COLUMN-Bracing for a winter of jobs discontent:Christopher Swann

By Christopher Swann NEW YORK, Nov 6 (Reuters) - Those looking for good news in the U.S. labor market are increasingly being forced to scrape the bottom of the statistical barrel. Optimists pointed to the 34,000 increase in temporary workers in the otherwise bleak October employment report. Temp hiring has traditionally been seen as a sign that companies are dipping their toes in the water before creating full-fledged positions. This looks like wishful thinking. A more plausible reading is that businesses remain skeptical about the recovery and will remain reluctant to commit to full time hires. A lack of faith among companies could be self-fulfilling. Johnson & Johnson's recent decision to cull up to 7 percent of its workforce was justified -- in somewhat circular fashion -- by the impact of rising unemployment on consumer spending. Many other companies are likely to be making a similar calculation. Even long into the recovery, businesses may still prefer to meet rising demand by using temporary workers. The number of workers stuck in part-time jobs has been rising relentlessly. In October, the unemployment gauge that includes involuntary part-time workers rose to 17.5 percent, from 12 percent last year. Even as output starts to expand again, landing a job is getting ever harder. A year ago, almost a third of Americans losing their jobs managed to clamber back into employment in less than five weeks. Now just 20 percent are so lucky. Instead, the average worker is languishing for more than six months without work. Businesses are still shedding jobs at a remarkable pace. The average jobs loss of the past three months of 188,000 -- while well below the lofty heights of winter 2008 -- is still close to the peak levels seen in recent recessions. Individually, companies are right to be cautious. As government stimulus measures fade, consumers may lapse back into pessimism. American households have barely made a dent in their record debts. Wage increases, meanwhile, remain stingy and credit harder to come by. But as the job slump continues there is a mounting danger that the pessimism of businesses and consumers will feed off each other. -- For previous columns, Reuters customers can click on (Editing by Martin Langfield) http://blogs.reuters.com/christopher-swann/ Keywords: COLUMN JOBS/ ([e-mail]) COPYRIGHT Copyright Thomson Reuters 2009. All rights reserved.

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