Read (cnn.com)

Depressing Job News from CNN/Money:

• Companies announced 104,530 job cuts in November, up 5.1 percent from a year earlier and 2.6 percent from October.
• The September through November totals mark the first time that announced job cuts have topped 100,000 for three or more straight months since January to April of 2002.
• If December cuts reach 69,310, it will mark the fourth straight year with 1 million cuts announced by U. S. employers
• The economy’s biggest worry is that a “large number of lower-middle class and middle-class Americans struggling to make it paycheck-to-paycheck will be short of discretionary income during the holiday shopping season.” (That’s certainly a major concern in this household this holiday season.)
• We’re about 5-1/2 million (jobs) short of where would be today if this were a typical expansion.
• We’ve fallen far short of prior economic expansions.