So yeah...... how bout dem jobs?

Alright, first off- much apologies for not actually writing anything for a month. Or two. Mostly three. I feel however, it would be fair to say that I've been quite busy since November. Work has been quite the bear, and I would not be able to look myself in the mirror and honestly say I have been doing my job proper justice if I had been spending much time blogging.
So yeah- things are a bit scary out there employment wise. For all of you under the impression that a job in the pharmaceutical industry has the equivalent job security as, what say, "the health industry", you may want to rethink that position. I am fortunate to have products that are Cardiac related, so I am not hit hard as those that sell in the "recreational" area- and by that, I mean- stuff that isn't keeping you alive. For example: Sleep medications, anti depressants, anti biotics (outside of, you know, hospitalization type infections), etc. I don't mean the hard stuff!
Nonetheless, the industry is downsizing at about a 30-40% clip. Pfizer announced a merger with Wyeth, just after laying off 4K people (company wide) and further announced another 19K reduction in the next year. And Pfizer sells some big money drugs- I am sure you have heard of Lipitor, have you not?
That being said, since people are having less jobs, people are having less insurance to pay for pesky things like prescriptions, and the companies are projecting a swift kick in the nads to their bottom lines.
What is worst of all is that I have to actually buy my own pens and paper now. THE HORROR
OK, that last part was just an inside joke. But this whole economy/job thing is sort of staggering.

While listening/reading the news as of late, most are easily projecting a double digit unemployment rate. I first looked at things in the light of "Well, that's only a few percentage points away at this point- it's not much of a change. We are already at 7%." Then, I realized, that if we go to 10.5% what say, that we still have an extra 50% to add to the numbers that are already out there. And that's just a low level of "double digits"

I f*ckin' hate math! It has an awful way of sneaking up on you.

What's nice is this........ A few months ago- I predicted $8 gasoline. And then- quite in line with all my other attempts at predicting how markets will go- gasoline dropped to about $1.85 locally. So I am hoping that the job market follows suit.