News

Recession Briefing 12.30: Workers Abandoning Vacation Days

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

The rough economy has claimed another victim: employee vacations. Two-thirds of American workers failed to use all of their vacation days this year, according to a survey released Tuesday. (New York Daily News)

Though single women account for only 46.5 percent of the female labor force, six in 10 are now jobless. 59 percent of adults in poverty are women, according to the latest Census report, which found an extraordinary discrepancy between the poverty rates of single women (20.8 percent) compared with married ones (6.2 percent). (The Big Money)

Nearly one in three metro areas have started to recover, but virtually none of the nation’s biggest cities. One likely reason is that the nascent economic recovery started in the nation’s midsection, from south to north, a part of the country that has relatively few big cities. (MSNBC)

Chief economist Mark Zandi, cofounder of Economy.com, says the chances of a second recession are one in four. (Christian Science Monitor)

Slowly, signs of life are starting to sprout in the bleakest job market in a generation. No question, it’s still awful out there and will probably get worse. But something is happening on the job front — even in areas badly battered by the recession: finance, construction, technology and media. (Forbes)

Highly compensated executives, a group typically insulated from heavy job losses during recessions, have been hit much harder in the current slump, experts say. They’re competing for far fewer positions — keeping them out of work longer, in many cases — and grappling with professional failure for the first time in their lives. (USA Today)

Nearly every sport and sports team took hits in 2009, from layoffs to dips in advertising, attendance and sponsorships. But they got more creative to lure fans who have seen discretionary income dwindle. (Los Angeles Times)

Just as the economy is finally beginning to strengthen, the real estate market is showing new signs of deterioration. Prices slipped in many cities in October, new figures show, despite low mortgage rates and a generous tax credit meant to spur sales. (New York Times)

Thousands of internal e-mails from AIG, as well as supporting interviews, reveal a company wracked by more division, doubt and turmoil than anyone on the outside realized during several tense months in 2007, a full year before the federal government undertook one of the largest corporate bailouts in U.S. history to prevent AIG’s collapse. (Washington Post)

Recruiters are bullish on the outlook for executive-level job hunters in 2010. Slightly more than half of 153 recruiters surveyed earlier this month said they expect a 19% rise in executive-search assignments during the first half of 2010, reports ExecuNet, a networking organization for recruiters and executives. (Wall Street Journal)

If you come across a good article or blog post about the recession pass it on. To receive Recession Briefing in your inbox, subscribe to our daily email.

Tags: economy, News, politics, The Unemployed Life, The Working World