NY Times: Troubled Outlook for New York City Economy Turns a Lot Grimmer

[marmar]

Troubled Outlook for New York City Economy Turns a Lot Grimmer

By PATRICK McGEEHAN
Published: March 18, 2008
The outlook for New York City’s economy and its main engine, the financial services industry, had already taken a bleak turn before the sudden failure of Bear Stearns, the fifth-largest firm on Wall Street.

Investment banks and brokerage firms started cutting their payrolls last fall as the weakening market for mortgages translated into huge losses. Employment in the city’s securities industry dropped by about 8,000 jobs from August to January, a decline of about 4 percent.

Now, with the impending loss of several thousand high-paying jobs at Bear Stearns, city officials and economists are bracing for the downturn to steepen. How deep it will be and how long it will last are open questions.

“Who knows?” said William C. Thompson Jr., the city’s comptroller. “We had been preparing for tougher times. This means things are going to get a little tougher. We just don’t know how many jobs are going to be lost because of this.”

Bear Stearns had about 14,000 employees, and as many as 8,000 of them worked in the city. Last year, those workers collected more than $3.4 billion in pay and benefits, or an average of about $242,000 per employee.

Bear Stearns was one of the 25 largest employers in the city and accounted for about one of every 25 jobs in the city’s securities industry. It was not the first major Wall Street firm to collapse. Drexel Burnham Lambert and Kidder Peabody fell more than a decade ago. But Bear Stearns was a bigger component of a more consolidated industry. .......(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/18/business/18local.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

[leftrightwingnut]

1. Someone should notify Homeland Security.

What is the biggest threat to the U.S. today? And whose fault is that?

[WShade]

3. The biggest concern....

The outsourcing of the right to a decent job.

Pretty soon, they're gonna start outsourcing toilets. We will all have to go take a dump in a latrine in Bangalore. Of course, we will need to be screened and get a special clearance from Homeland Security AND have to pay for a toilet visa.

Call it a dookie duty.

[madrchsod]

2. oh well ,shit happens

nobody gave a fuck when the steel working industries left the united states...

[smothtalker]

4. Don't scare me dude. I live in the Bronx

gulp.

[The_Casual_Observer]

5. It might be easier to get a table at Per Se.