Experts call economic downturn good opportunity
■ Lecturers advise students
on how they can succeed
in the current job slump
By Allyson Taylor
for the Emerald
Economists are speculating that
the job market will not look
promising for university gradu
ates for the next couple of years.
Thus, this is a time to travel, im
prove communication skills, join
the Peace Corps or just stay in
school and prolong graduation,
economics Professor Ed
Whitelaw said.
According to Whitelaw and
Margaret Hallock of the Labor Ed
ucation and Research Center, Uni
versity students need to concen
trate on perfecting their
communication skills before they
think about getting a job. Staying
in school is one way to do just that,
the two stressed at Monday’s Ca
reer Center-sponsored presentation
titled “Crouching Economy, Hid
den Career.”
The goal of the presentation was
to educate students about the cur
rent economy, the impact the econ
omy has on the Pacific Northwest
and on gender issues, said Bill
Bankhead of the University Career
Center.
Hallock said jobs opening in the
future will be in the services in
dustry, where students seeking em
ployment will need excellent com
munication skills.
“The ability to communicate
with other humans is very impor
tant,” Hallock said. “If you have
communication skills, talk your
way into a situation where you can
learn (technical) skills. If you have
technical skills, learn the commu
nications skills.”
If a person has a combination
of the two, job opportunities will
be endless in the next couple of
years, the speakers said. Accord
ing to Hallock, the service indus
try has exploded and will only
continue to do so. Health, educa
tion, technical, business, leisure
and public services are all areas
where jobs will be found in the
coming years and where commu
nication skills are necessary, Hal
lock said.
“If you can finance it, stay in
school. Refine your communica
tion skills because they are gold
en in the workforce,” Whitelaw
said. “Writing skills of under
graduates are not where they
should be. Get someone to edit
your work — beg for it if you
have to.”
Some audience members ex
pressed concern about the eco
nomic downturn the country has
seen since March 2001 and what
effects the Sept. 11 attacks will
have on the economy.
Whitelaw said the differences
would be “nearly impossible to
tell by the year 2010.” But since
the attacks, people might see a
lower payoff from taxes because
of the high costs of war, and peo
ple may see lower profits,
Whitelaw said.
He added that the job market
may also be affected, and the at
tacks could hasten the recession.
However, he said, since the
“downturn of jobs which started in
March 2001, only a quarter of total
jobs lost in the 1990-91 recession
have been lost in the past six
months,” so this is not a major re
cession.
“The underlying economic
forces are probably largely unaf
fected,” Hallock said.
She said she is “upbeat about
long-term aspects for women.”
“There are more women than
men in college right now, and sex
ism is slowly being chipped
away,” Hallock said. Though
equality in pay is still an issue, she
said, this is a “wonderful time for
women.”
The talk helped University stu
dents Heather Soczek and Jimi
Browne decide what they are go
ing to do after graduation.
“I feel I learned a lot coming
here. At first, I was coming for two
extra-credit points for class, but I
am very glad I came,” Browne
said. “On the way over, I was
thinking I was going to be making
$100,000 after college, and it is not
happening.”
Soczek did not have any idea
what she was going to do after
graduation and is now thinking
about joining the Peace Corps.
“I have been thinking about join
ing the Peace Corps for a while
now, and I am very glad
(Whitelaw) brought it up today,”
Soczek said.
Allyson Taylor is a freelance reporter
for the Oregon Daily Emerald.
Yesteryear’s news
An Emerald look
at University history
From the Oregon Daily Emerald,
Oct 30,1952:
Marx to Lash Out
Against Sex Emphasis
Groucho Marx will lash out
against '‘overemphasis on sex’* in
his speech here Dec. 2, New York
columnist Earl Wilson says,
“I hate to be a bluenose,” Marx
was quoted as saying by Wilson
in Wilson’s New* York Post col
umn of a few weeks ago, “but I
don’t think kids should have sex
thrown at them 24 hours a day,”
‘“Almost every ad you see to
day. selling anything at all, has a
picture of some dame in her un
derwear,’” Wilson quotes Grou
cho as saying.
Said Wilson:
“Groucho Marx — he of the
slight leer and the lifted eyebrow
•— is helping me crusade against
letting this decade become
known as “the Feelthv Fifties.".,.
*“Ne\ or has any country since
Rome been as sex-conscious as
we are today,’ Groucho told me at
lunch in Lindy’s,”...
“Tm going to criticize the
overemphasis on sex in a humor*
ous manner,* Groucho said.’*
“He proved it when I asked
him the title of his speech,
‘“I thought “Charlie” would be
a good title. Or maybe “Hank,” he
answered.”’
Girdle Uses In End Stretch
At Auction
A car bird horn and two cam
dlebolders were eagerly bid for
yesterday afternoon at the Asso
ciated Women Students auction,
but students felt little need for a
girdle, a bag of soap bars or an en
cyclopedia set...
A girdle took low money hon
ors at ten cents and went to an
unidentified male.
Receipts horn the auction, held
in the SU Fishbowl totaled
$100.00, according to Kay Moore,
AWS treasurer.
Rummage collected in Eugene
and left over horn the AWS auc
tion wOI be sold today at the
Rummage Center, in Eugene, ac- .
cording toAncy OavisTchairman
for the sate.
All proceeds from the auction
and rummage sale will go into the
AWS scholarship and charity
funds.
Thomas Patterson Emerald
Margaret Hallock of the Labor Education and Research Center gave sound advice to graduating students in the presentation Monday.
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