http://www.economist.com/business/displayStory.cfm?story_id=13579063&source=hptextfeature

You're hired, next year!

Summary
This article talks about how companies are cutting employment down without laying them off. Instead of hiring more employees to work in the main areas of the company, they hired more freelancers and consultants to save money. Instead of working to create more goods for the company, these freelancers and consultants helps the company cut down on employees. These freelancers and consultants suggest they give time off to employees without having to spend on employment benefits and the risk of competitors taking their employees. These articles also mention the relationship between universities and companies are going downhill. The amount of students guaranteed employment in a company is decreased significantly. Universities are now taking a further step and are helping their students hopefully to secure employment for them.

Connections
This article and chapter 8 connects because they both talk about employment and the different type of employment. In the article, companies are having abundance of employees take time off of work so that the company can save money and guarantee employment in the future. They do not have to pay for employment insurance because they are not working, but they are still employed. This doesn’t help the economy, it does not increase consumers spending, in fact this decrease consumers spending. The Companies are only doing goods to themselves and not the economy as a whole.

Personal Reflection
I think what the companies are doing is wrong; they are just protecting themselves and not the economy. At the end the companies will be the ones that will get hurt. The companies are one of the main components in the economy and if they are doing things that doesn’t help increase employment and consumer sale than the economy would take longer than needed to, to get out of the depression.