Realities of the Recession and the Changing Workforce

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• GWEN IFILL:

  That follows our Labor Day look at the bleak job market and the prospects for improvement.

  Economics correspondent Paul Solman begins with this report.

• PAUL SOLMAN:

  Almost 15 million Americans are out of work, five million of them for half-a-year or more, the average workweek at 33 hours, unchanged since April and lower than any time since the data started in 1964.

  Since last fall, we have been looking at the numbers, faces and themes of the great recession, such as the jobless testing the limits of unemployment insurance.

  How long have you been out of work?

  JEFF GOLDSTEIN, advertising copywriter: It's been about a year now.

• PAUL SOLMAN:

  How long you have been out of work?

• MAN:

  Two years.

• PAUL SOLMAN:

  Two years?

  MAUREEN LOCKWOOD, clerical worker: I'm out over a year now. Mine ends in September.

• PAUL SOLMAN:

  The unemployment, you mean?

• MAUREEN LOCKWOOD:

  Yes. Yes.

• PAUL SOLMAN:

  Men have been hit harder than women, African-Americans and Hispanics harder than whites.

  Black unemployment has been in the double digits for more than a year. For men over 20, it was back up last month to 17 percent. For those 16 to 19, more than one in three are still out of work.

  We saw the problem in struggling and isolated East Saint Louis in the spring.

• MAN:

  It's about who you know. If you don't know nobody, you're not getting in there.

• MAN:

  If I could get minimum wage, I would be happy. But there aren't any jobs for a 63-year-old man, not in this are, that I can get.

• PAUL SOLMAN:

  Since the recession began, some two million jobs have been shed in the manufacturing sector alone. In Elkhart, Indiana, due to stalled R.V. sales, whole families were unemployed…

• WOMAN:

  I have been out of work for a little over a year.

• PAUL SOLMAN:

  … or are woefully underemployed.

• WOMAN:

  When it gets bad, I'm maybe down to five hours a week.

• WOMAN:

  So, I got lucky and got a part-time job working with Lewis Bakery stocking bread. That's a good thing. At least people still need to buy bread. So…

• MAN:

  I went through a stretch where, from Thanksgiving to February, I didn't work at all. And — and it looks now that we will probably be getting more — more time off in the future.

• PAUL SOLMAN:

  Lucinda Gott had a job when we arranged this interview. But, by the time we set up our camera, she had lost it.

• WOMAN:

  And Thursday was my last day.

• PAUL SOLMAN:

  Her husband says his faith keeps him going, though he lost his job in April.

  Looking?

• MAN:

  Yes.

• PAUL SOLMAN:

  Finding anything?

• MAN:

  No, there's nothing around here. There's no jobs.

• MAN:

  They have got a dollar store right down the road here pays $6.50 an hour. They're not even hiring. So, there's nothing out there at all.

• PAUL SOLMAN:

  Since our interview, Ed Newfield did get hired as spokesperson for a green energy company that's come to Elkhart in hopes of reviving the town. But, in August, another 63,000 factory workers lost their jobs.

  The blue-collared haven't been the only folks hammered, of course.

• MAN:

  I'm going to have to get back to some hard — hard networking.

• PAUL SOLMAN:

  Here's a group of unemployed executives in suburban Chicago this summer.

• MAN:

  I'm Chris Damao. I have been out of work since December of 2008. And I'm a senior financial executive.

• MAN:

  My name is John Freck. I'm a senior audit executive from the banking industry. I have been in transition since January of this year.

• MAN:

  My name is Barat Tolapa. I'm an I.T. infrastructure professional. And I have been looking since January of this year.

• WOMAN:

  My name is Barbara Tomzhak. I'm a human resource leader. I have been in transition since February 2008.