Jobless rate surges past 10 percent

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By Patrice Hill

The nation's unemployment rate broke the 10 percent barrier last month as employers continued to slash jobs in an effort to lower their costs and stay in business.

The 190,000 jobs cut in October was the latest in an unprecedented string of large monthly job losses that have totaled 7.3 million since the recession began in December 2007, the Labor Department reported Friday. President Obama called the job news "sobering," signed an extension of unemployment benefits into law and said he is considering new legislation to spur job growth.

The pace of job losses has slowed since the beginning of the year, but businesses have continued to cut their labor costs as they grapple with a dramatic drop in demand from consumers, economists said. This not only has enabled many to stay in business, but also has generated surprisingly good profits for many firms and bolstered their stock prices even during the economic downturn.

"It appears that many firms have realized that they can meet demand with a much smaller head count," said Harm Bandholz, an economist with UniCredit Markets & Investment Banking. "Instead of hiring again, they prefer to use the resulting productivity gains to bolster their balance sheets. The surveys among small businesses suggest that they are not inclined to sacrifice this 'new efficiency' any time soon."

Friday's jobs report showed that businesses are cutting labor costs not only by slashing jobs but also by hiring 34,000 temporary workers when additional staff was needed, and cutting hours wherever possible. Employers often add temporary workers before they hire full-time staff if they are unsure whether an increase they are experiencing in demand will be temporary or permanent.

But economists view the addition of temporary jobs as a harbinger of improvement in the job market, because those same employers within a few months may decide they need full-time staff to handle the workload.

In the manufacturing sector, where orders have picked up noticeably in recent months, employers are adding to the factory workweek and even adding to overtime hours rather than hiring new full-time workers, reflecting their uncertainty over whether the increase in business will continue.

These types of "make-do" measures by employers resulted in a stunning 9.5 percent increase in productivity during the summer quarter - the biggest gain in six years - as existing workers were called on to deal with the robust increase in business activity.

Sung Won Sohn, an economics professor at California State University, Channel Islands, said that employers kept their most skilled employees on hand after layoffs, and that many of those who remain are voluntarily working harder out of fear of losing their jobs.

"The tough question is just how far companies can push their remaining workers before they decide that they simply must bring in new staff," said Nigel Gault, an economist with IHS Global Insight. He is among the more optimistic forecasters who believe the job-cutting trend will end soon as businesses realize they cut too many jobs during the recession.