Bloomberg (09/30/12) Shobhana Chandra; Steve Matthews

Weakening demand for a variety of goods and services is contributing to the already weak U.S. labor market. Finance chiefs are either limiting hiring or cutting more jobs than originally projected. This belt-tightening is likely to influence the labor market for the rest of the year.

“These cost controls are one of the key reasons job growth remains relatively weak,” says Charles Lieberman, chief investment officer at Advisors Capital Management LLC and former head of monetary analysis at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Companies will avoid hiring until orders have strengthened and “they cannot meet demand with their existing work force.”

Financial Times (09/28/12) Vanessa Kortekaas

White-collar recruiter Harvey Nash has benefited from the demand for temporary recruitment in Europe but has set its sights on the U.S. for medium-term growth. The firm has benefited from a rise in operating profits in the U.K. and Europe this year but growth was fastest in the U.S., where revenue up to the end of July increased by 25% to £21.9 million compared with the same time last year. Gross profits in the U.S. were up 16% to £5.4 million in the same period.

“I call it the Apple effect or the Google effect,” said Albert Ellis, chief executive. He said headhunting among technology companies—an area in which the recruiter specializes—has created a healthy and fluid jobs sector on the U.S. west coast. The U.S. accounts for about 13% of Harvey Nash’s gross profits worldwide.

South Jersey Times (09/28/12) Jessica Beym

Vanna Kem, the owner and operator of a New Jersey-based temporary staffing firm, has been sentenced to 18 months in prison for evading employment taxes for the business. Kem previously pleaded guilty to one count of tax evasion. Authorities said that despite being the true owner of Tri State Labor Services, Kem incorporated the business and maintained the corporate bank account in the name of a nominee. From the first quarter of 2006 through the last quarter of 2008, Kem paid Tri State employees more than $1 million in cash wages without withholding employment taxes. She also failed to file IRS Form 941—Employer’s Quarterly Federal Tax Returns—in which she was required to report the wages paid to her employees.