Economy Shows Little Sign Of Short-Term Health

January 6, 2009 With no improvement to the employment market in sight, an MBA degree is becoming an increasingly attractive option to many professionals

This week, the Labor Department released figures showing that 2.589 million jobs were lost nationwide in 2008, the biggest such drop since 1945, according to Bloomberg News

This leaves American workers facing a 7.2 percent unemployment rate and increases pressure on members of Congress to take action on economic stimulus legislation as soon as possible.

The job figures were somewhat worse than what many analysts had been expecting.

"Consumers are now going to get more and more scared at the prospect of losing their job," Nariman Behravesh of IHS Global Insight was quoted as saying

In the grim economic climate, many professionals have been opting to pursue MBA degrees, both online and in the classroom, rather than take their chances with the current job market. At the same time, there's much more to an MBA than just finding a job.

Many who graduate from such programs will find themselves excellently positioned to take their careers to new heights or even start their own successful and innovative companies when the economy does begin to recover, which is expected to happen in about a year.