Job Losses Could Keep Unemployment With Us

“Job Shift" Part Of Unemployment Challenge”

“The unemployment rate in Lee County jumped to 13.4 percent in January, according to numbers released Thursday by the state Employment Security Commission. The rate for Lee County in December was 10.9 percent.Statewide, the unemployment rate jumped to 9.7 percent, up from 8.1 percent in December. – Sanford Herald Facebook email 3:18 pm.”

A crisis in finance markets has rapidly become a global jobs crisis. Jobs are being eliminated and so unemployment rising. Businesses, local and global, are going under. Our blog includes a section called “Job Shift” and a download to a 1994 Fortune cover story based on a William Bridges’ provocative book, Jobshift: How To Prosper In A Workplace Without Jobs.(Google Version)Its premise is that one of the single most significant factors in adult life, “the job,” is disappearing, and that our individual and national well-being require a radically different perspective on how to make a living.

Consider these brief quotes (with emphasis added) from noted economists and commentator:

“This is not an ordinary recession that differs from other recent episodes simply by being somewhat more severe. It differs in kind.” Axel Leijonhufvud, VOX, March, 13, 2009.

“These jobs (651,000 more jobs disappeared in February) aren’t coming back,” said John E. Silvia, chief economist at Wachovia in Charlotte, N.C. “A lot of production either isn’t going to happen at all, or it’s going to happen somewhere other than the United States. There are going to be fewer stores, fewer factories, fewer financial services operations. Firms are making strategic decisions that they don’t want to be in their businesses.” Job Losses Hint at Vast Remaking of Economy”, New York Times, March 6, 2009

“this isn't likely an economic crisis that most of us have ever witnessed in our lifetimes. The problem is structural and across evermore sectors of the economy. Job losses that stem from structural changes are permanent. As entire sectors of industries decline, whole classes of jobs are eliminated, compelling workers to switch industries, sectors, locations, as well as develop new skills in order to find a new job. And that for starters can take years to work through.Are We on the Verge of Structural Unemployment?-Charles Lemos, MYDD,March 9, 2009

What if the crisis of 2008 represents something much more fundamental than a deep recession?We have created a system for growth that depended on our building more and more stores to sell more and more stuff made in more and more factories in China, powered by more and more coal that would cause more and more climate change but earn China more and more dollars to buy more and more U.S. T-bills so America would have more and more money to build more and more stores and sell more and more stuff that would employ more and more Chinese ..We can’t do this anymore. Thomas L. Freidman, “The Inflection Is Near”, New York Times, March 8, 2009

That perspective is nothing less than a new way at looking at the world of work so differently it will require a paradigm shift that requires we look at everything in our lives and society with a totally unique view. When a paradigm shifts, those who recognize it early and work on its assumptions emerge as leaders. The 13% of our workers would have a better chance at regaining work (if not a job), and our local economy improve greatly.Our Job Shift section is designed to help individuals, businesses, and leaders accept the realities of the coming change and prepare for it now.