Recession

The economy's yearlong downturn, officially declared a recession Monday, could last well into next year or even beyond, challenging the government to devise new responses as traditional methods show limited results.

The nation's worsening economy will continue to hemorrhage jobs next year, prolonging a deep recession that won't recover until at least 2010, forecasters at Chapman University said Tuesday. The U.S. unemployment rate is expected to climb from an estimated 5.7% this year to 7.8% next year as consumers pull back their spending, sending businesses already hurting from the credit crunch into further despair.

In early December, trucker Joe Rini learned that his own personal recession had just gotten worse. One of his best clients called about a load of building materials that needed to travel to the Pacific Northwest, Northern California and Colorado -- normally a $4,400 job. Rini offered to do it for $3,400. But before Rini's truck had arrived to pick up the load, the Cleveland-area customer of more than four years called back. Another trucker had offered to do the job for $400 less.

Libby Pachares felt trapped. It was the middle of 1992, and she had been back to work only a few months. Still torn about having ended her maternity leave, she became infected by the anguish and self-doubt that spread over Los Angeles with the flames of the riots. Assumptions she held before the baby was born--that she would readily go back to work--wrestled with her need to nurture and protect her two children. But she had to work.

With jobs disappearing in numbers not seen since the end of World War II, pressure mounted on Congress and President-elect Barack Obama on Friday to overcome their differences and reach agreement on a massive recovery program to stave off economic catastrophe. The nation's unemployment rate rose to an eye-popping 7.2% in December and brought the total jobs lost for the year to the largest number since 1945, the Labor Department said.

It's official: This recession is the worst the United States has experienced in more than 25 years, the government said Friday. And it appears likely to get worse before it gets better. At the White House, where the new administration is working on a broad strategy to combat the crisis, President Obama described the downturn as "a continuing disaster for America's working families."

Unemployment in California shot to 11.2% in March, the highest level since the state began keeping records. What's more, the number of people out of work for almost a year rose by 9.4%, and has now doubled in the last 12 months. Carpenter Luiz Vasquez knows the frustration all too well. In the last year, he said, he worked only two weeks. "I go through town, and I do not hear the sound of work," said Vasquez, 40, who is seeking help through a Chrysalis job center in Santa Monica.

Happy hour is getting happier, and that's making restaurants sadder. As the recession drags on, drinkers such as Luis Romero of Anaheim are gravitating to happy hour -- that late-afternoon period when bars and restaurants sell discounted drinks and food to attract customers during what otherwise would be a slow time. "You start watching your pennies a bit more," said Romero as he sipped a $3.

Unemployment in California shot up to its highest level in nearly 26 years in January, leaving more than 1 in 10 workers without a job. Figures released Friday show that 79,300 jobs were lost in the state last month, bringing the total number of unemployed to 1,863,000, or 10.1% of the workforce. That's the highest since the rate touched 10.4% in 1983. Conditions are even worse in Los Angeles County, which saw its unemployment rate jump to 10.5% in January from 9.2% the month before.

California's unemployment rate in May hit 11.5% -- its highest level in more than three decades -- but the pain of losing work isn't being shared equally between the sexes. The state lost 68,900 jobs in May as unemployment rose from a revised 11.1% in April and 6.8% in May 2008. This is the highest rate since the national record-keeping system began in 1976. Out of every four jobs lost nationwide since the recession began in December 2007, three have been lost by men.

Small gyms and fitness studios in Southern California are battling the recession like boxers in the ring fighting for any advantage. For many, 2010 will be another year of dodging blows from rivals and anxious customers coping with economic uncertainty. With new customers harder to land, the pressure is on to keep the old ones. "We are working so much harder for our money," said Stephanie Moore, owner of Revolution Fitness in Santa Monica. Los Angeles is an especially challenging environment for independent fitness studios and clubs because there are so many of them competing for the same customers, said Linda Conrad, executive director of the statewide trade group, California Clubs of Distinction.

The state's children found no escape from harder times last year whether at school, where they endured larger classes, unfamiliar teachers and scarce supplies -- or at home, where they faced family stresses from emptier refrigerators, job losses and more frequent dislocation. The grim compilation comes in a report to be released today by UCLA's Institute for Democracy, Education and Access and the University of California All Campus Consortium on Research for Diversity. "It's the bleakest I've ever seen," said one Los Angeles County school principal, who, like others in the principals survey, participated anonymously.

The United States has more poor children now than it did a year ago. As more families are hammered by the recession, more are using food stamps to feed their kids, according to a study by the Brookings Institution and First Focus, a bipartisan child advocacy group. "They are a really good barometer, a kind of economic-needs test," said Mark R. Rank, an expert on social welfare programs at Washington University in St. Louis. "If you're receiving food stamps and you're a child, by definition, you're in poverty."

Between dealing with terrorism threats and crises abroad, President Obama is unwinding in Hawaii with his family this week. They've snorkeled in pristine bays and dined in fashionable restaurants. Tourism officials only wish there were thousands more visitors like them. Tourism is the glue that holds this island state's finances together, keeping its streets clean, its workers paid and its children educated. But for the last two years, vacationers and conventioneers alike have abandoned Hawaii in favor of less exotic destinations closer to home.

This year the Lakers e-mailed Christmas cards to save postage. The team cut back on corporate gifts, created an installment payment plan for season-ticket holders and noticed many fans didn't buy season parking passes. Blame the recession. Even the Lakers, the NBA's most valuable franchise (worth $607 million and with a $51.1-million operating profit last season, according to Forbes magazine) is pinching pennies. "We're doing cost-cutting," said Tim Harris, the Lakers' senior vice president of business operations.

Step through the glass doors of Eso Won Bookstore, the landmark but struggling Leimert Park shop specializing in African American titles, and you'll see shelves stacked with civil rights classics by Martin Luther King Jr., poetry by Maya Angelou and important fiction including James Baldwin's "Another Country." Their ranks will be thinned substantially when co-owner James Fugate switches to more bargain-priced books when restocking his shelves next year in a bid to boost sales. Too much money is tied up in the slow-moving back-list tomes, which sell for $15 or more, he said.

Single and unemployed, Adam Holguin knows he could find better opportunities outside California, where the unemployment rate is 12.3%. But with little savings, and college loans and credit card bills to pay, he can't afford to leave. "I don't have the finances at this time to move," said Holguin, 31, of Rancho Cucamonga. One of the hallmarks of the American worker has been mobility -- the speed with which people like Holguin have moved to find opportunities. But the recession of the last two years has produced a profound change, creating conditions that have tethered many people where they are. Since 2007, the nation's mobility rate has fallen to its lowest level since World War II, says William Frey, a demographer at the Brookings Institution.

Six years ago, when Jason Reitman set out to write a dramatic comedy about a "corporate downsizer" who flies around the country and fires employees, the economy was booming and jobs were plentiful. By the time the young director, known for his 2007 hit "Juno," got around to making "Up in the Air," the world had drastically changed. The great recession hit, unemployment soared to nearly 10% and adult audiences had largely forsaken films with weighty topics, instead favoring escapist fare.

Dubai is a clever blend of audacity and architecture, a shiny monument to the egos and ambition that turned a tiny emirate into a Middle East financial giant. Russian oligarchs stroll along man-made islands shaped like palm trees, and sheiks race down a ski slope built inside a shopping mall. Lacking the oil reserves of the emirate's neighbors, Dubai's ruling family created a parallel economic reality fueled by real estate, international investment and the art of the possible. The emirate was fashioned into a sleek cityscape of startling images: Islam balanced against the seduction of Western capitalism, and tribal traditions brushing the fleeting trends of globalization.

Two young actors are rehearsing a pivotal fight scene in a new short play opening tonight at a small theater in Lower Manhattan. They are portraying out-of-work laborers from the Midwest who have been flown to New York to participate in a kill-or-be-killed social experiment that earns the survivor $25,000. For what feels like a very long minute, the actors struggle, their faces and bodies contorted, over a (fake) knife until finally they crash onto the stage floor. The thump shakes every inch of this 75-seat theater.