Study Finds Job Losses 2005-2007 Similar To Previous Three Years

Aug. 22, 2008 (McClatchy-Tribune Regional News delivered by Newstex) -- About 8.3 million U.S. workers lost their jobs from January 2005 through December 2007 because of business closures or moves, insufficient work, or elimination of shifts or positions.

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics said the level of such worker displacement was substantially the same as in the previous three-year period.

Similar job losses affected 8.1 million workers in 2003-05 and 11.4 million in 2001-03.

The 2005-07 report, released this week, showed:

• One in four of the displaced jobs was in manufacturing -- about equal to the previous reporting period.

• Two-thirds of the displaced workers who had held their jobs for at least three years had found re-employment by the end of the three-year period -- a poorer re-employment rate than the nearly three-fourths who were re-employed in the previous report.

• Fifty-five percent of the displaced workers had found work that paid as much or more than the jobs they lost -- an improvement from the 50 percent re-employed in the previous three years.

• Twenty-five percent were re-employed in jobs that paid at least 20 percent less than what they previously earned -- a bit more favorable rate incomewise than the 29 percent who earned less in the earlier report.

The new report suggested that re-employment was more difficult for the longer-tenured workers age 55 and older. Sixty-one percent of that group had new jobs as of December, compared with 73 percent of workers age 25 to 54. The report did not tell whether the older workers left the labor force because they were discouraged job seekers or because they retired.

Among the 8.3 million workers who were considered displaced in the 2005-07 period, 67 percent found new jobs and 19 percent were unemployed as of January 2008.

The displacements of the longer-tenured workers (those who had worked in the job at least three years) occurred when 45 percent lost or left their jobs because their plant or company closed or moved. Thirty-one percent said their positions or shifts were abolished. Twenty-four percent said their jobs ended because there was insufficient work to do.

The report, which mostly focused on longer-tenured workers, is available online at www.bls.gov/news. release/disp.htm.