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Recession Briefing 11.13: Jobs Remain a Conundrum

What you need to know today to survive and thrive in the recession.

Job seekers take heed, the best cities to find work may be in Texas. The Milken Institute released its annual Best Performing Cities Index earlier this week, and the Lone Star state dominated the rankings. (Huffington Post)

When a huge Andy Warhol canvas sold Wednesday at Sotheby’s for $43.7 million — more than triple its pre-sale estimate — it may also have been a sign that growing talk of economic recovery is being taken to heart by the world’s moneyed class, for whom art collecting is a competitive blood sport. (Toronto Star)

As they draw up blueprints for the house of the post-recession future, builders are struggling to distinguish among what luxury home buyers need, what they want and what they can live without — Jacuzzi by Jacuzzi, butler’s pantry by butler’s pantry. (Wall Street Journal)

President Obama plans to hold a White House forum on job creation next month, an attempt to signal his concern about the growing ranks of the unemployed and build consensus on future action to stoke the economy. (Washington Post)

Neil Barofsky, the special inspector general for the $700 billion U.S. financial-industry bailout, said the program will “almost certainly” result in a loss to taxpayers. (Bloomberg)

The recession has made a slow burn through hundreds of small rural U.S. towns. For such communities, the loss of a large local employer casts a long shadow. Tax revenue falls, hitting local services from schools and healthcare to police forces and firefighters. (Reuters)

“We need to start doing something more than, and different from, what we’re already doing,” to counter unemployment, writes Paul Krugman. “The experience of other countries suggests that it’s time for a policy that explicitly and directly targets job creation.” (New York Times)

In the past year, more than five million people exhausted their unemployment benefits. Now, some are returning to work at jobs that pay considerably less than what they were earning before, a trend that threatens to slow an economic recovery. (Wall Street Journal)

After five consecutive quarters of economic contraction, the euro zone economy finally grew by 0.4% in the third quarter to mark the region’s exit from the worst recession since World War II. (Forbes)

Economist Nouriel Roubini said on Thursday that a double-dip recession can be avoided if stimulus measures are unwound properly. (Reuters)

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Tags: art, double dip, jobs, stimulus, The Unemployed Life