How to stay employed if (when) a recession hits
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How secure are you in your job if the economy tanks? Three employment experts offer frank advice on how to stay recession-proof.
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For Democratic candidates, the growing risk of a recession is an opportunity for action. For Republicans, it presents a dilemma.
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You may not be able to stop disaster from striking, but you can keep it from devastating your finances.
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Wary employers clamped down on hiring and pushed the unemployment rate to a two-year high of 5 percent in December, an ominous sign that the economy may slide into recession. President Bush explored a rescue package, including a tax cut, with his economic advisers.
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Why you should stay invested for the long term.
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How about adding some tax breaks to your Christmas shopping list? Though there are only a few weeks left in the year, there may still be time for tax-saving maneuvers if, for example, you buy a new home furnace, spring for a hybrid car, or get new investments to replace battered ones.
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Friday's news of a buckling job market sent stock investors running for the exits, and next week promises to be no less stressful as investors grapple with the increasing possibility of an economic recession.
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Don't wait for the economic alarm bells to sound. There's action you can take now to make your position as safe as possible.
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Here's how to diversify your fixed-income portfolio so you prosper no matter what happens to the economy.
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With the market dropping, you have to do something, right?
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A pair of Forrester Research analysts gave CIOs a passel of advice Thursday on how to deal with the possibility of a U.S. economic recession.&quot;We are not predicting a recession, but we think its important for CIOs to be proactive, to get their businesses ready in case there is a recession,&quot; said analyst Andrew Bartels, who conducted the teleconference with colleague Alex Cullen.Their recommendations boiled down to a number of main themes: The right ways to cut costs, to work closely with CFOs, and to plan not only for the lean times but for the good ones that inevitably follow.&quot;Get close to your CFO. You want to be arm in arm with that CFO,&quot; Bartels stressed.Forrester said there is a 55 percent probability the economy will remain essentially stabilized, due to factors including U.S. exports boosted by a weak dollar. The firm projects a 35 percent chance the country will enter a shallow recession, and a 10 percent chance it will fall into a deep one.The analysts said to watch for two key warning signs: Gas prices rising above $4 a gallon and two or more consecutive months of non-farm payroll employment.If they haven&#39;t already, CIOs should prepare now by reviewing their portfolios and identify which projects could be postponed, cut, or cancelled, he said.&quot;If you&#39;re running things well, adapting to recession is easier,&quot; Cullen noted.The tradeoffs vary depending on the type of cut, he said. For example, delaying hardware purchases could result in increased service outages.CIOs could also try other tactics, such as renegotiating vendor pacts or enacting hiring freezes, according to Forrester. Such measures could antagonize business partners and overburden staff, they said.But those types of risks are mild in comparison to that posed by cutting certain types of &quot;low-hanging fruit,&quot; such as time and support for research and development.&quot;These things look like they don&#39;t have immediate payback, so the question is &#39;Why are we doing them when times are tight?&#39;&quot; Cullen said.Likewise, it would be foolish to pull money and resources away from architectural strategy, he argued: &quot;You&#39;re going to be impeding your ability to take a long-term view of IT investments. When the tap opens up again people are going to be creating silos ... and you&#39;re going to spend your time unwinding these things.&quot;&quot;The worst thing you can do as a CIO is get so focused on cuts that when you come out of a recession, your department can&#39;t take the business where it wants to be,&quot; Bartels added.Outsourcing IT may also look like an appealing option, but the analysts issued a stern warning against it as a quick fix.Large-scale outsourcing deals take a long time to close, for one thing, Cullen argued: &quot;This is not near-term savings. This is not 2008 savings.&quot; But outsourcing of a particular IT function could make sense, he said.The hot trend of the past couple of years -- SaaS (software as a service) -- is not necessarily a fitting remedy during a recession, the analysts argued. While SaaS vendors relentlessly tout the cost savings their offerings can provide, it would cost a lot more to rip and replace legacy assets with SaaS products, the analysts said. However, they added, SaaS might offer lower upfront costs for a new technology.
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The best of times, or the worst of times. The US economy is the strongest in years, or is mired in the deepest employment crisis in decades.
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The market is still down from its March 2000 peak. Here's how to protect your assets from further drops.
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If you exit the market, how do you know when to get back in?
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Grab lower interest rates, but keep that borrowing in check.
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Prepare for an odd kind of financial disaster.
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Wall Street is still on course to end 2006 in the plus column, but it's too early to pop the champagne corks. Investors will comb through next week's jobs report for November and other data to see if the U.S. economy and corporate profits will be able to withstand the fallout from a slowdown in housing and the dollar's slide.