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Strategies & Market Trends : Zeev's Turnips - No Politics -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: yard_man who wrote (16151)	12/26/2001 7:24:32 PM
From: Sully-	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 99280

Report: Most U.S. Layoffs in Years Report: United States is on Pace to Hit Record Job Losses for 2001 CHICAGO (AP) -- The United States is on pace to record more job losses in 2001 than it has in at least nine years, the job placement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas said. Since the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, U.S. companies have announced 624,411 job cuts, more than the 12-month totals for every year from 1993-1997, the job placement firm said. Through the end of November companies had announced close to 1.8 million job cuts in 2001, nearly three times more than were announced in 2000 and the largest number since Challenger began tabulating such figures in 1993. ``This year the downsizing just dwarfs anything we've seen before that,'' John Challenger, chief executive officer of the company that tracks employment trends, said Wednesday. The worst year prior to 2001 was 1998, when 677,795 job cuts were announced. The job losses cut across three significant economic sectors: manufacturing/industrial, high technology and travel, Challenger said. Challenger compiles figures from job cut announcements and does not count actual job losses, which can come from firings, early retirements and attrition. The telecommunications industry led the way with 292,756 planned cuts through November. Besides the struggling economy and the Sept. 11 attacks, Challenger pointed to two other trends that seem to have led to more layoffs: an increase in mergers in recent years and a ``frenzy of overhiring'' that occurred as the economy soared in the mid to late 1990s. Challenger said he has also been struck by the fact that even industry-leading companies are now downsizing. biz.yahoo.com

To: yard_man who wrote (16151)	12/26/2001 9:48:14 PM
From: Zeev Hed	Respond to of 99280

I am not sure what you mean by "media", if it is TV, I rarely watch the thing. In the rest of the media, I do not see much of a perception that the Euro-welfare state is excessive. I would presume that it differs from country to country. The tenet that Europe excessive taxes (if you include the VAT, onerous?) somehow stifle their economies surely is debatable. They entered the current malaise well after the US did. I presume each country developed a system to fit its own circumstances, one reason that all these countries should not be able to live under a single monetary regime (because each has it's own unique circumstances). As for "soaking" the Euro and its comparison to the dollar, two very different circumstances. The Euro transition is a discontinuity, the dollar "soaking" by underground economies, turned out to be a US tax on those external economies. In time, the impact on the Euro will be "absorbed", but initially, disruptions will be present with an associated cost to the Euro's union GDP. The timing is unfortunate, since the transition occurs during a time of European economic contraction, and artificial contraction of the Euro money supply (soaking by the "underground economy" and going into mattresses to replace deutchmarks and dollars) at a time of economic contraction amplifies the underlying true economic causes for such contractions and could slow down a future recovery from such a contraction. As for agreeing or not on economic issues being replaced by "that they find advantages in doing their business in the given currency vs. another", would work if the "another" currency was available, after the transition, I think that most day to day transaction will have no such choice. All the members adopting the Euro must accept it as in essence the only currency. If there is not enough of it to support a given desired (or natural) economic growth, agreement to expand (or for that matter contract) its supply will have to be reached. Since the velocity of this new currency will be quite variable in the first few years, I can see unnecessary dislocations occurring, and quite often. Zeev