I can say that here in Connecticut, the downturn has REALLY hit hard (mostly for those of the middle class and lower. Connecticut pretty much has two kinds of jobs available that aren't retail, Insurance and insurance. There used to be manufacturing, but almost all the manufacturers either closed their doors and moved overseas or are trying to.
I ended up with a genetic health dissorder that rendered me dissabled two years ago which has screwed my life and now I make only a quarter of what I used to. My wife, who worked in insurance got laid off after 10 years of service along with a HUGE portion of the whole Connecticut insurance industry. Insurance companies all over Connecticut are ADVERTISING for workers, but they are only HIREING temps ! So my wife is now stuck as a temp and every time she goes for a job interview, there's at least 20 other people trying for the same job, or they don't like the fact that she has 10 years of experience (They say "OVERQUALIFIED" a lot which is bullcrap).
She says that right now, where the offices used to be all full time workers are all now 90% temps that the companies don't have to pay health insurance for and pay pennies for wages. We just got this nice apartment a few years back, and now, because of all this, we're going to have to dump it and move to a smaller/cheaper place.
I don't see a light at the end of the tunnel for the blue collar or lower class workers at all for the near future. Those classes ALWAYS had trouble here in this state, and now, they're REALLY having problems.
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