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But since the start of the recession in December 2007, 7.3 million Americans have lost their jobs and key sectors -- construction, manufacturing and retail trade -- are still seeing significant declines.
The president has not been helped by reports of flaws in the administration's count of jobs created by the $787 billion stimulus.
Ten months into the job, Obama did not even try to lay the blame for the economy at Bush's feet, as he has in the past. His only criticism was implied.
"When we first came into office, our immediate goal was to stop the free fall that caused our economy to shrink at an alarming rate," he said. "We've succeeded in achieving that goal, as our economy grew last quarter for the first time in a year."
But Obama has already taken ownership of the economy.
Republicans, he noted wryly during a July speech in Michigan, were eager to blame him for the economy.
"That's fine," he added, "Give it to me!"
Four months later, it would be hard to give it back.
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EDITOR'S NOTE -- Jim Kuhnhenn covers economics and politics for The Associated Press.
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At a Glance Competition: More people, more workers "He-Cession": Male-dominated professions hardest hit Education: Matters, but NO guarantee Duration: Longer periods of joblessness Ethnicity: African American unemployment, but lower than last time; more Hispanics in the workforce Age: "Grayer workforce" as young workers' percentage of workforce drops States: Beyond Rust Belt woes, bursting housing bubble pushes California and Nevada up into Top 5 unemployment states Sectors: More Health and Education workers, while fewer Manufacturing workers
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WASHINGTON (AP) -- The last time unemployment climbed past 10 percent, "The A-Team" was one of the top 10 TV shows and Michael Jackson was about to release "Thriller."
Much has changed since the jobless rate hit 10.1 percent in September 1982, including the composition of the nation's labor force. American workers are now older, more educated and more Latino. The elderly are more likely to be working. Fewer teenagers are in the work force.
After the last time the unemployment rate entered double digits, it stayed there for several months, through June 1983. By the time the rate got above the 10 percent mark again -- hitting 10.2 percent last month -- the proportion of workers employed in health care and education had nearly doubled since 1982, and manufacturing employment had shrunk by more than half.
Lawyers make up a bigger slice of the work force now. So do people who work in restaurants, hotels and other parts of the leisure and hospitality industry.
Here, by the numbers, are some other ways the work force has changed since September 1982.
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110.7 million: Size of the work force in September 1982
154 million: Size of the work force in October 2009
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10.7 percent: Adult male unemployment rate in October 2009
8.1 percent: Adult female unemployment rate in October 2009
27.6 percent: Teenage unemployment rate in October 2009
9.5 percent: Adult male unemployment rate in September 1982
8.4 percent: Adult female unemployment rate in September 1982
23.6 percent: Teenage unemployment rate in September 1982.
ANALYSIS: The greater disparity between men and women in this recession reflects the heavy impact of layoffs in male-dominated fields, such as construction and manufacturing. Industries with higher female employment, namely education and health care, have actually added jobs during the recession.
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15.5 percent: Unemployment rate in October 2009 for those without a high school diploma
11.2 percent: Rate for high school graduates
4.7 percent: Rate for college graduates
3 percent: Unemployment rate in March 1982 for college graduates (at the time, figure was reported once a year)
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6.8 percent: Proportion of unemployed with college degree in September 1982
14.7 percent: Proportion in October 2009
ANALYSIS: College graduates still have much lower jobless rates than those with less education, but they are more likely to be unemployed than in 1982. Job cuts in the financial industry and in high-skilled manufacturing, such as the aerospace industry, have caught up with them, according to Gary Burtless, an economist at the Brookings Institution. And companies in all sectors are more willing to cut middle managers than in previous recessions, he added, which also affects college graduates.
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16.6 weeks: Average length of unemployment in September 1982
26.9 weeks: Average length in October 2009, a record
ANALYSIS: More than a third of the jobless in October were unemployed for 6 months or more, compared with less than 18 percent in September 1982. One reason is that layoffs were more likely to be temporary back then, as manufacturers furloughed workers until demand returned. But last month only 10.9 percent of the unemployed were on temporary layoff, compared with 22.2 percent in 1982.
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15.7 percent: Black unemployment in October 2009
19.7 percent: The rate in September 1982
ANALYSIS: While unemployment among African-Americans is higher than the nationwide rate, it is much lower than in 1982. That reflects both good and bad trends, according to Roderick Harrison, a senior research scientist at Howard University. On the positive side, there is a much larger black professional middle class that is less subject to layoffs than was the case 26 years ago, he said. But on the negative side, more African-American men have dropped out of the labor force after giving up looking for work, Harrison said -- that means they aren't reflected in the unemployment statistics.
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22.5 million: Number of Hispanics in work force in October 2009
6.7 million: Number in work force in September 1982
13.1 percent: Hispanic unemployment rate in October 2009
14.4 percent: Hispanic jobless rate in September 1982
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Michigan: 15.8 percent
West Virginia: 15.6 percent
Alabama: 13.8 percent
Ohio: 13.1 percent
Illinois: 12.2 percent
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Michigan: 15.3 percent
Nevada: 13.3 percent
Rhode Island: 13 percent
California: 12.2 percent
South Carolina: 11.6 percent
ANALYSIS: Manufacturers in the rust belt were hit particularly hard in the early 1980s, putting Midwestern states such as Michigan, Ohio and Illinois in the top 5. While Michigan again has the nation's highest unemployment today, states like Nevada and California are suffering from the housing bubble.
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4 percent: Teenagers' proportion of the labor force in October 2009
7.7 percent: Proportion in September 1982
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14.8 percent: Proportion of workers employed in health care and education in October 2009
8.4 percent: Proportion in September 1982
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8.9 percent: Proportion of workers employed in manufacturing in October 2009
19.2 percent: Proportion in September 1982
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In a brutal job market, here's a task that might sound easy: Fill jobs in nursing, engineering and energy research that pay $55,000 to $60,000, plus benefits.
Yet even with 15 million people hunting for work, even with the unemployment rate nearing 10 percent, some employers can't find enough qualified people for good-paying career jobs.
Ask Steve Jones, a hospital recruiter in Indianapolis who's struggling to find qualified nurses, pharmacists and MRI technicians. Or Ed Baker, who's looking to hire at a U.S. Energy Department research lab in Richland, Wash., for $60,000 each.
Economists say the main problem is a mismatch between available work and people qualified to do it. Millions of jobs with attractive pay and benefits that once drew legions of workers to the auto industry, construction, Wall Street and other sectors are gone, probably for good. And those who lost those jobs generally lack the right experience for new positions popping up in health care, energy and engineering.
Many of these specialized jobs were hard to fill even before the recession. But during downturns, recruiters tend to become even choosier, less willing to take financial risks on untested workers.
The mismatch between job opening and job seeker is likely to persist even as the economy strengthens and begins to add jobs. It also will make it harder for the unemployment rate, now at 9.8 percent, to drop down to a healthier level.
"Workers are going to have to find not just a new company, but a new industry," said Sophia Koropeckyj, managing director of Moody's Economy.com. "A fifty-year-old guy who has been screwing bolts into the side of a car panel is not going to be able to become a health care administrator overnight."
It's become especially hard to find accountants, health care workers, software sales representatives, actuaries, data analysts, physical therapists and electrical engineers, labor analysts say. And employers that demand highly specialized training -- like biotech firms that need plant scientists or energy companies that need geotechnical engineers to build offshore platforms -- struggle even more to fill jobs.
The trend has been intensified by the speed of the job market decline, Koropeckyj said. The nation has lost a net 7.6 million jobs since the recession began in December 2007. Yet it can take a year or more for a laid-off worker to gain the training and education to switch industries. That means health care jobs are going unfilled even as laid-off workers in the auto, construction or financial services industries seek work.
"So we have this army of the unemployed" without the necessary skills, Koropeckyj said.
Sitting in his office overlooking the Clarian Health complex, Jones leafed through some of the applications he's received. One came from a hotel worker who listed his experience as, "Cleaning rooms; make beds, clean tubes, vacuum." Another was from a fitness instructor whose past duties included signing up gym members.
Many of the jobless seem to be applying for any opening they see, Jones said.
"You just don't have the supply to fill those particular positions," he said of the more than 200 "critical" jobs he needs to fill at Clarian, including nurses, pharmacists, MRI technicians and ultrasound technologists.
Contributing to the problem is that in a tough economy, employers take longer to assess applicants and make a hiring decision. By contrast, "in a healthier economy, you don't wait around for the perfect person," said Lawrence Katz, a professor of labor economics at Harvard.
To be sure, employers in most sectors of the economy are having no trouble filling jobs -- especially those, like receptionists, hotel managers or retail clerks, that don't require specialized skills.
But as more jobs vanish for good, the gap between the unemployed and the requirements of today's job openings is widening. Throughout the economy, an average of six people now compete for each job opening -- the highest ratio on government records dating to 2000.
Sifting through applications for jobs at the U.S. Energy Department's Pacific Northwest National Laboratory in Washington state, Baker said he sees "people that have worked in other areas, and now they're trying to apply that skill set to the energy arena."
"Unfortunately, that's not the skill set we need."
The jobs opened up after the lab received federal stimulus money to research energy-efficient buildings. Baker needs employees with backgrounds in city management and a grasp of the building codes needed to design energy-efficient buildings. Yet even a salary of $140,000 for senior researchers isn't drawing enough qualified applicants.
Baker said he's getting resumes from well-educated people, including some from information technology workers who want to enter the green-energy field. But he said it could take a year to get an unqualified employee up to speed on all the building codes they need to know.
"We're running out of people to train" new employees, he said. "We simply cannot attract enough (qualified) people."
The lab has hired a recruiter for the first time to fill dozens of positions. Rob Dromgoole, the recruiter, is going so far as to make cold calls to college professors. He's also visiting academic conferences to pitch jobs.
The trend has left jobseekers like Joe Sladek anxious and frustrated. Sladek's 23 years in the auto industry haven't helped his efforts to land a job in alternative energy since he was laid off a year ago.
As a quality control engineer for auto supplier Dura Automotive Systems Inc. in Mancelona, Mich., he made about $75,000. Sladek would review technical reports to make sure the factory's auto parts matched the specifications of clients like General Motors and Toyota.
He hoped to parlay that experience into a similar job at a factory making windmill blades or solar panels. Several factories were hiring, and Sladek landed a few interviews. But he never heard back.
At PricewaterhouseCoopers in Chicago, there's a shortage of qualified applicants for management jobs in tax services, auditing and consulting. Rod Adams, the company's recruiting leader, said huge pay packages on Wall Street siphoned off lots of business school graduates earlier this decade.
"That made our pipeline more scarce," he said.
Some of the openings at PricewaterhouseCoopers pay around $100,000 and don't even require graduate degrees -- just specialized accounting certifications or other credentials.
Formerly successful bankers or hedge fund managers don't necessarily qualify.
"We've gotten a lot more resumes, but they haven't been the right people," Adams said.
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Associated Press reporters Christopher S. Rugaber in Washington and Mike Smith in Indianapolis contributed to this report.
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NEW YORK (AP) - After getting a call from your lawyer at work, you might be tempted to turn to your co-workers and gripe about your acrimonious divorce proceedings.
Before you do, ask yourself whether sharing too much about your personal life could hurt you at work. Could it stand in the way of getting a promotion? Could it make you more vulnerable if there are layoffs?
What you reveal about your life can influence your bosses' and co-workers' perceptions of you and how competent you are. The subject matter may be just part of the problem - how much time you spend chatting rather than working could also be an issue.
"The person who interrupts the work flow, that is going to reflect a little more poorly on them when it's time for downsizing," said Cindy Post Senning, an etiquette expert at the Emily Post Institute, based in Burlington, Vt.
It's a good idea to think about what you share about yourself at work, and whether you've become that person who gives too much information.
Watercooler talk can be a vital part of working. Some sharing contributes to a sense of camaraderie that makes a workplace a more pleasant and productive place to be. Often, though, it's about topics of general interest, not personal problems.
"There is a whole set of things people use for small talk, like sports teams and local events," Post Senning said.
Still, because you're likely to have different relationships with different co-workers, the people you're close to may be willing to hear more of the details of your personal life. There are no hard-and-fast rules on what you can share, or with whom. It could be that the person you're most at ease with is your boss.
Politics and religion are often taboo topics at work. Other subjects that should be off-limits include too much detail about your love life or your nights out drinking.
What you might not realize is that even seemingly innocuous subjects could also cause problems.
If all you talk about is your love of knitting, for example, people may eventually tire of it and start avoiding you, said Rachelle Canter, president of RJC Associates, a career counseling firm based in San Francisco.
Your obsession with a single topic probably won't affect perceptions about your competency. But it could undermine you in more subtle ways, perhaps by hurting your rapport with co-workers. In turn, that could affect how much you enjoy heading into the office, and ultimately, your performance.
Even if co-workers share your enthusiasm about a particular hobby, you don't want to let it become too much of a distraction.
"Sooner or later, the boss is going to realize you don't have enough to do, and you're going to be expendable," Canter said.
Another pitfall could be the information you post online on social networking sites. Even if you post it in a way so that only friends can see it, it's always safer to assume anything you put online could become public.
You probably know people at work who give more details about their personal life than you want to hear. Apart from some inner groans, these oversharers generally don't cause any real harm.
If the chatter starts becoming a distraction, however, there are ways to cope.
"Do not in any way ask questions or egg them on. Nod, and be passive in responding," Post Senning said. Once they realize you're not going to engage, they'll eventually stop coming to you.
The tactic might seem cruel if someone is confiding in you about a serious matter, like a family illness. In that case, be frank in explaining how busy you are, and apologize that you can't give them the attention they so clearly need.
If you share a cubicle and can't escape the daily monologues, you might want to get a supervisor involved. Your boss may be able to leave you out of it, and simply note to your co-worker that his or her productivity isn't up to par.
There are of course times when you have a responsibility to share very personal information. If you're going through a divorce or wrestling with a chronic illness, for example, you should talk to a supervisor about any time off or other accommodations you'll need.
Especially at a time when everyone is nervous about layoffs, you don't want to leave any doubt in your boss's mind about your priorities. For example, when you're getting married, you need to tell your boss about the days off you need, but keep the conversation focused on what are likely to be his or her concerns.
"It shouldn't be, 'Yippie, I'm going on my honeymoon!' You need to think about how much lead time to give your boss, and how you can help make any absences easier," Canter said.
That said, you don't need to lay out every detail. Stick to the aspects of your situation that will affect your job. Anything else might be more than anyone wants to hear.
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