Challenger: Slow Growth Likely Through 2012

A recent report on the employment situation was cause for neither disappointment nor celebration, but was just another month of slow job growth. This is likely to be the trend well into 2012, according to employment authority John A. Challenger, CEO of global outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas, Inc., who says that employers simply are not seeing enough demand for their products and services to warrant a large increase in hiring. 

Democrats and Republicans continue to argue about which party's policies will create more jobs, but the fact of the matter is there is not much anyone in Washington can do to ignite job growth, short of ejecting trillions of dollars in additional stimulus spending into the economy. Tax breaks, fewer regulations and easy access to low-interest loans are all meaningless if no one is buying a company's products. Until demand increases to the point where employers are unable to meet it with existing employees, they will not make the commitment to hire more, said Challenger. 

That being said, the employment situation report could have been much worse, considering recent dips in various economic measures. The fact that the private sector added 104,000 net new workers the 20th consecutive net increase in private sector payrolls and the number of people experiencing long-term unemployment fell along with the number working part-time jobs for economic reasons are promising signs that we are at least still heading in the right direction, Challenger said.