BLS DAILY REPORT, MONDAY, JUNE 26, 2000
If the national economy continues to moderate its growth rate over the rest
of this year, employers could see some relief from chronic labor shortages
dominating virtually each region, say private and government analysts across
the country who were interviewed in mid-June for the Bureau of National
Affairs' annual Regional Outlook. But the projected slowdown may not ease
pay pressure in the short run. Businessmen across the country have met the
challenges of hiring and keeping workers in the tightest labor market in at
least 30 years by turning to creative hiring approaches and a variety of
nontraditional pay schemes. Immigrants have been a major group that has
expanded labor pools in many regions, along with people moving from welfare
to work and people returning to the labor force to take advantage of a
prosperous economy. ... (Daily Labor Report, Special Report).
The Chicago-based outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas says its
latest survey shows that 62 percent of 200 human resource executives polled
view telecommuting as a benefit to help retain employees. Ten percent said
the labor crisis is so severe that their companies are at risk of turning
away business. Less than 5 percent of those polled said the situation had
improved from a year ago. The Challenger poll indicated that finding and
keeping skilled workers was by far the biggest employer concern, which was
cited by 53 percent of those surveyed as the greatest challenge that they
will face in the second half of 2000. ... (Daily Labor Report, page A-12).
The key driver of costs at the top U.S. colleges, Cornell University
professor Ronald G. Ehrenberg, who is both an economist and a former vice
president of Cornell University, concludes, based on research and personal
experience, is the desire of school administrators to make their
institutions "the very best they can be in every area of their activities."
... Ehrenberg points out that the cost of higher education generally has
grown at a rate 2 to 3 percentage points above the cost of living for most
of this century. That mattered little when only a handful of Americans went
to college, and, in the years following World War II, when college
attendance soared, household income was rising at a similar rate. The
change came in 1980 when household income began falling behind the cost of
living while college costs continued to run ahead of it. That pattern is
what has made higher education a major stress factor in the economic lives
of middle-class American families today. To a certain extent, the steady
rise in education costs is understandable. Unlike manufacturing,
electronics, and other areas of the economy, education is difficult to
automate, and technology offers limited opportunities to make teachers more
efficient. Thus, many of the efficiencies that have made some goods and
services cheaper over the years are less available in education. ... The
Washington Post article (June 25, page H1) is illustrated with a graph that
shows that, since 1983, the cost of tuition, room, board, and fees at
Harvard has far outstripped the rise in the CPI. ...
Struggling for summer help, resorts turn to foreigners, says The Washington
Post (June 25, page C1). ... Beach resorts, theme parks, state parks,
summer camps, and other businesses throughout the nation are struggling to
fill summer jobs and are eagerly recruiting and hiring thousands of visiting
foreign students. They are turning to a growing array of agencies to help
them hire and are sending their own recruiters abroad. They offer travel
subsidies and cut-rate housing. In some cases, they are even hiring over
the Internet without face-to-face interviews. ... Besides their willingness
to take jobs that may pay little more than the minimum wage, foreign
students offer something many U.S. workers can't. They usually are
available to work past Labor Day, still a prime moneymaking time for
seasonal businesses that generate most of their income from late May to
early September. ...
Automakers say that despite recent deep discounts, auto sales have not
picked up in June from the relatively subdued pace of May, providing
evidence to the Federal Reserve that recent interest-rate increases may be
slowing the American economy. Auto executives and dealers say sales of
luxury cars and luxury sport utility vehicles remain extremely strong. But
the mass market for more affordable cars, minivans, sport utility vehicles,
and pickup trucks has softened as middle-class families have become leery of
borrowing money at ever steeper rates. ... (New York Times, page B2).
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