Down, But Not Down and Out

The Securities Industry

This industry continues to fare pretty well relative to many others, losing just under 3,000 jobs for the month; albeit against downwardly revised numbers for October and September. Job losses for the year are down just over 12,000 from January and are down 27,000 from the peak employment month of June.

The Insurance Industry

If we can call the addition of 1,500 new jobs a bright spot, then this industry was a bright spot for November. Joining a short list of industries actually adding jobs during the month, direct life and health insurance companies have continued to lead hiring by adding to field level insurance producers in the financial services area.

The Banking Industry

This sector has been the hardest hit this year and November was no exception; job losses in the broad Banking sector have exceeded 70,000 this year, with last month adding 20,000 to that total.

Citigroup announces a cut of 50,000 jobs; bank failures continue to make the news and at this point there doesn’t seem to be an end in sight.

Overall

The Labor Department reported the worst job loss since 1974 in their employment report for November. U.S. non-farm payrolls plummeted by 533,000 which was much deeper than the 350,000 predicted by economists and which marked only the fourth time in 58 years that payrolls have fallen by more than 500,000 in just one month. Unemployment is now at 6.7 percent; the highest rate since 1993.

The big losers for the month were the services industries where over 370,000 jobs were lost, with the broad financial services sector losing 34,000 of that total.

The National Bureau of Economic Research made it official on December 1, by declaring that the U.S. economy had been in recession since December of ’07; something that most of the unemployed millions already knew.

– Jeff Testerman, Vice President, Sales, BrokerHunter.com

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