Why hiring is dead in the water

Charles Hugh-Smith of OfTwoMinds blog  ( posted on Zero Hedge, linked from Instapundit )

Excerpts:

• In sum: the population and GDP have both expanded smartly since 2000, but full-time employment has barely edged above levels reached 13 years ago. [emphasis added]
• what the Fed's policies are boosting: financial sector profits [emphasis added]
• The only way to understand why employment is dead in the water is to stand in the shoes of a potential employer or entrepreneur.
• Those who have spent their careers in government or academia have little idea what it takes to hire more people. Number one is a business with strong demand for one's products or services. In a developed world with too much of everything except energy, that is no small challenge: the world is awash in over-capacity in every field except niche industries such as deepwater oil rigs.[emphasis added]
• Cheap credit doesn't create surplus value, increase gross margins or get rid of over-capacity. It is a financial non-sequitur for all but a relative handful of enterprises. The only firms interested in borrowing money for expansion are those relative few in sectors that are not burdened with overcapacity. That might include oil services, network security and a handful of others.[ emphasis added]
• There is no other way to stay solvent in a post-bubble, over-capacity, over-indebted consumerist economy awash in too much of everything but energy, common sense and fiscal prudence.[emphasis added,  comment Bravo!]

Note that the one thing that I've been pushing is energy, and it is the one of many things that the left is trying to kill ( and succeeding).

Update:

Bad link above (Hugh-Smith), fixed, sorry.