Wall Street Journal (04/07/14) Damian Paletta

Government data show that more than one-tenth of job growth since 2009 is tied to temporary jobs, and ASA corporate partner CareerBuilder says that figure is more than 50% in cities like Cincinnati and Milwaukee and close to 100% in Stockton, CA. While the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that 2.8 million people currently hold temporary positions, ASA estimates that around 11 million people had a temporary job at some point last year.

“We do not see this as an indicator that we are at a ‘peak’ economy,” says Jeffrey Joerres, chief executive of ManpowerGroup. “We rather see it as more of a structural or secular change, that our industry will be absorbing more of the workforce than it did in the past.” Jim Link, chief human resources officer at Randstad North America says “lessons learned from a tough recession” are driving the increase in temporary employees.

The Conference Board (04/07/2014)

The Conference Board Employment Trends Index increased in March to 117.52, up from an upwardly revised 117.01 in February. This represents a 5.1% gain in the ETI compared with a year ago.

“The increase in the ETI in the first quarter is signaling solid job growth in the coming months,” says Gad Levanon, director of macroeconomic research at the Conference Board. “With [gross domestic product] forecasted to average 2.5% to 3.0% through the end of this year, there is little reason to expect employment growth to slow any time soon.”

March’s increase in the ETI was driven by positive contributions from four of its eight components: initial claims for unemployment insurance, industrial production, number of temporary employees, and real manufacturing and trade sales.

New York Times (04/06/14) Jonathan Weisman

The U.S. Senate is expected to retroactively restore unemployment benefits that ended Dec. 28 and extend them through June 1, though the bill’s fate in the House is unclear. The legislation passed with the votes of six Republicans and all 55 Democrats.