New York: The fear instilled by the credit crunch following the collapse of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc in mid-September may be setting the stage for a moderation of the job slump in coming months, some economists said.
The Lehman bankruptcy "scared the living daylights out of companies," said Ken Mayland, president of ClearView Economics LLC in Pepper Pike, Ohio. "It may prove to be the case that companies cut too much."
Payrolls fell by 598,000 last month, the biggest decline since December 1974, the Labour Department said yesterday in Washington. The unemployment rate soared to a 16-year high of 7.6 per cent from 7.2 per cent the previous month.
Job losses accelerated in the months after Lehman failed, surging to 538,000 on average from October through January, almost triple the average of the prior four months.
"They were very fast to pull the trigger," said Mayland, who was named the best forecaster in a 2004 survey by Bloomberg Markets magazine.
The decline in US Steel Corp's headcount in recent months "is the biggest change as a result of business conditions" since a series of plant closings from 1981 to 1992, said spokesman John Armstrong. In that period, the company's workforce fell to 21,000 from 171,000, Armstrong said.
The company in November said it would cut 677 jobs in North America as steel demand declines.
In the last couple of weeks, companies ranging from Macy's Inc to Boeing Co to PNC Financial Services Group Inc have announced thousands of job cuts. Those firings, which are likely to show up in statistics over the next couple of months, may prove to be the final surge, he said.
Service industries have contributed to the recent jump in dismissals. The drop in payrolls among service providers and fin-ancial firms over the last three months has been the fastest since 1958.
Cost cutting has been "the most aggressive I've seen", said Antony Nieves, chairman of the Institute for Supply Management's non-manufacturing survey and a senior vice president of supply management for Hilton Equipment Corp, last week. "Companies don't know what the future holds in store."
The wave of mergers in service industries in recent years left companies with a lot of debt, forcing them to focus on short-term survival when the credit crunch hit rather than on long-term goals, he said. Some of those workers will be needed back "for sure", he said.
The US economy entered a recession in December 2007, according to the National Bureau of Economic Research.
The Lehman bankruptcy "scared the living daylights out of companies," said Ken Mayland, president of ClearView Economics LLC in Pepper Pike, Ohio. "It may prove to be the case that companies cut too much."
Payrolls fell by 598,000 last month, the biggest decline since December 1974, the Labour Department said yesterday in Washington. The unemployment rate soared to a 16-year high of 7.6 per cent from 7.2 per cent the previous month.
Job losses accelerated in the months after Lehman failed, surging to 538,000 on average from October through January, almost triple the average of the prior four months.
"They were very fast to pull the trigger," said Mayland, who was named the best forecaster in a 2004 survey by Bloomberg Markets magazine.
The decline in US Steel Corp's headcount in recent months "is the biggest change as a result of business conditions" since a series of plant closings from 1981 to 1992, said spokesman John Armstrong. In that period, the company's workforce fell to 21,000 from 171,000, Armstrong said.
The company in November said it would cut 677 jobs in North America as steel demand declines.
In the last couple of weeks, companies ranging from Macy's Inc to Boeing Co to PNC Financial Services Group Inc have announced thousands of job cuts. Those firings, which are likely to show up in statistics over the next couple of months, may prove to be the final surge, he said.
Service industries have contributed to the recent jump in dismissals. The drop in payrolls among service providers and fin-ancial firms over the last three months has been the fastest since 1958.
Cost cutting has been "the most aggressive I've seen", said Antony Nieves, chairman of the Institute for Supply Management's non-manufacturing survey and a senior vice president of supply management for Hilton Equipment Corp, last week. "Companies don't know what the future holds in store."
The wave of mergers in service industries in recent years left companies with a lot of debt, forcing them to focus on short-term survival when the credit crunch hit rather than on long-term goals, he said. Some of those workers will be needed back "for sure", he said.
The US economy entered a recession in December 2007, according to the National Bureau of Economic Research.
