The Recession Will End… When Small Businesses Steady Themselves

Says who: Mark Zandi of Moody’s Economy.com.

“Small business tends to lead the way out, and that’s just not happening here.” (via USA Today)

Why it might be false: It might be false because we might be due for a slight redefinition of “small business.” In recessions and other periods of some job loss, more businesses tend to be created. Entrepreneurs are energized, and others are just looking for a way to generate some income. In New York, laid off Wall Street executives have been launching companies in part through a Bloomberg-backed incubator funded with $45 million. In the state of Colorado, the number of new business registrations has increased over last year…

Screwed: 2,500 at Sprint

A daily review of the employment fallout around the country and the world.

Today’s Total: 7,281

The good news: Production is up at GM Canada which recalled 150 previously laid-off workers… A Toyota plant in Georgetown, Kent. also brought back 275 workers that had been let go last year.

Sprint announced its plans to trim its workforce by 2,500 by the end of the year… Electronic Arts will eliminate 1,500 jobs… Microsoft is scheduled to make 800 additional cuts to “adjust to economic conditions”… Pfizer sold its St. Louis operations to the Monsanto Company and expects 600 layoffs… PG&E will reduce its workforce by 500… The University of Nebraska system will be forced into 300 layoffs in response to budget cuts proposed by Governor Dave Heineman… Herbst Gaming handed out 200 pink slips after declaring bankruptcy… UniCare Life & Health Insurance will cut 187 jobs… A research subsidiary of Johnson & Johnson laid off 174 staffers in Penn. as part of a global restructuring program… Grand Rapids, Mich. is set to release a budget overhaul that calls for the elimination of up to 150 city workers… AOL will lay off 100 staff members… The Star Tribune of Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minn. will lose 100 workers after declaring bankruptcy…

Recession Briefing 11.9: Reuse, Recycle, Regift?

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

More Americans are planning on regifting, or passing on a gift they got from someone else, according to a poll. A total of 36% of U.S. adults said they would recycle a gift this year, compared with 31% last year and 24% in 2007. (Los Angeles Times)

Make-up sales have risen despite the recession as women aim to look their best without breaking the bank on clothes and shoes, new figures show. (Telegraph)

A $25 billion nationwide push to improve the energy efficiency of buildings will likely not be felt until well into next year, potentially undermining the job-creating aim of the stimulus. (Washington Post)

Recession Briefing: Shoes are Recession-Proof!

The news you need to survive and thrive in recession.

Clothes, cars and houses aren’t on the list these days, but one thing people are still spending on the recession is shoes. (NY Times) Here’s how to spend less–if you want to. (Recessionwire)

The United States economy shed 190,000 jobs in October, and the unemployment rate reached a 26-year high of 10.2 percent, up from 9.8 percent in September. (New York Times)

The House voted yesterday to expand a popular tax credit for home buyers. The bill, which also extends unemployment benefits and expands a tax break for money-losing businesses, now goes to President Obama, who plans to sign it today. (Boston Globe)

LA’s homeless population is dropping despite the downturn–by a whopping 38 percent in two years. (LA Times)…

Screwed: 10,000 at GM

A daily review of the employment fallout around the country and the world.

Today’s Total: 15,116

The good news: According to WSJ, planned layoffs fell in October for the third consecutive month and reached their lowest level since March 2008… Puerto Rico has decided to delay the layoffs of 7,000 employees until next year.

The bad: GM announced its plan to slash 10,000 jobs from European division Opel… HSBC anticipates trimming 1,800 jobs… Daimler announced plans to lay off 1,000 workers at a Mercedes car unit in Germany… Microsoft completed its layoff plans by cutting 800 staffers… Associated British Foods is expected to reduce its workforce by 400… Anglo Irish Bank is set to lay off 230 employees globally as phase one of its “redundancy program”… Citigroup Inc. reduced its credit card and wealth management staff by 175 this week… DRS Technologies laid off 160 employees from offices in Brevard County, Fla… Sitel reduced its workforce by 150 in Andalusia, Ala… Novell laid off up to 130 people last week… Kingfisher Airlines handed out 100 pink slips to Indian pilots… Robinson Memorial Hospital of Ravenna, Ohio laid off 54 full and part-time workers… The Wheatland Tube Co. of Pennsylvania consolidated two plants and cut 40 employees… The Glen Electric plant laid off 40 workers in the U.K…

Recession Briefing 11.05: Wearing Your Dirty Laundry

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

Some coin laundries are closing and many others are battling sales declines, asAmericans are cutting back even on their laundry costs. Some are using the home equipment of friends or relatives, while others are wearing items multiple times between washes. (Wall Street Journal)

Remember those 99-cent recession iPhone cases? Well, Case-Mate is holding a contest for artsy people who take the time to decorate them. Win a mo-ped! (Case-Mate)

Last week the Obama administration claimed the $787 stimulus program saved or created more than 640,000 jobs, but a review of those reports shows that some are simply wrong, while others contain apparently subjective estimates. (New York Times)…

Recession Briefing: Antarctica Gets $18.5 Million Stimulus

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

How far would you travel for a job? How about Antarctica? That’s where $18.5 million of stimulus money is ending up. (CNN/Money)

The Obama administration is intensifying its search for policies that can stoke job creation without adding significantly to the nation’s crippling budget deficit. (Washington Post)

The Senate and House are poised to agree on a compromise measure to extend unemployment benefits that also would expand a popular $8,000 tax credit for homebuyers. (New York Times)…

The Recession Ended… in September

Says who: U.S. Commerce Secretary Gary Locke, as the department reported a 3.5 percent growth in the GDP in the third quarter following six quarters of decline.

“Today’s numbers indicate that the tough decisions this administration made to rescue the economy from the abyss were correct. We’re headed in the right direction, and even though there are still too many Americans out of work and still much work to be done, without the action taken in the early days of this administration, the pain families are feeling today would be much worse.” (Commerce Department press release)…

Video: America’s “Great Unwind”

One should always be skeptical when a guy who makes his living from selling people stuff they don’t need starts talking about “empowering” consumers and how great it is that people are shopping less.And there are some annoying, ad-guy aspects to the talk John Gerzema, chief insights officer of Young and Rubicam, gave at the TED conference.

That said, he’s not wrong. From the start of the downturn, we saw changes developing in society—people would think differently about money…

Recession Brieifing 11.03: The Underwear Model of Economics

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

The “underwear model” as an economic metric has recently gained in popularity, following Alan Greenspan’s to an NPR correspondent to the effect that the less men’s underwear is sold the worse off the economy. But the metric might not be as revealing as it’s purported to be. (New York Mag)

The pain of the financial crisis has economists striving to understand precisely why it happened and how to prevent a repeat. (Wall Street Journal)

Artist Andres Zapata has been working on a project called Recession Nation, collected photos, short stories, visual art and poems from Baltimore and abroad. He recently published them in the book “The Recession Nation Project.” (Baltimore Sun)…