Recession Briefing: Hiring Finally Happening

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

Job openings rose sharply earlier this year, evidence that employers are slowly ramping up hiring as the economy improves. The number of openings in January rose about 7.6 percent, to 2.7 million, compared with December, the Labor Department said. That’s the highest total since February 2009. (Associated Press)

IRS agents will be more flexible with taxpayers who have seen their incomes drop during the recession. (USA Today)

The number of U.S. households with a net worth of $1 million or more — excluding wealth derived from a primary residence — grew 16 percent last year, according to a new report. (Huffington Post)…

Poor Little Millionaires

Every year, Fidelity Investments polls about 1,000 people who are “millionaires.” This year, almost half of them said they don’t feel very rich at all.

According to Fidelity’s report out today, the millionaires saw an average drop in household income of 19 percent and real estate value fell 28 percent. Still, they reported an average of $3.5 million in investible assets and $306,000 in annual household income.

These people are very nervous about their wealth status…

Be Nice to Rich People

Paul Krugman blogged about the “paradox of thrift” for the New York Times this morning. Basically, people are cutting spending, which negatively affects the economy, which results in more job losses, which causes people to pull back on spending, and so on…

Funnily enough, yesterday a friend who has a designer retail business was lamenting the trend of lambasting the rich for shopping.