Shape Of Things To Come

The unemployment figure is now at 8.1%. My understanding is that this is usually less than the actual figure because many have left the unemployment roles, their benefits have expired. Also this does not include the self-employed, many of these folks have no unemployment benefits in the first place.

The articles goes into the details of all the various sectors affected.

McClatchy: The worst recession since World War II? Shaping up that way

Harvey is a research associate with the National Bureau of Economic Research, the organization that calls recessions. He and colleagues at Duke recently did a survey with CFO magazine and found that chief financial officers of corporations expect to slash 5.7 percent of their work forces this year. That's about 6.3 million additional private-sector jobs lost, and implies an unemployment rate of 12.2 percent — and those numbers reflect only planned layoffs, not closures as companies are shuttered.