a proposal to join operations with the nature center, said Sue Wells, manager of Parks and Recreation Operations.
The city is considering several options Austin recommended to balance its $29 million budget.
Also on the line are 23 full-time and 23 part-time city jobs.
"Some of these jobs are ones that are vacant or people are retiring, or are seasonal jobs that we won't fill," Austin said.
Eight full-time and two-part time employees who are now working would lose their jobs. Closing the nature center would eliminate a full-time and part-time job there.
The city's children's librarian, Alex Krentzin, knows he might get laid off.
"We wouldn't be in this big mess if the library was financed correctly," Krentzin said. "The City Council can ask voters for a special tax for the library. Plus, they don't even have to ask the voters. They can just impose it. Then the library would have plenty of money to operate normally."
Mayor Pro Tem Brian Hartwell rejects the notion of imposing a new tax on Madison Heights residents.
"City Council reviewed the law on a library tax years ago and again for the most recent budget," Hartwell said. "A new library tax, which is not being considered anytime soon, would create unnecessary red tape with the creation of a possible independently elected library board. Current funding for the library is stable enough to preserve the high level of services that our residents have come to enjoy."
Some council members are not satisfied with Austin's budget overview as written, which recommends the city dip into its rainy day fund to fill the $1.1 million void. Councilmen Robert Corbett and Kyle Geralds both call for Austin to find another way to bridge the gap.
"If we pass this budget, the consensus would be that $1.1 million is acceptable," Geralds said. "I don't think it's acceptable at all. We need to cut that amount by at least $500,000, if not $1 million."
Madison Heights has been in negotiations with its labor unions, which represent the largest percentage of the budget, some 67 percent, Austin said. Unions that have not agreed to concessions or whose contracts are not final include those representing municipal employees and technical, professional and office workers. However, an agreement won't happen before the budget is passed, Austin said.
On the positive side, the proposed budget also reflects a $111 decrease in the city portion of property tax per household, equaling a 2.5 mill savings.
"I think that's a significant achievement," Austin said.
City Council will meet again May 10 to further discuss the budget. Council must approve a final budget by May 17.
A hospital in Spain says it has carried out the world's first full-face transplant, giving a man a new nose, skin, jaws, cheekbones, teeth and other features after he lost his face in an accident.
Jobs are so 20th century. The future is part-time.
Whatever you want to call it -- contracting, contingent labor, part-time work, gigs, freelance -- independent work is on the rise. While the government does a poor job at consistently counting the self- and marginally-employed workforce, the available evidence all points to booming trend. According to various polls, almost a third of the labor force participates in freelancing, independent or part-time work.
Today the Times reports that the recession is adding to the appeal of working contract-to-contract without being tied down to a cubicle. Rather than destroying the old work model, the downturn is accelerating the transformation already underway, as white-collar workers grasp for hours, whether or not they come with benefits:
In just one snapshot of what is going on, the number of people who describe themselves as self-employed but working less than 35 hours a week because they cannot find full-time work has more than doubled since the recession began, reaching 1.2 million in December 2009, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics ... As the economy continues its halting recovery and employers' confidence remains shaky, economists believe that it is likely that the ranks of these kinds of workers will continue to grow.
If this sounds like a positive development to you, then congratulations, because you are almost certainly very young! Twentysomethings might embrace a job market that lets them mix and match jobs to make a career. Older Americans with families and dependents would prefer positions with a little more support. The freelance market has grown in the last decade into something like a skyscraper built on string and haystacks: a lot of workers with zero foundation.
Independent workers rarely qualify for unemployment insurance, health insurance, or wage theft laws. So when freelancers go out on their own, they are, rather literally, out on their own. In economy where the marginally attached are truly marginal, perhaps that's a government failure one can ignore. But as the gigs go mainstream, policymakers will have to think about counting and providing for this shadow labor market. Even intrepid independent workers need a net when they fall.
SALEM - VDOT says it's almost finished with the major job cuts its been forced to make due to budget slashing.
Some of the changes you'll notice starting next week include the closing of 15 residency offices. Four of those locally: Amherst, Chatham, Hillsville, and Rocky Mount.
Also, by the end of this week VDOT will have 360 fewer employees.
VDOT says it has cut about 1,000 full-time jobs, and 450 part-time jobs since 2008 to make up for a $4.6 billion shortfall.
(April 11) -- When she learned last week that the country had actually started adding jobs instead of losing them, my friend Molly was unimpressed. She's a slim, lively 67-year-old who has been trying to find work since September.
"It doesn't do anything for me," she said. "They're looking for young people on the cheap. I'm not young and I'm not cheap."
Her timing's not so good, either. In another six or seven years, the U.S. may be eager to put people like Molly to work. A major new study holds that by 2018, there will be at least 5 million jobs going begging -- and it may be up to people of retirement age and beyond to fill them.
How is it possible for the country to go from the worst job market since the Depression to a big job surplus in a handful of years? According to Barry Bluestone, a professor of political economy at Northeastern University and author of the study, it's all about demographics.
"The baby bust generation is simply not big enough to handle all the new jobs created by an economic recovery," he told AOLNews. "If the baby boomers leave the labor market at the same age as past retirees, we'll be in real trouble."
The labor shortage would rob the economy of a potential $600 billion a year in GDP, Bluestone says. It would also squeeze health care and social services, where many of the new jobs will be created.
On the other hand, everything could work out fine if only some substantial number of the 78 million boomers opt to stay in or return to the labor market -- and there is evidence they might, with a little encouragement.
My friend Molly, for example, has some savings and could probably scrape by without a job, but retirement doesn't appeal. "I'm looking for part-time, something I'd enjoy," she said. "I want to use my talent and experience and participate in life. I want to give back."
Many boomers feel the same way: They're healthier than earlier generations and not ready to hit the rocking chair at age 65. Others expect to keep working simply because they don't have enough savings to provide for their retirement. For those who have lost their homes and/or jobs and gone deeply into debt, the economic downturn has effectively ruled out retirement.
The recession has also forced more retirees to go back to work -- 16 percent of those 65 and older now hold jobs versus 11 percent a decade ago. Many have taken low-paying entry-level posts usually filled by young people with limited education.
Bluestone expects that kind of generational competition to be gone by 2018, when there will be more than enough jobs for all.
To help make up the shortfall, he envisions a substantial increase in the labor force participation rate, the percentage of those employed or looking for employment, among older people.
Current trends will not do the job. The government projects, for example, that the participation rate for people 65 to 74 years old will be 30.5 by 2018. That figure takes into account the studies showing that many boomers plan to work longer. In his scenario for meeting the worker gap, Bluestone pushes the rate up to 33.3.
For that to happen, he acknowledges, the traditional job market will have to be turned on its head: Employers will have to find ways to entice the once-disdained elders to stay on the payroll or get back into the labor market.
Full-time jobs might be reconfigured as part-time, performed by pairs of older workers. Some tasks could be adjusted to make allowance for elders' reduced physical capacities as well as their desire to enjoy their work. Social and recreational facilities at the work site might help.
Some experts challenge the Bluestone scenario. It assumes no change in the rate of immigration, for example, and they suspect employers will lobby the government to allow many more foreign workers into the country. They also suggest that employers may export jobs overseas rather than jumping through hoops to attract older American workers. And the critics doubt that really large numbers of older boomers will delay their retirement for very long or return to the work force once they do retire.
The debate will have consequences. At some point, Washington will have to decide how the nation should prepare for the coming of age of the baby bust generation. There are all sorts of possibilities to play with. If larger numbers of older people do remain in the work force, for instance, their payments into the Social Security fund could push back that program's day of reckoning.
Meanwhile, a number of nonprofit organizations are already helping older workers and retired people find jobs.
The AARP, for example, has dozens of WorkSearch sites around the country. They provide access to skill testing and instruction as well as on-the-job training with partner companies.
New York-based ReServe places skilled retirees in part-time jobs with nonprofits or government agencies where they are paid $10 an hour. The stipend is intended to encourage both employer and employee to take their association seriously.
As it happens, Molly is trying to find work through ReServe. "I want to try something new, and I may have found it," she said. She has applied for a job in a prison. "It's in the office," she assured me.
Michael Sinclair is contracted by the marketing department of a health care manufacturing company. "I think it's far less risky than being in a full-time job somewhere and cut at will and left with nothing," he says. David Walter Banks / New York Times News Service
NORCROSS, Ga. — Michael Sinclair knows that in a few months, his stint in the marketing department of a health care manufacturing company north of Atlanta is set to end.
He has been with the company for only six months, but he is not dismayed. In fact, he actually prefers his life as an independent contractor — constantly being laid off and rehired, sometimes juggling multiple jobs — to his old corporate position.
"I think it's far less risky than being in a full-time job somewhere and cut at will and left with nothing," Sinclair said. "I see this as the way more people will work in the future."
Economists believe that Sinclair's situation has become increasingly common. What is known as "contingent work," or "flexible" and "alternative" staffing arrangements, has proliferated, although exact figures are hard to come by. Many people are apparently looking at multiple temporary jobs as the equivalent of a diversified investment portfolio.
The notion that the nature of work is changing — becoming more temporary and project-based, with workers increasingly functioning as free agents and no longer being governed by traditional long-term employer-employee relationships — first gained momentum in the 1990s. But it has acquired new currency in this recession, especially among white-collar job seekers, as they cast about for work of any kind and companies remain cautious about permanent hiring.
More part-timers
In just one snapshot of what is going on, the number of people who describe themselves as self-employed but working less than 35 hours a week because they cannot find full-time work has more than doubled since the recession began, reaching 1.2 million in December 2009, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Economists who study flexible work arrangements believe that the increase has been driven in large part by independent contractors like Sinclair and other contingent workers, struggling to cobble together whatever work they can find.
As the economy continues its halting recovery and employers' confidence remains shaky, economists believe that it is likely that the ranks of these kinds of workers will continue to grow.
"To the degree there's more uncertainty coming out of this recession than in past recessions, we would expect companies to be more cautious about taking on more permanent employees," said Susan Houseman, senior economist with the W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research, who studies contingent workers. "So they'd be looking for more of these nonstandard employees to hire."
Some, like Sinclair, have embraced this lifestyle, influenced by a growing sense of just how precarious traditional employment can be and reveling in the other benefits, like flexibility and diversity.
Others, however, would vastly prefer permanent jobs. They have struggled to deal with the instability, the second-tier status often accorded contractors and other temporary workers and the usual lack of benefits. In most states, they are ineligible for unemployment insurance and worker's compensation. Indeed, it is not at all clear that the shift to these kinds of arrangements is good for workers.
Federal and state officials have recently stepped up efforts to crack down on companies that have sought to save money by avoiding paying taxes and benefits on behalf of workers they classify as independent contractors who should actually be treated as full-time employees.
The universe of contingent work and alternative employment arrangement is broad. The largest segment appears to be independent contractors, which includes consultants like Sinclair, as well as freelance writers, nurse practitioners, information technology specialists and myriad other professionals. In 2005, the last time the Bureau of Labor Statistics attempted to track these kinds of workers, independent contractors accounted for 7.4 percent of total employment
There is also a much smaller group whose ranks have been expanding in recent months — workers who draw their paychecks from temporary help agencies. Still others are employed directly by contracting firms, and there are also temporary workers, like seasonal retail hires, brought on directly by companies.
Consultant plunge
Despite the drawbacks, there are many who have entered this world voluntarily. In Sinclair's case, he had been working at a marketing and strategy consulting firm in the Atlanta area but was laid off last year.
After realizing that companies were mostly not hiring but still had short-term work to be done, Sinclair plunged into selling himself as a consultant. After taking a few months to get started, he found himself juggling a steady stream of part-time projects.
His current position at Molnlycke Health Care, which makes surgical gloves and other medical products, started out as a short-term assignment but has morphed into a full-time job as the company's interim head of marketing. The company plans to hire someone permanent but has been busy with other priorities, which is fine with Sinclair.
If he is offered the position, he said that while he would be tempted, he was not certain he would take it. His experience with his last company — the first time he had been laid off — taught him a lesson.
"I just saw you really can't rely on a company," he said. "I think too many people, even in this day, still think you can rely on a company for security."
Pueblo County School District 70's board of education Tuesday night voted 4-0 to outsource its bus service to a private firm, eliminating close to 70 jobs. Most of those positions are part-time and the contract with the private firm, First Student, gives all of them priority in being rehired if there are positions available.
Board member David Valdez was absent.
Ryan Elarton, the district's director of business services, told the board that the move would save $400,000 a year in transportation costs, in part because of reductions in service and the elimination of jobs that would have happened whether the service had been outsourced or not.
The district also will get a one time payment of $1.5 million from the sale of its current fleet to First Student, money that will be put into its capital reserve fund.
The contract requires First Student to buy 11 new buses and outfit all the buses it uses in the district with global positioning system units, cameras, retractable arms that keep children from walking alongside the bus and other safety features.
Board members asked Elarton about safety issues and he said that the Colorado Department of Transportation gave the firm "glowing" reviews.
The move was not welcomed by drivers and fellow classified workers who sported yellow stickers reminding board members they were taxpayers, too, and signs asking that the bus program not be outsourced. A large number gathered outside Pueblo West High School before the meeting, marching on the sidewalk with their signs. The board meeting drew more than 200 people and was moved into the gym from the commons area where it was supposed to be held.
While board members expected some resistance from bus drivers, public speakers addressed a broader issue: the district's apparent lack of interest in continuing to negotiate with its classified employees' union.
Already smarting over the board's move to a four-day week that would sacrifice some classified jobs and cut many peoples' weekly pay while protecting the teachers' contract hours, the classified workers pleaded with the board Tuesday night to at least leave their contract intact.
During a break in the meeting, Superintendent Dan Lere said that when the contract expires June 30, there is no requirement that the board extend it or negotiate a new one. He said that in past years, expired contracts have been extended but this year he could not say the board would do that. "It's a coin flip," he said.
Andy Bobian, speaking during the public comment session, became emotional when he told the board that upon starting his career as a custodian he questioned whether he wanted to spend his career cleaning toilets.
"I am following my heart working toward the education and future of our kids," he said, his voice breaking up.
Bobian pointed out that the 402-member union has a binding contract that requires negotiations and added that so far the district's cuts have been on the "backs of classified employees."
Another classified employee, Shari Price, told the board, "We understand teachers are important in the education process. Why aren't the people who support those efforts?
Why doesn't the administration want to extend the contract?"
Pointing out that many workers faced 16 percent cuts by the closing of schools on Fridays, she said, "You're asking employees to take wage cuts and furlough days on top of a wage reduction."
It is no government secret, but finding a job during these financially unstable times is hard to do. This is even truer for those going to college. With a new-found freedom, students-unless if their parents are rich-will find that they have more financial responsibilities. With a full-time class schedule, it will be difficult, even impossible to find a full-time job. Your best bet is to find a part-time job. However, which companies will hire individuals on a part-time basis? You college campus may be the answer for you. There are many part-time jobs you can get without leaving your campus.
If you have a good personality and love to walk, you may consider being a campus guide. You take prospective college students to different parts of the campus and answer questions they may have. If you are thinking about majoring in sales and marketing, this job will help boost your experience since you are selling the campus by getting them interested in it. Most college students will use a computer at least once in their college life. Therefore, there may be many IT jobs available on your campus. The positions may include fixing hardware/software problems, tutoring or giving general advice.
If you want to live in dorm for free, you may want to get a Resident Assistant job. You monitor what is going on in the dorm and acts as an adviser and mentor to the other students. This is an excellent opportunity if you have great interpersonal skills.
You can help students for their futures by being a Career Services Assistant. Some of your responsibilities would be to help students prepare their resumes, and help them search for jobs and prepare for interviews. If you are majoring in the sciences, you may want to consider getting a job as a Lab Assistant. You can at as a tutor and help the professor grade papers.
Most college campus has a bookstore. You can get a job as an assistant by helping students find the correct books for their classes. Do not think that you will not have a job a week or two after classes start. Students will be using the bookstore throughout the semester to purchase additional supplies, books for the next semester and gifts.
A hospital in Spain says it has carried out the world's first full-face transplant, giving a man a new nose, skin, jaws, cheekbones, teeth and other features after he lost his face in an accident.
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