Economic News 2000 December

updated: 2013-12-04

2000-12-01

2000-12-01
Jacques Steinberg _NYU_/_NY Times_
Looking at Higher Education, Report Finds Vast Differences Among States
"because of differences in state tuition, Vermont families must spend nearly 40% of their annual income to send a child to a state university, compared with families in Utah, where the figure is 17%...   The survey found that only 34% of North Carolina high school freshmen went on to apply to college after four years, one of the lowest rankings in the country.   That compares with New York and Connecticut, where the figure is 44%, and New Jersey, where it is 54%, the best in the nation...   The survey found that the state with the highest percentage of residents who graduate from high school was North Dakota, with 95%."
 

2000-12-02

2000-12-02
_Sheela Murthy Law_
Interesting H1B Statistics for 2000 -- India, Land of Techies
"According to the INS, in the first 5 months of the calendar year 2000 -- that is, January through May -- there were a total of 42,563 H1B Petitions approved by the INS for technology positions within the computer industry...   Indian nationals received about 65% of all H-1B approvals, about 8 times as much as the next country, [Red China], which was listed as receiving about 8%."

2000-12-03

2000-12-04

2000-12-04
_Christian Science Monitor_

2000-12-04
_USA Today_/_AP_
Veterans of Failed Dot-Coms in Demand

2000-12-04
Matt Krantz _USA Today_
What detonated dot-bombs?
"More than 117 dot-coms failed from 1999 September to 2000 October, according to Boston Consulting Group...   Poor business models are the leading cause of dot-com demise, says George Stalk of Boston Consulting.   He found 34% of the 109 pure-play dot-com fatalities were because of business models that didn't bring in enough revenue or were burdened with too many costs to have even a chance at survival...   delivery costs...   But Daniel Ries, analyst at C.E. Unterberg Towbin, disagrees.   Why invest in companies that can't even post a profit before they pay over-head costs?...   economic cycles...   [spending too much on advertising for the amount of business it brings in]...   'virtual supply chains'..."
 

2000-12-05

2000-12-06

2000-12-06
Edward Kennedy _Thomas_
Lay-Offs
"During the period of January to October in the year 2000, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that there were a total of 11,364 lay-offs resulting in more than 1.29M Americans who were unemployed.   In 2000 October alone, there were 874 mass lay-offs -- a lay-off of at least 50 people -- and 103K workers were affected.   Often when workers lose a good job, they are unable to recover.   In a study of displaced workers in the early 1990s, the Bureau of Labor Statistics recorded that only about a quarter of previously laid-off workers were working at full-time jobs paying as much as or more than they had earned at the job they lost.   Too often, laid-off workers are forced to accept part-time jobs, temporary jobs, or jobs with fewer benefits or no benefits at all.   I am always reminded that if you were to compare the economic growth in the immediate postwar period, from 1948 up to 1972, and broke the income distribution into fifths in the United States, virtually every group moved up together."
 

2000-12-07

2000-12-08

2000-12-09

2000-12-09
John Geralds _vnunet.com_
No Christmas cheer for US dot-com staffs
"at least 10 internet-related companies axed a high percentage of their staff during the past week...   He pointed to a recent University of Texas study, which found that 2.3M people are employed at internet companies.   When that figure is compared with another recent report, which found that 31,056 jobs had been axed by internet companies since 2000 January, the reality is a little brighter...   According to...Challenger, Gray & Christmas, November saw the most number of dot-com redundancies in the US since records began in 2000 January.   Last month US internet companies slashed 8789 jobs, and 31,056 staff have been laid off since the beginning of the year."
 

2000-12-10

2000-12-11

2000-12-12

2000-12-12
Ron Paul
Ron Paul Calls for and End to Withholding Taxes

2000-12-13

2000-12-14

2000-12-15

2000-12-16

2000-12-17

2000-12-18

2000-12-18
_USA Today_/_AP_
Holiday Cheer Dampened by Lay-Offs

2000-12-18
John Greenwald _Time_
mostly fair skies for 2001 (i.e. Time doesn't have a clue)
 

2000-12-19

2000-12-19
_USA Today_
Employers Begin Paring Jobs

2000-12-19
_Berkeley Daily Planet_/_AP_
Holiday cheer dampened by lay-offs
"a growing list of companies that have announced large-scale lay-offs in recent weeks, unsettling workers just before the holidays.   There is more going on than the usual trims and tucks companies often save for the fourth quarter.   The pink slips are a tangible sign of a slowing economy and more lay-offs are likely, analysts say...   job cuts across a range of industries...   monthly lay-offs have risen to about 51K during the second half of this year, up from about 37K per month through June...   While many analysts say the overall lay-offs are in line with projections of a 'soft landing' for the economy early next year bringing slower, but sustained growth with minimal inflation."
 

2000-12-20

2000-12-21

2000-12-22

2000-12-23

2000-12-24

2000-12-24
_LA Times_
Tech Immigrants' Effect on Economy
"Margaret Talev's article fails to mention what the immigration of thousands of high-tech [workers] -- usually paid less -- is doing to US workers who are under-employed or not able to find tech work."

2000-12-24
Carolyn Said _San Francisco Chronicle_
The Year In Review
"The much-feared Year-2000 computer glitch caused barely a hiccup on January 1.   But the actual year 2000 saw many dooms-day predictions come true, albeit in slow motion: The stock market plunged back to Earth, the dot-com revolution flamed out, California suffered a devastating power crisis, big-name computer stocks swooned and the economy got softer than a ripe Brie amid whispers of the dreaded R-word -- recession...
 
The first cracks in the dot-com veneer came as early as January, when Beyond.com and Amazon.com laid off employees and Value America narrowed its focus to sales of computers, electronics and office supplies rather than being an on-line super-store...   The dot-coms that stayed in business were cutting costs like mad, jettisoning employees, sub-letting office space, even -- gasp -- giving up foosball, fruit and other perks.   Stories about lay-offs became an every-day occurrence...
 
June... Challenger, Gray & Christmas issues first [tech] lay-off survey, showing that 5,400 Internet workers at 59 companies have lost their jobs since 1999 December.   Bay Area companies affected included Reel.com, AltaVista and Petstore.com...
November... Internet lay-offs for month hit high of 8,789, according to Challenger, Gray & Christmas; tally since December stands at 31,056 jobs pared from 383 companies...
December... M$ agrees to pay $97M to settle class-action law-suit by long-term temporary workers [perma-temps] who claimed they were improperly denied benefits."
-30-
 

2000-12-25

2000-12-25
_USA Today_
"hiring freezes"
 

2000-12-26

2000-12-27

2000-12-27 08:40PST (11:40EST) (16:40GMT)
Melanie Austria Farmer _CNET_
Dot-com job cuts surge as year winds down (graph)
Xent
"Job cuts for the period from Nov. 27 through Dec. 26 rose 19% from November's record of 8,789 to the December tally of 10,459, according to a study released Wednesday by international out-placement firm Challenger Gray & Christmas... November represented a 55% jump from October, when 5,677 jobs were slashed by dot-coms. Since Challenger Gray began tracking layoffs at dot-coms in 1999 December, the firm said it has recorded roughly 41,515 job cuts from about 496 companies. The new study showed that 91 companies, or 18% of dot-com companies tracked, have since gone out of business. From January through June, dot-com lay-offs totaled 5,097, according to the study. In comparison, between July and December, about 36,177 cuts were announced, representing a 600 percent increase over the first half of the year. Most of the job cuts have come from Net companies that specialize in activities such as consulting and financial and information services. Lay-offs in this area totaled 19,535, or 47% of the aggregate job cuts since December of last year, according to the study. E-tailers marked the second-largest group to trim their work forces, with 9,523 positions eliminated in total."

2000-12-27 08:56PST (11:56EST) (16:56GMT)
_CNN_/_Money_
Dot-com lay-offs up again: Climbed 600% in last half of 2000

2000-12-27
_At New York_
Dot-Com Job Cuts Hit New Record
ComputerWorld
"The number of jobs cut from the dot-com ranks reached 10,459 this month, a 19% jump over November's report and a new record, according to out-placement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas.   The company, which began tracking the lay-offs in December of last year, said this month marked the seventh consecutive month in which dot-com cuts increased over the previous month, even though the pace slowed somewhat.   For example, November's cuts were a 55% increase over the number of cut-backs in October, the firm added...   From January through June, job cuts at Internet-related companies totaled 5,097 nationwide.   But from July to December, that number grew to 36,177 dot-com cuts, an increase of about 600%...   'In the first 6 months, all you heard about were job fairs, lavish recruiting parties and after-hours mixers where would-be entrepreneurs hoped to meet.', [John Challenger] said.   Now, he added, pink-slip parties are the rage..."

2000-12-27
_AP_/_USA Today_
Internet job cuts climb 19% in December
CNN/Money
"December marked the seventh consecutive month in which job cuts at Internet companies increased over the previous month...   Internet firms announced 10,459 job cuts in December, a 19% increase over November's prior record total of 8,789 cuts.   But that increase was small compared to the 55% jump in job cuts between October and November.   A report released by international out-placement firm Challenger, Gray &emp; Christmas revealed a stark comparison between the first 6 months of 2000 and the last 6 months.   From January through June, dot.com job cut announcements totaled 5,097.   But between July and December, 36,177 cuts were announced, a 600% jump...   [Since 1999 December] 41,515 cuts [have been announced by] 496 companies.   The report shows 91 companies, or 18%, have gone out of business."

2000-12-27
_USA Today_
"41,515 since last December"

2000-12-27
_USA Today_/_Bloomberg_
Dot-com Job Cuts Increase 19% in December

Dot-Com Job Cuts Announced

1999 Dec	301
2000 Jan	303
2000 Feb	130
2000 Mar	25
2000 Apr	327
2000 May	2,660
2000 Jun	1,652
2000 Jul	2,194
2000 Aug	4,193
2000 Sep	4,805
2000 Oct	5,677
2000 Nov	8,789
2000 Dec	10,450
total	41,515

 

2000-12-28

2000-12-28
_USA Today_/_AP_
Internet Job Cuts Climb 19% in December

2000-12-28
_USA Today_
"hiring freezes"
 

2000-12-29

2000-12-30

2000-12-31

2000-12-31
Julie Bennett _Chicago Tribune_
Eat a Little Crow: Former Firms May Be Best Chance for Laid-Off Internet Workers
 

2000 December
_Migration News_
Legislation: H-1B & LIFA
archive
 

1999-09-06 through 2000-01-31
Linda Muller _Buchanan's Internet Brigade_
H-1B horror stories

1999/2000
_Queensland Department of Industrial Relations_
National Wage Case 1999/2000 (with graphs)
"Employment growth for much of the 1990s was slower than during the previous decade but in the last 3 years the unemployment rate has fallen below 8%.   Job vacancies have been trending upwards at a steady rate since 1998 November (18% increase in the last year)...
 
In the 1990s, however, a significant proportion of the growth in non-standard [contingent/temporary/bodyshopping] work has taken place through the contracting out of work to employment agencies and labour hire companies.   In just 6 years, between 1989 and 1995, over one third of work-places in the Australian Work-place Industrial Relations Survey (AWIRS) panel data had contracted out some of their services.   Over this period the proportion of work-places using agency workers jumped from 14% to 21% -- an increase of 50%.   Overall, the proportion of non-employees as a percentage of employees increased by nearly 40% (Morehead et al 1997, 'Change at Work: The 1995 AWIRS Survey' pp.46-47).
 
As a result of these changes, traditional avenues into permanent jobs have diminished.   These changes are not welcomed by all of the affected work-force...   about one third of people work in these jobs because of employment reasons, generally because it's the only type of work available.   Amongst full-time casuals, the 'only type of work available' reason was more than twice as common as any other reason, and accounted for nearly 35% of the total (ABS 1997b, Tables 7 & 8 Cat No 6247.1)...
 
The significance of non-standard employment for falling living standards is 2-fold.   First, the precarious nature of the employment relationship erodes both full-year and life-time earnings potential.   Secondly, the bargaining position of precarious workers is much weaker than those employees working under standard employment relations...
 
Many of the work-place changes which have occurred since the early 1990s have eroded conditions of employment, particularly concerning hours of work and patterns of work intensification, and casual workers are amongst the least able to resist this deterioration in their working lives (Australian Centre for Industrial Relations Research and Training [ACIRRT] _Australia at Work: Just Managing?_ 1999).
 
There is an important connection between unemployment and non-standard employment.   There is a significant group amongst the unemployed who move between unemployment, under-employment, and various forms of non-standard employment.   These people are being 'churned' through the labour market, cycled 'in and out of work without finding a long-term secure job'.   The ABS has recently identified a significant amount of labour market churning, particularly at the bottom of the labour market.   For example, starting in 1995 May the ABS followed the fortunes of a sample of job seekers over a period of 18 months.   In that time, about 70% of the sample worked for some period of time, but two-thirds of their jobs were casual and 90% were short-term.   At the end of the 18 months, most of them were unemployed again.
 
The unemployed and the low paid are not 2 distinct groups of people.   Rather, labour market churning shows that significant numbers of the unemployed can expect to be engaged in low paid and precarious employment, while significant numbers of the low paid work-force can expect to move into unemployment or under-employment.   Protecting the interests of this group of people requires an increase in the hourly rates of pay for low paid jobs, since the living standards of this combined group (the low paid workers/unemployed) hinge on the adequacy of their remuneration when they are in work.   If the Commission does not ensure this, ie, an adequate hourly rate of pay when work is available, then no other institution is likely to."
-30-

2000
_Pop.Stop_
More Information about the H-1B Foreign Temporary Worker Program from 2000

2000
David Southgate _Techies_
Studies on age discrimination inconclusive: Two agencies call for further research into the perceived preference for hiring younger workers.

2000
_India Child_
Life Expectancy and Mortality in India
"The average Indian male born in the 1990s can expect to live 58.5 years; women can expect to live only slightly longer (59.6 years), according to 1995 estimates.   Life expectancy has risen dramatically throughout the century from a scant 20 years in the 1911-1920 period.   Although men enjoyed a slightly longer life expectancy throughout the first part of the twentieth century, by 1990 women had slightly surpassed men.   The death rate declined from 48.6 per 1K in the 1910-20 period to 15 per 1K in the 1970s, and improved thereafter, reaching ten per 1K by 1990, a rate that held steady through the mid-1990s.   India's high infant mortality rate was estimated to exceed 76 per 1K live births in 1995 (see table 7, Appendix).   30% of infants had low birth weights, and the death rate for children aged 1 to 4 years was around 10 per 1K of the population."

2000
rob zand
a geographical analysis of h-1b visa holders (pdf)

2000
Emilio J. Castilla, Hokyu Hwant, Ellen Granovetter & Mark Granovetter
Social Networks in Silicon Valley pp 220-221, 229, 230, 231, 234, 237 and note 4 pg 394

"Scholars have written extensively on the role of social networks in allocating labor (see Granovetter 1995a).   [Recruiting] often occurs not through close friends, but from what Granovetter (1973) called the 'strength of weak ties'.   Close friends know the same people you do, whereas acquaintances are better bridges to new contacts and non-redundant information.   Firms benefit from employees' social networks, and employers are thus willing to pay monetary bonuses to them for successful referrals (Fernandez and Weinberg 1997; Fernandez, Castilla, and Moore 2000).
 
Workers' social connections are considered resources that yield economic returns in the form of better hiring outcomes.   Employees hired though social networks tend to quit less, experience faster mobility inside an organization, and perform better than those recruited through other means.   Commenting on Silicon Valley's exceptionally high rates of inter-firm mobility, Saxenian (1994) has argued that 'The region's engineers developed loyalties to each other and to advancing technology, rather than to individual firms or even industries.'.   The result of this unique culture and vast network of weak ties is that engineers in the Valley move frequently from one project or company to another.
 
High mobility reinforces the dense networks, strengthening their role as channels through which technical and market information, as well as other intangibles -- organizational culture and trust, for example -- are diffused and shared among firms.   Engineers not only hop around firms in the same industry; they also move from one industry and/or institutional sector to another -- from technical firms to venture capital firms or to university research centers -- creating cross-institutional ties and loosely integrating different institutional nodes in Silicon Valley...
 
Further, venture capitalists often (re)organize the boards of directors of their start-ups, sometimes reducing the role of original founders and even severing the original founders from their own creations; Cisco Systems and Silicon Graphics were 2 [in]famous cases...
 
Recent research on the 'small world problem' (known to the general public as the issue of 'six degrees of separation') shows that a remarkably small number of strategically placed ties can dramatically increase the connectivity of a network (see Watts 1999)...   The Honors Cooperative Program, founded by Frederick Terman in 1953, made it possible for local companies to send their engineers and scientists to pursue advanced degrees at Stanford as part-time students while working full time.   The program 'strengthened the ties between firms and the university and allowed engineers to keep up to date technically and to build professional contacts' (Saxenian 1994, 23)...   Now foreign firms can send their employees to Stanford to study Silicon Valley for a nominal fee.   In fact, one of Stanford's main current roles is to attract people from all over the world to the region, which is a crucial matter, as Silicon Valley start-ups are increasingly formed by nationals of foreign countries (see Chapter 12)...
 
the top 10 technology regions of the United States, which include Atlanta, Austin, Boston, Dallas, Denver, Phoenix, Portland, Raleigh-Durham, Salt Lake City, and Seattle (Joint Venture: Silicon Valley Network, 'Index of Silicon Valley', various issues)...
 
Valentine's connection to Fairchild Semiconductor salesmen led him to invest in Atari, entering the home video game industry.   In 1976 Atari was bought by Warner Communications, which brought large returns to Sequoia.   The founder of Atari, Nolan Bushnell, subsequently referred Steve Jobs, who worked for Atari, to Valentine.   Jobs approached Valentine in 1977 in his quest to found Apple Computer; though Valentine passed on this funding opportunity, he did connect Jobs to his ultimate financial supporters...   This list includes only professional associations whose focus is technology industry.   It does not include the numerous Chinese and Indian political, social, and cultural organizations in the region; nor does it include ethnic business or trade associations for non-technology industries."
-30-

2000
Jennifer Wipf & Peter Wipf _About.com_
Indentured Service 2000: Behind the High-Tech Visa Crunch
"Having collected a staggering $10M in campaign funds from high-tech companies, both Republicans and Democrats are eager to move forward without giving much thought to the anti-immigrant abuses against foreigners that exist in the system."

2000
Margret M. Blair & Thomas A. Kochan
The New Relationship: Human Capital in the American Corporation
"Reports of corporate life over the past decade suggest an historic break in the social contract between employers & employees...   Entire functions & departments are routinely out-sourced to contractors...   The prospect of a life-time career... is in decline... and job security has become much more contingent on the short-term [whims] of the employer...   Silicon Valley is presented as the model for a competitive economy with its rapid mobility [disposability] of employees across companies and 'learning by doing' as opposed to formal training programs [e.g. employers are trying to get the benefits of training without paying for it]...   These developments are often presented as... breaking down best practice principles about how employees should be managed and companies run."

2000
"Tech JOB CUTS: 1999 December-2000 December.

1999 December	301
2000 January	4,805
2000 October	5,677
2000 November	8,789
2000 December	10,459
Total:	41,515

2000 June
_The Hessians_
The next phase
"John Challenger, chief executive of Chicago-based job-placement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas. 'Now we're moving into the second phase of the digital revolution... where we're going to sort out the companies that don't produce.   There's no doubt you're going to see a summer littered with dot-com lay-offs.'"

2000 June
Patricia Buckley, Sabrina Montes, David Henry, Donald Dalton, Gurmukh Gill Jesus Durnagan, Susan Laporte, Sandra Cooke, Dennis Pastore, Lee Price, Robert Shapiro, Jeffrey Mayer
_Digital 2000_ US Dept. of Commerce Economics & Statistics Administration pg 4 (v)
"Declines in computer prices, which were already rapid -- roughly 12% per year on average between 1987 & 1994 -- accelerated to 26% per year during 1995-1999.   Between 1994 & 1998 (the last 4 years for which data are available), the price of telecommunications equipment declined by 2% a year.   Declining IT prices & years of sustained economic growth have spurred massive investments not only in computer & communications equipment, but in new software that harnesses & enhances the productive capacity of that equipment.   Real business investment in IT equipment & software more than doubled between 1995 & 1999, from $243G to $510G.   The software component of these totals increased over the period from $82G to $149G."

2000 June
Patricia Buckley, Sabrina Montes, David Henry, Donald Dalton, Gurmukh Gill Jesus Durnagan, Susan Laporte, Sandra Cooke, Dennis Pastore, Lee Price, Robert Shapiro, Jeffrey Mayer
_Digital 2000_ US Dept. of Commerce Economics & Statistics Administration pg 5 (vi)
"Between 1994 & 1999, US R&D investment increased at an average annual (inflation adjusted) rate of about 6% -- up from roughly 0.3% during the previous 5-year period. The lion's share of this growth -- 37% between 1995 & 1998 -- occurred in IT industries. In 1998, IT industries invested $44.8G in R&D, or nearly one-third of all company-funded R&D."

2000
Digital Economy 2000 (pdf)
"In 1998, the IT work-force -- covering workers in IT-producing industries and workers in IT occupations in other industries -- totaled roughly 7.4M workers, or 6.1% of all workers.   While IT employment has grown faster than overall employment for many years, the growth in both IT-producing industries and IT occupations accelerated in the mid-1990s.   IT industry employment grew almost 28% from 1994 to 1998, and employment in IT occupations increased by 22% over the same period.   By contrast, over those same years, total U.S. non-farm employment rose by about 11%...
 
The number of workers in IT-producing firms grew from 3.9M in 1992 to 5.2M workers in 1998 [an increase of 1.3M, a one-third increase].   Even at this level, employment in IT-producing firms in 1998 accounted for less than 5% of total private employment...   Among all IT-producing industries, software and computer services recorded the fastest employment growth.   Job positions in these areas nearly doubled, from 850K in 1992 to more than 1.6M in 1998...   The average annual wage for workers in IT-producing industries was $58K in 1998, or [185% of] the $31,400 average wage for all private workers.   Since 1992, wages paid by IT-producing industries have grown by 5.8% per year, compared with private-industry average wage growth of 3.6% annually [but lagging increases in the professions and executive suites]...
 
Although many workers who enter the country under the H-1B visa program hold jobs other than IT jobs, a recent Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) survey found that over 60% of H-1B visa petitioners are IT workers.16   Applying the INS estimate to the current H-1B visa limit of 115K suggests that the H-1B program currently fills over 70K IT jobs, equivalent to 28% of the average annual demand for IT workers with at least a bachelor's degree during the 1996 to 1998 period...
 
American IT companies are powerful competitors in markets around the world.   Yet the United States ran a trade deficit in information technology goods of almost $66G in 1999...   The most recent published data show that in 1997, when the United States exported $121.4G of IT goods and services, foreign sales by over-seas IT affiliates of American companies totaled $196G.   IT affiliates of foreign companies reported U.S. sales totaling $110.5G...   Through the 1990s, U.S. exports of these goods, including pre-packaged software, rose at an average annual rate of about 9.5%.   Over the same period, U.S. imports of IT goods increased at an average rate of 12.3% a year.   As a result, the U.S. trade deficit in IT goods jumped from $11.5G in 1990 to $65.9G in 1999...   The U.S. trade surplus in pre-packaged software reached $2.8G in 1999, a record level.   The trade surplus in scientific instruments has also generally been on the rise.   And following a long series of trade deficits dating from 1983, telecommunications equipment manufacturers enjoyed export surpluses in 3 of the 5 years after 1994."
---30---

2000 December
Ronnie Schoeb & David E. Wildasin
Economic Integration & Labor Market Institutions: Worker Mobility, Earnings Risk, & Contract Structure
see also same authors 2003 December (pdf)
"the US market seems to exhibit considerable wage flexibility.   This flexibility, i.e. the comparative ease with which wages can be adjusted, might be expected to give rise to large wage differentials among sectors and regions.   Indeed, real wages certainly are not identical for all US workers with given skill and other attributes.
 
But -- focusing for concreteness on job switching that involves movement among spatially-distinct labor markets -- there is a high degree of mobility among regions in the US, as evidenced by persistently high rates of internal migration, so that wage differentials are eroded by migration from low- to high-wage areas...   Here, it is assumed that migration costs are no longer prohibitively high so that, in the event of favorable demand shocks, it is possible for workers from other regions to immigrate or, in the event of adverse demand shocks, workers can emigrate and obtain jobs in regions with high labor demand.
 
Our primary interest, however, is not in the structure of equilibrium labor contracts in a single jurisdiction, but rather in the way that mobility influences labor market conditions in an entire system of jurisdictions...   The fact that workers who migrate (or remain unemployed) are worse off than those who are not laid off is the key to understanding how the equilibrium level of expected utility, ubar_M, is determined...   there are several competing models of labor markets which do not clear instantaneously, such as the insider-outsider model, models of unionized labor markets, job-matching models, and, of course, implicit contract models...
 
The analysis has also shown that increased integration of labor markets can harm workers, at least in cases where migration costs do not fall sufficiently to completely eliminate unemployment, that is, in cases where both migration and unemployment are observed.   In fact, in the absence of some sort of compensation mechanism, workers are definitely harmed by greater labor mobility.
 
Firms, OTOH, benefit from labor mobility in the sense that expected profits necessarily rise as migration costs fall.   The ability to hire additional workers in response to positive shocks reduces the implicit premium that the firms' existing workers pay, in favorable states of nature, under the implicit contract, leading to a change in the terms of the implicit contract in a way that ultimately reduces labor market rigidities.   Workers are consequently exposed to increased risk of lay-off and to a reduced implicit contract wage."
-30-

2000 December
_monster_
H-1B visas: an update
"With the recent decision to increase the cap on H-1B visas from 115K to 195K per year, programmers, engineers and others from around the world may have an easier time finding jobs in the USA..."
 

2000
_eResume Writing_
In today's job market an employer can get 200 resumes for every job

2000
_International Council of Nurses_
Part-Time Employment
"The International Council of Nurses (ICN) and its member associations strongly denounce the proliferation of part-time nursing posts motivated purely as a cost-containment measure and without regard to the effect on the quality of services provided and the professional development of staff.   ICN and national nurses associations oppose short-sighted efforts to reduce the cost of employee benefits by replacing full-time nurses with part-time or casual nurses."

2000
_WorkIndex_/_Wharton School_
Do Lay-Offs Mean You Actually Lose Your Job?
"Each day seems to bring another announcement of job cuts, lowered earnings and other signs of economic distress.   The damage can be seen across the board -- from high-tech to low-tech; from on-line to off-line; banks and brokerages to media, automotive and consumer goods...
 
'What's interesting about this down-sizing, for example, is that it's happening so much more quickly than it would have years before in equivalent circumstances.', says Wharton management professor Peter Cappelli, director of the school's Center for Human Resources.   'Companies are taking the initiative in laying off workers even before they are experiencing any real shortfalls in their business.'   The reason, Cappelli says, is that companies 'want to send signals to the investment community that they are on top of things, that they can move quickly and be responsive' to changing market conditions...   says [Brian] Bushee, 'if short-term investors are looking for a company to maintain profitability, whether or not this includes trying to streamline the workforce, managers may feel pressure to institute lay-offs' as a way to prevent these investors from taking their money elsewhere...
 
[In] addition, he observes, 'it's historically unprecedented to see announcements of lay-offs precede the increase in the unemployment rate.   Usually that rate goes up, signaling that the business cycle is beginning to turn down, and then companies start cutting back.   But the unemployment rate so far hasn't gone up [very much] and yet we're hearing all these announcements of lay-offs.   It doesn't track.'   The unemployment rate was 4.2% in February; from the fall of 1999 to the end of 2000, unemployment has hovered between 3.9% to 4.1%.
 
Dan Rodriguez, professor of organization and management at Goizueta Business School at Emory, contrasts the current market conditions with 1996.   'If you read a book written back then called _The DownSizing of America_ by the New York Times, it's clear that lay-offs 5 years ago were much more significant than this past January.   AT&T was laying off 40K, Delta 15K, Sears 50K, Boeing 15K and DEC 20K.   The raw numbers were much worse.'"
-30-

2000
appendices to Digital 2000 (pdf)

Appendix Table 3.2
Information Technology Producing Industries:
Gross Product Originating

Industry	1990	1991	1992	1993	1994	1995	1996	1997	1998	1999	2000
(Millions of $, except as noted)									estimate	estimate	estimate
Total Gross Domestic Income	5,772,700.0	5,966,600.0	6,275,200.0	6,578,600.0	6,995,800.0	7,374,000.0	7,780,300.0	8,303,900.0	8,807,500.0	9,381,300.0	9,831,602.4
Year-to-Year GDI Change (%)		3.4%	5.2%	4.8%	6.3%	5.4%	5.5%	6.7%	6.1%	6.5%	4.8%
Pre-packaged software	11,322.9	12,552.9	14,554.5	17,263.4	19,775.9	22,768.3	26,926.5	29,511.7	34,496.8	40,016.2	46,418.8
Pre-packaged software wholesale sales	1,810.1	1,927.7	2,127.2	2,278.8	2,330.2	2,733.0	3,291.7	3,607.7	4,217.1	4,891.9	5,674.6
Pre-packaged software retail sales	99.8	100.9	102.3	122.5	145.3	152.6	149.2	163.6	191.2	221.8	257.3
Total Software and Services	63,638.8	68,124.6	75,489.6	84,786.6	96,869.9	111,350.2	131,489.6	153,863.8	185,609.1	213,986.2	245,643.8
Employment Trends (in thousands)
field	1992	1993	1994	1995	1996	1997	1998	change 1992-1998	Average Annual Growth Rate 1992-1998
Pre-packaged software wholesalers	14,600	14,200	14,300	15,000	16,000	17,600	19,300	4.7%	4.8%
Pre-packaged software retailers	3,800	4,000	4,300	4,700	5,200	6,100	6,600	2.8%	9.7%
Pre-packaged software	130,800	144,800	157,400	180.8	201,000	224,500	252,200	121.4%	11.6%
Total Software and Computer Services	853,900	911,000	977,100	1,109,600	1,248,900	1,433,100	1,625,300	771%	11.3%

2000
D. Mark Wilson "Labor, Employment & Wages" _Issues 2000_
(citing Challenger, Gray & Christmas 1996-01-04 "Blizzard of December Lay-Offs"
George J. Church 1996-01-15 "Disconnected" _Time_ pg 44
Stuart Silverstein 1996-01-03 "Huge Lay-Offs May Now Be in Decline, But Worries Linger" _LA Times_ pg D1
Peter Behr 1995-12-25 "Lay-Offs, Contract Cuts Touch a Nerve in Greenbelt" _Washington Post_ pg A1
K.A. Swinnerton & H. Wial 1995 January "Is Job Security Declining in the US Economy" _Industrial & Labor Relations Review_
Francis X. Diegold, David Neumark & Daniel Polsky 1994 "Job Stability in the United States" _NBER Working Paper_ #4859)
"Workers remain concerned about job security, lay-offs, & corporate down-sizing.   In 1995, companies announced lay-offs of almost 440K workers.   Announced lay-offs in 1995 were down 28% from the peak of 615K in 1993, but were still 45% higher than 1990.   Each month it seems the media report another large lay-off & more stories about employees who fear they will be next...   The median duration of unemployment in 1995 November was 7.7 weeks, down from 8.8 weeks in 1992.   From 1992 June to 1995 November, the number unemployed for 27 weeks or more declined by 42% to 1.2M...   53% who found new jobs were earning the same as or more than their old job paid.   Over 27% were earning 20% more."

2000
Kara Lane _Cooling System_
Disposing of Age Discrimination Charges

2000
_deeshaa_/_soc.culture.Indian_
Who Acutally Paid for My Education?
alternate link
"India suffers from very low literacy even compared to other developing countries.   Yet one gets to hear about the tremendous impact that Indian doctors, engineers and scientists have had around the world.   This conveys the impression that the Indian [education] system works.   I believe that that impression is wrong and that in fact the Indian school system is inefficient and biased against the poor...
 
Someone else paid for my education.   That is true for a very large number of people who are educated in India's premier institutions -- someone else paid.   Nagpur is a medium-sized city by Indian standards.   It has a bunch of good high schools.   You have to have a middle-class or better background to get into those because competitive pressures keep the poor out.   But if you get in, and don't goof off too much, you can do well in the competition for admission into a good engineering or medical college.   And then you get heavily subsidized education in college.   Armed with all the advantages, you fill out a bunch of applications, write the GRE and the TOEFL and off you go to the US, never to return."
-30-

2000 December
Daryl E. Chubin, Willie Pearson, Eleanor Babco, et al. _Commission on Professionals in Science and Technology_
Scientists and Engineers for the New Millennium: Renewing the Human Resource (pdf)

2000
_U.S. Department of Commerce_ pg 51
Digital Economy 2000: H-1Bs accounted for 28% of all IT hires requiring at least a Bachelor's degree or equivalent

2000
Antony C. Sutton
The Best Enemy Money Can Buy

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