12/11/2003 thu
- keep hope-vs-doom acomin' with $8/mon subscription check to ‘ Timesizing.com with Phil Hyde’, Box 622,
Cambridge Ma 02140 - all 675 files, # visitors yesterday 12/10/wed:802 (12/11/02/wed: 751 incl.spidrs) -
Headlines from Hell (tm)  • Ridge wants legalize millions of illegal aliens, thus encouraging millions more
• for 2nd time in week, US military acknowledges child victims (9 this time) of airstrikes aimed at Taliban  
• major phone cos. raise rates regardless of competition - so reason for breaking up Ma Bell would be??  
• savings rate over past decade lower than thought - so 1990s more desperate than we thought??
+ 3 DOWNsizings, totaling 1,420+?? lost jobs reported in Wall Street Journal (WSJ) or NY Times (NYT):
• 8% workforce cut (1220 jobs lost) as Abitibi-Consolidated newsprint spooks over slack newsprint prices, instead of just trimming its workweek 8% (38 minutes a day for everyone, including top executives), re-investing overtime savings in overtime-targeted training&hiring and keeping everyone together working, earning, confident & buying at least 92% as many newspapers as before     • 200 jobcuts by Dana   • unspecified cuts as Warnaco closes its last 44 Speedo stores
+ disability in the news: • there are 53m disabled Americans of whom over 10% are on disability pay
+ makework rampant:  • aides try to deflect blame for Halliburton overcharges onto subcontractor
vs.  glimmers of hope
TIMEsizing on the newswires: = strategic hope ignored since Pearl Harbor -
• North Manchester Foundry, Indiana, has cut to 24-hour workweek to avoid layoffs
• Electrical Workers official in Fairbanks offers 37½-hr workweek to ease city budget squeeze
• next July, public-sector workers in South Korea to have 5-day workweek twice a month
• another inside-the-box economist parades time-blindness
+ headlines from heaven in Wall Street Journal (WSJ) or NY Times (NYT) = random glimmers:
• 1 UPsizing - 100 new jobs at Google/India   • panel proposes ways to constrain executive pay  
• serial entrepreneurs thrive on creating companies from scratch, then move on to start more

12/10/2003 wed
- keep hope-vs-doom acomin' with $8/mon subscription check to ‘ Timesizing.com with Phil Hyde’, Box 622,
Cambridge Ma 02140 - all 675 files, # visitors yesterday 12/09/tue:870 (12/10/02/tue: 806 incl.spidrs) -
Headlines from Hell (tm)  • states ask: what recovery?
+ 6 DOWNsizings, totaling 11,800 +?? lost jobs reported in Wall Street Journal (WSJ) or NY Times (NYT):
• 12.5% workforce cut (7400 jobs lost) as Washington Mutual reacts exacerbatingly to sharp slowdown in mtgs & re-fi's, instead of just trimming its workweek 12.5% (to five 7-hour days for everyone, including top executives), re-investing overtime savings in overtime-targeted training&hiring and keeping everyone together working, earning, confident & spending at least 87.5% as much as usual     • 4000 jobcuts by SBC   • 400 cuts by America Online   • unspecified cuts by Georgia-Pacific, • Hewlett-Packard & • A & F Quarterly mag
+ makework rampant:  • Halliburton pacts for Iraq work rise to nearly $5 billion  
• Pentagon awards Lockheed Martin $4.6B contract to develop missile targets
vs.  glimmers of hope
TIMEsizing on the newswires: = strategic hope ignored since Pearl Harbor -
• employer-repesenting pols in UK rationalize special exemption from EU 48-hr workweek cap
• employer rep seizes right to defend employees’ 'right' to 'choose' long hours
• survey finds jobsharing among top benefits that employers like to lipservice
• Bangladeshi professor explains flextime to countrymen

12/09/2003 tue
- keep hope-vs-doom acomin' with $8/mon subscription check to ‘ Timesizing.com with Phil Hyde’, Box 622,
Cambridge Ma 02140 - all 675 files, # visitors yesterday 12/08/mon:838 (12/09/02/mon: 876 incl.spidrs) -
Headlines from Hell (tm)  • new CEOs are so bad, firms are turning to retirees   • America can invade nations at peace but can't get a flu vaccine that's either up-to-date or plentiful enough for our populations at risk  
• Bush's labor secy touts four-month job gain despite knowing we need that amount every single month
+ eroding retirement: • Bush signs Medicare bill   • but its costs and benefits remain elusive
+ 6 DOWNsizings, totaling 6200 +?? lost jobs reported in Wall Street Journal (WSJ) or NY Times (NYT):
• 12.5% workforce cut (5000 Korean jobs lost) as KT Corp. cuts annual expenses (& markets), instead of just trimming its workweek 12.5% (to five 7-hour days for everyone, including top executives), re-investing overtime savings in overtime-targeted training&hiring and keeping everyone together working, earning, confident & spending at least 87.5% as much as usual     • 700 jobcuts by LG Card   • 300 cuts by Doosan Heavy Industries & Construction   • 100 by SK Chemical   • 100 by U.S. Steel   • unspecified cuts by Spiegel
+ 1 bankruptcy reported in WSJ &/or NYT: • Cable & Wireless placed its US arm in Chapter 11  
+ 1 prison item: • top court considers constitutionality of 2-part interrogations with Miranda put off till part 2
+ makework rampant:  • War remains the turbine that drives America's economy  
• House of Reps passes massive, $829B spending bill 242-176
vs.  glimmers of hope
TIMEsizing on the newswires: = strategic hope ignored since Pearl Harbor -
• China implemented 48-hour workweek in 1960, 44 in 1994, & 40 in 1995
• Toronto Star quotes Roach in dismissing U.S. measure of "productivity"
• and 7 other articles about worktime developments

12/06-08/2003 sat-mon (re fri biz)
- keep hope-vs-doom acomin' with $25/yr subscription check to ‘ Timesizing.com with Phil Hyde’, Box 622,
Cambridge Ma 02140 USA  (# diff.visitors to any of our 674 files, F Sa Su: 455,436,543 - wk's daily avg 689
**  we offer free consulting to novelists or playwrights setting stories in timesizing future-worlds**
headlines from hell (tm)  • long wait for colonoscopies in 'fast' private-sector US healthcare system   • and there's a shortage of many vaccines   • and health officials are urging rationing   • and employers are pushing more of the premiums onto employees   • but misery has company - like US, the EU is getting more illegal aliens too
+ 2 DOWNsizings, totaling 550 lost jobs reported in Wall Street Journal (WSJ) or NY Times (NYT):
• 13% workforce cut (425 Normal Ill. jobs lost) as Mitsubishi freaks over sales slump & worsens it, instead of just cutting its workweek 13% (to five 7-hour days for everyone, including top executives), re-investing overtime savings in overtime-targeted training&hiring and keeping everyone working, earning, confident & spending at least 87% as much as before     • 125 jobcuts by 3M  
+ 2 prison stories: • woman's drug sentence oscillates with politics  
• NY judges protest federal Feeney-amendment bullying toward longer sentences
+ homelessness in the news: • in nightly ritual, New York homeless gather at Manhattan
drop-in centers to await buses to take them to cots in church basements all across the city
+ makework rampant: • private eyes in Calif. take off like lawyers   • Air Force pursued $20B Boeing
deal despite concerns re improprieties   • Beijing gov't to inject $15.7B into two private banks
vs.  hope du jourtm - the only thing we haven't tried lately  
TIMEsizing = strategic hope: • A-American Machine in Rockford, Ill., shortened workweek to reduce layoffs when steel prices went up last year   • IMS Health Canada in Montreal offers job sharing, shortened 'summer hours' & shortened worktime for gentle re-entry after absence  
• more lawfirms let attorneys work part-time if willing to kiss promotions goodbye  
• 60% of HR professionals back EU 48-hour workweek ceiling
weekend roll-up -
5 issues/wk - wk's avg homepage hits/issue: 69
doom of the weektm from the WSJ & the NYT:
• 14 DOWNsizings, over 11,320 jobcuts   • 1 homelessness story 
• 4 bankruptcies   • 4 eroding-retirement stories   • 3 prison stories  
vs.  hope of the weektm from the WSJ & the NYT:
• 17 TIMEsizing items  • 7 UPsizings (7500+ new jobs)  + clouded hope:   • 10 makework items
{{ ytd: 768 timsizngs (20595+ new or sav'd jobs) + 99 upsizngs (81445+ new jobs) + 124 makwrk (269543+ 'jobs') =
tot: 371583 = 29% of cuts VERSUS 661 dnsz (1294285+ cuts) + 307 bkrp ($23.2B+) +29 homlss +88 prisn +47 kills }}

12/05/2003 fri
- keep hope-vs-doom acomin' with $8/mon subscription check to ‘ Timesizing.com with Phil Hyde’, Box 622,
Cambridge Ma 02140 - all 674 files, # visitors yesterday 12/04/thu:779 (12/05/02/thu: 767 incl.spidrs) -
Headlines from Hell (tm)  • Bush regime's motto, "Have we looted America's future today?"  
• new jobless claims rise   • rise in mfg won't automatically raise employment in robotics age
+ eroding retirement: • Medicare bill relies on HMOs, but one NY retiree was cut off twice by Medicare HMOs  
• Congress' shenanigans - gives corporate welfare while defined-benefit pensions are $400B underfunded
+ 3 DOWNsizings, totaling 3720 +?? lost jobs reported in Wall Street Journal (WSJ) or NY Times (NYT):
• 10% workforce cut (3000 jobs lost) as Schering-Plough drugs cuts annual expenses (& markets), instead of just trimming its workweek 10% (48 minutes a day for everyone, including top executives), re-investing overtime savings in overtime-targeted training&hiring and keeping everyone working, earning, confident & buying at least 90% as many drugs as usual    
• 720 jobcuts by Tyson Foods   • unspecified cuts by Oneida
+ 4-in-1 bankruptcy reported in WSJ &/or NYT: • Erb Group's 4 holding companies in Switzerland  
+ 1 prison item: • 2 Ark. prisons, till recently Wackenhut-run, warned re poor healthcare & assault protection
+ 2 PUFFsizings = makework rampant:  • former trial atty goes after wasteful synfuel tax credit for corn growers
• it's also ba-a-ack! - Pentagon awards $300,000 to re-rev 'effective strategic influence' campaign of sort disbanded under pressure last year
vs.  glimmers of hope
TIMEsizing on the newswires: = strategic hope ignored since Pearl Harbor -
• 'officers should never try to use overtime to supplement their pay'
• Dundee is shortest-hour centre in Scotland
• NZ bizmen still kicking against extra week of vacation
+ headlines from heaven in WSJ or NYT = random glimmers:
• 4 UPsizings - 2100 new jobs at Merrill Lynch & unspecified new jobs at
- Goldman Sachs Group Inc., - Credit Suisse First Boston and - Safeway Inc.
• reader slams Krugman's assumption of all globalization, all growth, all the time, even in fossil fuel supply & terran pollution absorbability   • charity revs up with stocks - but no fundamentals

12/04/2003 thu
- keep hope-vs-doom acomin' with $8/mon subscription check to ‘ Timesizing.com with Phil Hyde’, Box 622,
Cambridge Ma 02140 - all 674 files, # visitors yesterday 12/03/wed:847 (12/04/02/wed: 835 incl.spidrs) -
Headlines from Hell (tm)  • companies sneak in more & more little fees to charge consumers for same service
• Wal-Mart raised healthcare premium 50% in last 2 years & now only 60% of eligible workers can afford it
• new Bush law lets more timber & brush be cut & cleared with less environmental scrutiny
• meanwhile this year likely 3rd global-warmest after 1998 & 2002
+ eroding retirement: • suddenly WSJ is spinning corporate pension contrib burden as earnings booster
+ 3 DOWNsizings, totaling 3470 +?? lost jobs reported in Wall Street Journal (WSJ) or NY Times (NYT):
• 7% workforce cut (3000 India jobs lost) as Tata Iron & Steel cuts costs (& markets), instead of just trimming its workweek 7% (34 minutes a day for everyone, including top executives), re-investing overtime savings in overtime-targeted training&hiring and keeping everyone together working, earning, confident & spending at least 93% as much as usual    
• 470 jobcuts by Alcatel CIT   • unspecified jobcuts by Bombardier
+ 3 PUFFsizings = makework rampant:  • federal spending per household is most since WWII
• energy bill helps firm that wants build $1.2B plant in home state of senate energy-panel's chairman
• it's ba-a-ack! - Star Wars contract worth $4.5 billion awarded to Northrop & Raytheon by Pentagon
vs.  glimmers of hope
TIMEsizing on the newswires: = strategic hope ignored since Pearl Harbor -
• personal example of inflated US 'productivity' measurement
• Business Journal of Tri Cities in Tennessee gets hours trend backwards
• Venezuela has maximum daytime workweek of 44 hours, nighttime 35 hours
• big 2-bus crash in Malaysia spurs proposals for limiting working hours for drivers
+ headlines from heaven in Wall Street Journal (WSJ) or NY Times (NYT): = random glimmers:
• 1 UPsizing - 3100 new jobs in 12 countries at Anadarko Petroleum over past 17 years
• presidential candidate Sen. John Edwards (D-NC) proposes restricting lobbyists

12/03/2003 wed
- keep hope-vs-doom acomin' with $8/mon subscription check to ‘ Timesizing.com with Phil Hyde’, Box 622,
Cambridge Ma 02140 - all 673 files, # visitors yesterday 12/02/tue:878 (12/03/02/tue: 886 incl.spidrs) -
Headlines from Hell (tm)  • 'birds of a feather' - Bush wouldn't sign Kyoto unless perfect - now Putin won't either
+ eroding retirement: • Medicare weakened (but could block Bush's plan to weaken Social Security)
+ 3 DOWNsizings, totaling 3250 +?? lost jobs reported in Wall Street Journal (WSJ) or NY Times (NYT):
• 7.5% workforce cut (2500 UK jobs lost) as Aviva insurance 'moves' jobs to India tho' still dependent on UK markets that it's diminishing, instead of just trimming its workweek 7.5% (36 minutes a day for everyone, including top executives), re-investing overtime savings in overtime-targeted training&hiring and keeping everyone together working, earning, confident & buying at least 92.5% as much insurance as usual    
• 750 jobcuts by PepsiCo   • unspecified jobcuts by FAO Inc.
+ 2 bankruptcies reported in WSJ/NYT:  • Michael G. Tyson and Mike Tyson Enterprises   • FAO (2nd time!)
+ 1 PUFFsizing = makework rampant:  • Raytheon, fattened at public trough, pays off $1¼B in debt
vs.  glimmers of hope
TIMEsizing on the newswires: = strategic hope ignored since Pearl Harbor -
• Lieberman proposes $30/yr tax on all employees to finance half-pay leave for parents
• UK employers abuse EU 48-hr workweek cap cuz employee opt-out during labor glut is no-op
• 1/3 of UK firms offer work options for full-timers but only 9% of those offer job sharing
+ headlines from heaven in Wall Street Journal (WSJ) or NY Times (NYT): = random glimmers:
• 1 UPsizing - 300 new jobs at Veritas Software in India over the next twelve months
• Calif. communities start zoning against Wal-Mart's suffocating monsterization

12/02/2003 tue
- keep hope-vs-doom acomin' with $8/mon subscription check to ‘ Timesizing.com with Phil Hyde’, Box 622,
Cambridge Ma 02140 - all 673 files, # visitors yesterday 12/01/mon:884 (12/02/02/mon: 913 incl.spidrs) -
Headlines from Hell (tm)  • Diebold touchscreen voting machines yield
insecure, manipulable & unverifiable results & are spreading throughout USA
+ 3 DOWNsizings, totaling 330 +?? lost jobs reported in WSJ &/or NY Times:
• 10% workforce cut (330 jobs lost) as Hartford Financial buys group insurance unit from CNA Financial, instead of just trimming its workweek 10% (48 minutes a day for everyone, including top executives), re-investing overtime savings in overtime-targeted training&hiring and keeping everyone together working, earning, confident & buying at least 97.1% as many long distance services as usual    
• unspecified jobcuts by DuPont, and • Ashikaga Bank
+ 1 bankruptcy reported in Wall Street Journal & NY Times: • C2 Media  
+ 1 mega PUFFsizing = makework rampant:  • Japan has sunk trillions of yen into nonperforming banks
vs.  glimmers of hope
TIMEsizing on the newswires: • another take on impact of US overtime bill
• EU sets absolute 48-hour workweek ceiling but 25% of UK employees routinely exceed it
• UK's opt-out from EU 48-hour-per-week ceiling blows huge hole in protection vs. megahours
+ headlines from heaven in Wall Street Journal (WSJ) or NY Times (NYT): = random glimmers:
• 1 UPsizing - 2000 new jobs at Electronic Arts over next 4 years
• you can't be a 'social conservative' in Canada without being a wacko
• jobseekers are starting to strike back at abusive employers & evil HR directors