Reuters (04/09/12) Lynn Adler

After the release of the March jobs report, indicating the lowest
level of hiring since October, shares of several staffing firms
fell on April 9. ManpowerGroup’s shares were down 2.6%, while
Robert Half International fell 3.1%, Kelly Services dipped 1.7%,
and TrueBlue Inc. declined 3%. However, shares rose 1.4% for
Hudson Highland, 1.2% for Adecco, 2.7% for Randstad, and 0.9% for
Michael Page. Jeff Joerres, chief executive of ManpowerGroup,
says, “The trend we’ve seen over the last three or four
months continues, which is a slow, kind of trudging, clawing out
of the hole that we’ve been in. For the second half, we
expect more of the same—slow, having some spurts of better
months than not.”

J.P. Morgan analysts reported on April 9 that flexible staffing
as a percentage of nonfarm payrolls reached 1.87% last month, up
from 1.75% in July 2011 and 1.34% in June 2009, noting, “In
our view, penetration will continue to increase as the memory of
the Great Recession continues to spur businesses to look to flex
staffing as a source of agility.” Most of the new jobs are
in accounting, finance, and information technology, according to
Joanie Ruge, chief employment analyst at Randstad Holding U.S.,
and many of them are long-term projects that could lead to
permanent employment.

Wall Street Journal (04/09/12) Miriam Jordan

In a development that may signal that the economy is improving,
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service says it has seen a sharp
increase in petitions for H-1B visas this year. USCIS has
received 25,600 petitions for the visas since April 2, almost
twice as many as it received for the entire first month of last
year’s application period. Some 17,400 of the petitions
received in the first week were in the general category of
skilled workers, while 8,200 were in the advanced category, for
workers with an advanced degree. The increase in visa
applications reflects an increase in activity for related
businesses such as technology companies.

NFIB Small-Business News (04/10/12)

The National Federation of Independent Business’
Small-Business Optimism Index dropped nearly two points to 92.5
in March, with nine of 10 index components—including
hiring—posting declines. However, the job creation
component of the index was the one bright spot, with 10% of
small-business owners surveyed adding 3.1 workers per firm on
average during the past few months on a seasonally adjusted
basis. About 44% of respondents hired or attempted to hire
workers, but 32% said there were few or no qualified applicants.
Although actual hiring figures indicated that March was the best
job creation month in a year, there are concerns about weakness
in the job market given that the percentage of owners with
hard-to-fill job openings and those expecting to boost the number
of employees decreased.

New York Times (04/09/12) Steven Greenhouse

Pressure to boost the minimum wage is rising as the economy
recovers at a slow pace and income inequality becomes a focus of
the presidential campaign. The federal minimum wage rose to $7.25
per hour in July 2009, but lawmakers in New York, New Jersey,
Connecticut, Illinois, Massachusetts, and other states are taking
steps to raise it even higher. Washington currently has the
highest minimum wage of $9.04 per hour, but in Massachusetts, a
measure was approved by the joint committee on labor to boost the
minimum wage to $10 per hour. Meanwhile, some labor groups are
pushing for U.S. Senate Labor Committee chairman Tom Harkin
(D-IA) to lead a charge to boost the federal minimum wage to
$9.80 per hour over the next two years.