Opportunity Amid Uncertainty

With consumer prices plummeting, if you're not one of the nearly 2 million people to have become unemployed this year, and if you have some job security, this holiday season could be very good for you, since there are lots of great deals out there.

Likewise, while many businesses, of all sizes, are suffering, those that have so far weathered the storm stand to clean up, since there is a growing reservoir of cheap and talented labor actively searching for work. BusinessWeek has picked up on this theme in a recent piece about how small businesses can prosper in this environment (BW):

Still, despite the overall gloomy forecasts, the downturn also presents hiring opportunities for small businesses. For starters, there is a huge wealth of talented applicants in search of work at the moment. "If you want to hire someone today, it is like buying a car or house," says Dunkelberg. "Employees are cheap, good, and readily available. Nobody is complaining about the quality of applicants. The choices you have now are much improved." For instance, the NFIB's survey also found that 14% of business owners reported that they had positions they were unable to fill, down from 24% in January. "If you are a buyer of labor, this is a buyer's market."

[...] The major job cuts at large corporations also translates into a boon for small business owners who have the resources to hire workers who were perhaps unattainable previously.