It's Black Friday, right?
"Retailers pushing the practical; Stores offering deals on flannel shirts, underwear" by Anne D’Innocenzio, Associated Press | November 26, 2009
NEW YORK - This year, stores are also using necessities like diapers and socks as what the industry calls “loss leaders’’ - items that stores are willing to lose money on to draw shoppers through the doors.... The early sales from the big chains and discounters have helped attract customers, but the pre-Thanksgiving discounts at clothing stores in malls were mostly ignored by shoppers, BMO Capital Markets analyst John Morris said.
Yeah, that's me. I buy food, a paper, a cup of coffee (my lone luxury I still afford myself), and whatever basketball gear I need. That's it.
One thing that could work in stores’ favor: Shoppers who put off buying all but the most essential items all year may finally use the holidays as an excuse to splurge a little.
Look at them wishing, hoping, praying.... going to be a disappointing season for the retailers.
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WASHINGTON - A flurry of good news this week - including falling jobless claims, stronger consumer spending, and higher new-home sales - suggests the economic rebound, modest though it is, might just be here to stay.
While analysts caution that the recovery will be too sluggish to stop the unemployment rate from rising, the reports are at least encouraging enough to calm fears of a dreaded “double-dip’’ recession....
We call it a DEPRESSION around h're!
Lied to us the whole time so I grain of salt this before I flush.
Looked at together, the reports the government issued yesterday signaled that the final quarter of 2009 at least got off to a decent start. And holiday sales should be slightly better than last year’s figures....
Yeah, that's what I'm talking about! Always OVERSTATING POSITIVE RESULTS and revising downward later (we call it lying around here), and UNDERSTATING NEGATIVE NEWS before revising it worse. I'm WISE to the GAME, CHUMPS!!!!!,
The economy has lost 7.3 million jobs since the recession started in December 2007 and is expected to lose 145,000 more in November. It would have to add 125,000 jobs a month to keep the unemployment rate from rising.
Yeah, so why did the MSM HIDE the RECESSION for 10 months?
And the LOSSES are being ACCRUED and ACCUMULATED EACH MONTH (more water into the Titanic, cap'n!) during this JOBLOSS "recovery."
Some optimism was raised by a separate report yesterday that sales of new homes rose last month to the highest level in more than a year. All the strength came from a big increase in sales in the South. Sales in all other regions dropped.
I'm happy for them, but....
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So why were they so special?
“The only reason we’re seeing good numbers is because of government policies that are propping the market up.’’
Here are some highlights from the region:
--more--"Yeah, about those "highlights"....
"Economy’s gains called modest; Lackluster 2.8% growth recorded in last quarter" by Jeannine Aversa, Associated Press | November 25, 2009
WASHINGTON - The economy grew at a 2.8 percent rate last quarter....
Government told us it was 3.5!!!
The Commerce Department’s revised estimate of gross domestic product for July through September was less than the 3.5 percent growth rate foreseen just a month ago....
What did I just type above?!
The GDP report showed the economy started to grow again from July through September, after a record four straight losing quarters. For the current quarter, some analysts think growth will slow to around a 2.5 percent pace, but it could hit 3 percent if holiday sales turn out better than expected.
Please, please, pretty please!!!
Many economists say they think the economy will weaken again next year....
Then THAT is a DOUBLE-DIP!!!!!!
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Also see: GM may shed 9,000 jobs in Europe
That part of the bailout terms?
It also explains the auto show!
No line here, though:
"Amid high unemployment, some positions hard to fill; Skilled workers loath to job hop" by Katie Johnston Chase, Globe Staff | November 25, 2009
Even with the country’s unemployment rate at its highest in decades, some companies are having trouble hiring highly skilled employees.
Phil Nachman, an Arlington recruiter for medical device companies:
“Some of them think that the world is still their oyster.’’
One reason job seekers are not lining up at companies’ doors is that, despite a 10.2 percent US jobless rate, many skilled workers are still working; the unemployment rate for people with college degrees is about half the national average. And many of them are less willing to jump ship than they used to be....
It’s not that companies are not getting applications. Job openings are generating a flood of resumes, in many cases submitted with just the click of a mouse: “They’re blasting it like a shotgun,’’ said Nachman, of Nachman BioMedical. But often missing from the stack of resumes are those with the most experience - many of whom don’t want to leave their jobs during a recession....
Of course, plenty of high-quality workers have lost their jobs, but recruiters say still being employed suggests stability - and ability. And at a time when companies have precious few openings, they are being pickier than usual about whom they hire, holding out for the top 2 or 3 percent of candidates, said Ben Hux, director of legal recruiting at Boston Group, part of the executive search firm Management Recruiters International Inc. “There is a stigma with people who have been laid off, with good reason or not,’’ Hux said....
That explains a lot right there.
For companies, the additional scrutiny by candidates is only part of the problem. People are less willing to consider start-ups than they used to be, said recruiter Pearl Freier of Cambridge BioPartners, and less willing to relocate....
When a high-tech start-up folded in 2001 or 2002, for instance, every employee was left without a job, from the receptionist to the CEO, meaning there was a diverse array of talent looking for work; today, workplace specialists say the perception among employers, misguided as it may be, is that the people who have been let go were not among the top-tier employees.
That explains so much.
Ginger Gregory, the global head of human resources for pharmaceutical company Novartis, said Pfizer’s recent announcement that it is closing six research facilities means there will be more talent on the market....
“People want security,’’ said Scott Ragusa of the Waltham recruiting firm Winter, Wyman....
Is that such a hard thing for the greatest system of government and economics ever invented to deliver?
It was an agonizing decision for Larry Letteney to leave his successful consulting business this year to become chief operating officer at Second Wind, a Somerville alternative energy company.
Pfffffft!!
One of Letteney’s friends took a new job in June 2008, developing an Israeli software company’s US business. He was let go that fall.
:-)
Letteney had many debates with his wife last spring when he was contemplating the change. What would happen if the technology failed or the business lost its funding?
Or they lost $308 million dollars?
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