It's getting to be hard work finding work

Star Tribune (Minneapolis) (MCT) - Paul Ries can't keep a job.

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His last one ended in early November when his employer, a Minneapolis medical device company, closed a factory. It was at least the sixth job since 2004 for Ries, including temp work at a local refinery _ twice _ and at another medical device company. A "permanent" position at a chemical research company ended after six months when the firm folded.

Now Ries, a purchasing and supply chain manager with more than 30 years experience, will resume what has been his most steady gig in the past four years _ "that job-hunting thing."

He expects a particularly long search. "The tea leaves don't look good," said Ries, who's married with four grown children and will be 65 in December.

People like Ries, of Shoreview, Minn., are a repeat business that is frustrating job placement agencies _ government and private. Counselors talk about more temp-to-hire placements that "never get around to the hire part," as one said. And they see more permanent jobs turn temporary, as struggling companies let go of their newest hires when hard times hit.

The job losses are hitting young and old, those with college degrees and experience and those just starting out, and they show no sign of abating as the economy lingers in a recession.

It's the revolving door at job agencies.

"Counselors see people coming back through their doors after they just left," said Louis Huether, a project manager at the Employment Action Center in St. Louis Park, Minn. "People get placed successfully in a job, then all of a sudden the company runs into problems and they get laid off again. It's devastating for people if it's their second or third layoff; it's really hard luck when that happens."

Typical of economic downturns, it is getting harder for many to even get their foot in the door. Huether estimated the average job search has stretched from six to eight months in the past year. And as in all buyers' markets, the shoppers are increasingly picky, said Jane Samargia, executive director of HIRED, a Minnesota agency with nearly 70 training and employment assistance programs. So any job candidates with the usual minuses _ short on education or experience, for example _ face tough odds.

That's what Tim Madden is finding. At 19, and a spring high school graduate, Madden wants to start a career as a cook. A pal of his who graduated a year earlier found a cooking job, but Madden, of Brooklyn Park, Minn., has had no luck. "I've applied everywhere, and I do the follow-up call and everything," he said.

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But the difficulty staying hired is the new and most depressing development.

Dan Murphy, 58, of New Hope, Minn., is looking for his fifth job in four years. As a packaging engineer, Murphy designed containers at a manufacturer in Wisconsin for 11 years until 2005, when the company started moving the plant to China.

He was hired by another Wisconsin manufacturer in November 2005. But when a large account fell through, the company laid him off the next April. Sales jobs at two Minneapolis companies, one a manufacturer and the other a packaging supplies company, both lasted only a matter of months as business fell off at both places.

Like Murphy, Theresa Baugh has circled through the job market several times. Baugh moved to the Twin Cities in 2001, with her husband, Patrick, four children and another on the way. Both had spent years in the Army, and Theresa took a job with a local defense contractor while Patrick worked for another defense contractor. Patrick's job has been stable, but Theresa's ended in a year and a half.

With a master's degree and experience as an operations manager for a motor pool, Theresa launched a job search that ended only when she took a year's government assignment to Qatar in 2004, leaving her family behind. She finally landed a position at a small information technology consulting firm in Minneapolis this past January. But business slowed, and she was one of three laid off in September.

"My salary was really helping out, paying off a few bills and saving some money," Theresa said. "But when my job started slowing down, when I wasn't as busy, I started to worry. I had restless nights. I knew it wouldn't be long before they told me they had to let me go."

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