Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont., and member Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, introduced legislation Wednesday to create job opportunities for veterans returning home from war and help businesses create jobs.

IMGCAP(1)]The big economic question these days is when is hiring going to pick up and the unemployment rate drop?

Nearly half of accounting and finance workers are likely to make a job transition in the next 12 months, according to a new survey.

The unemployment rate fell four-tenths of a percentage point to 9.4 percent in December, as nonfarm payroll employment increased by 103,000.

Approximately 89 percent of public accountants in a recent survey believe that businesses will either hire more in 2011 than they did in 2010 or maintain the same employee count from 2010 in 2011.

Few early signs of economic recovery will get as mixed a reception as the news that salaries in accounting are likely to rise in 2011.

IMGCAP(1)]Several months ago, I got an e-mail from a young CPA asking my advice about whether he should stay with his firm, or leave to start his own. He was depressed. He had lost respect for his partners during the recession, when the firm made what seemed like overreaching layoffs. In addition, they'd stripped away perks like telecommuting that he and many of his colleagues valued. And at the end of 2009, the firm leaders quietly celebrated a "very profitable year." Deeply saddened by this behavior at a firm he once loved, he wondered if it was time to move on.

While flexibility at work and work/life balance remain important for young staff in CPA firms, advancement opportunities and compensation rank higher on a list of what they want out of their job. They also want their partners to communicate better about what success means.

A net 2 percent of CFOs said they plan to hire full-time accounting and finance professionals in the first quarter of 2011, according to a new survey.

After a dramatic drop last quarter, CPA executives regained modest optimism in the past three months about the prospects for the U.S. economy, but still believe the recovery will be slow and are cautious about expansion and hiring plans.

After 38 years at the Big Four firm Deloitte, with the last seven of them as chairman of the board, Sharon Allen is retiring from her post in May 2011.

CBIZ found a 0.44 percent decrease in its Small Business Employment Index in November, after posting an increase of 0.73 percent in October.

The U.S. economy gained only about 39,000 jobs in November, far fewer than expected, sending the unemployment rate up two-tenths of a percentage point to 9.8 percent, and putting more pressure on Congress to pass an extension in federal unemployment benefits.

Small business employment continued to show growth in November, according to a payroll report by Intuit, although wages were down and hours worked remained flat.

Employment in the private sector rose by 93,000 from October to November on a seasonally adjusted basis, according to ADP’s National Employment Report, released Wednesday.

In this Generational Viewpoints, RLB LLP (www.rlb.ca), a Guelph, Ont.-based accounting firm with over 60 employees, shares views on firm specialization from the perspective of Gen X partner Jason Gibbons, born in 1974, and Baby Boomer partner, Michael Manera, born in 1959.

Nonfarm payroll employment increased by 151,000 in October, but the unemployment rate remained unchanged at 9.6 percent, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Friday.

Economic confidence is rising among CFOs, according to a new survey that found 57 percent of them saying they plan to hire additional employees in the next six months.

Accounting and finance employees are feeling less confident in the economy and the job market, but optimism about their own personal employment situation has increased, according to a new survey.

Is it just me, or does anyone else find something egregious about the fact that the resident idiots of the reality show "Jersey Shore" receive roughly $30,000 per episode while the median annual earnings for someone aged 25 in the labor force hovers at about $32,000.