MICHAEL S. WIRTZ / Staff Photographer
Laid-off workers milled about the parking lot of Reynolds Packaging Group in Downingtown last month after turning in their I.D. badges. The firm is mothballing the plant, which employed 150 people. Upheaval in the job market has hit Chester County hard. Continuing claims for unemployment benefits were up 114 percent from two years ago.
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Upheaval in the Region’s Job Market
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In epidemic of layoffs, no one is immune
Joblessness spreads in Pa. and N.J., caused by an ill economy. Any cure looks to be slow and painful.
The areas that expand the fastest, he said, tend to fall first and furthest. He suspects that one would find similar increases in the fastest-growing areas in New Jersey.
"Mount Laurel - that was a hot-growing area - and Moorestown. Those are the areas where it is going to hurt the most," he said.
In sheer numbers, Camden, Gloucester and Burlington Counties have been hit hard by the decline in consumer spending. In February 2008, 120,300 people worked in the sector that includes stores and trucking companies. A year later, that number dropped by 6,700.
"Within New Jersey, South Jersey was outperforming northern New Jersey," said James Hughes, dean of the Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy at Rutgers University in New Brunswick.
"That was really driven by housing costs and a much stronger housing product in South Jersey. People would have a long commute - they could go up 295 or the turnpike to Trenton, or the Route 1 corridor.
"Housing was so much more affordable, much cheaper than the expensive suburbs to the west of Philadelphia. South Jersey accounted for the population growth. When you have housing growth," he said, "you have the retailing that follows, and the doctors' offices and the accountants' offices.
"South Jersey had the housing boom, so it got hit hard by the housing bust," he said. "Starting in 2007, it started to falter and fell behind the state as a whole."
These days, Bruce M. Weissberg, 55, of Haddon Township, a laid-off information-technologies project manager, wonders how it will play out.
Weissberg is among 32,424 people in Burlington, Camden and Gloucester Counties receiving unemployment benefits, up 52 percent from two years ago.
"Everybody's downsizing," he said, passing out his resume at a job fair at Rutgers University-Camden last week. "Last year, I got 20 calls a week from people who wanted to hire me. This year, I'm happy to get one call.
"I'm scared to death, to tell you the truth."
Jane's Job Blog
It's a tough world. Maybe we can help - help navigate the troubled waters of unemployment and the recession, help vent about the insanity of it all or at least help find a laugh. Maybe we can provide some hope as we all try to reinvent ourselves.
For job-hunting tips, useful links, workplace news, and a new blog - "Jobbing" - by Inquirer writer Jane M. Von Bergen, visit go.philly.com/jobbing
Contact staff writer Jane M. Von Bergen at 215-854-2769 or jvonbergen@phillynews.com.
