Part 2: 

Today, we look at the changing workplace. Are we looking at a future of telecommuting, skyping, and emailing from home? Will employers increasingly move the workplace to the home?

At Google's offices in Zurich, employees work in hanging chairs. (andrewarchy via Flickr)

Or will offices become more like those of Google and Facebook — with free food, games, and quirky decorations — all of which might encourage you to spend just a little more time at work?

A panel of experts joins us to take a peek at the future. We'll explore the kinds of labor increasingly being rewarded and accommodated and who will have trouble making it in the new workplace.

Guests:

• Wendy Murphy, assistant professor of management, Babson College

• Fred Foulkes, professor, Boston University School of Management; and faculty director, Human Resources Policy Institute.

• David Sanford, executive vice president of client relations, Winter, Wyman

The Gig Economy

A common setup for a gig-worker: The coffee-shop desk. (librarianby day via Flickr)

We all know that musicians, models, and actors often have lives filled with unpredictable, one-time gigs. But what if, along with hip-hop bands, wedding photographers, and freelance writers, we’re all being enveloped by the gig economy?

WGBH reporter and host Ibby Caputo introduces us to a scap-hauling, satire-writing nanny; and a world where cobbling together jobs isn't unusual.

Guests:

• Ibby Caputo, reporter, WGBH

Today, we take the pulse of the job market. Are companies finally starting to feel more secure? And what kinds of jobs and skills are now most in demand?

Plus, we look at summertime hiring. Is it a myth that recruitment goes on vacation?

Guests:

• Stu Coleman, partner and general Manager, Winter Wyman

• Elaine Varelas, managing partner, Keystone Associates; writer, Boston Globe's “Job Doc”

• Melinda Gleason, delivery team leader, Forum

 
BOSTON — A new report from Harvard University concludes that the long-struggling U.S. housing market has finally hit bottom. But it's still a long way back to the surface, even in Massachusetts, which has fared better than much of the country.
 
Chris Herbert of Harvard University’s Joint Center for Housing Studies said the report indicates the housing crisis may be at an end.
 
He acknowledged that experts have predicted recovery before — only to see the market fall back down.
 
"But this time is different," he said. "It's different because we’re seeing fundamentals improve in both demand, in terms of steady but moderate upticks in terms of sales, and in supply side, in that we’re seeing home inventories down to levels that are more normal in a market."
 
Nevertheless, Northeastern economist Barry Bluestone, who prepares annual housing report cards for the Greater Boston area, said it could still take many years for Massachusetts prices to return to their peak 6 years ago:
 
"A few years ago we did an analysis and we thought we would be back around 2014, 2015. But indeed the depressed prices have continued much longer than the last cycle. And now I wouldn’t be surprised if we didn’t see those prices regaining their past levels until the end of this decade," he said.
 
So is now a good time to buy a house in Boston?
 
"This is a terrific time for people in the home buying market to buy," Bluestone said. "Housing prices are near the bottom and interest rates are lower than they’ll ever be in our lifetime."
 
Bluestone said homeowners who want to sell still should wait a little longer, if they can, for prices to rise a bit.
 

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. — MIT's president is addressing the high cost of a college education. On the WGBH coproduction The Takeaway, Susan Hockfield said that despite shaky employment figures, the chances of finding employment with a college degree are significantly greater than with only a high school diploma.

If cost is an issue, she said there were avenues students and families should consider.

"For a family that is deeply concerned about the cost of college education, I would offer two important directions to pursue. The first is that public universities in almost every state are outstanding and can offer an outstanding education. Education is largely the responsibility of the student, so a well-motivated student can get an education at any one of the public universities in America," she said.
 
Hockfield added that most people don’t know about the financial support private universities provide.
 
"Here at MIT, Harvard, at Yale, Stanford, Princeton, we admit students in a need-blind application process. We don’t consider a family’s ability to pay for an education when we review who comes to MIT," she said. "We decide on which students are prepared to make the best use of MIT’s resources. We make it financially possible for every one of those students to come to MIT. If you’re a family with an annual income of $75,000 a year, we cover all of your tuition costs, and in some cases, more."

> > EXTRA: John Hockenberry of The Takeaway reflects on the value of college in his family.
 

 
BOSTON — A national survey of governors' budgets released on June 12 shows Massachusetts tax revenues are finally projected to hit pre-recession levels in the fiscal year that starts in July. But Gov. Deval Patrick is still taking a tight-fisted approach to budgeting.
 
The Fiscal Survey of States is published twice annually by the National Association of State Budget Officers (NASBO) and the National Governors Association. It shows that Massachusetts is one of 25 states in which, despite more robust revenue growth, the executive branch isn't ramping up spending to match. Tax revenues are expected to go up by 3.1 percent in Massachusetts next year but Patrick is only proposed raising spending by 2.9 percent.
 
Scott Pattison of NASBO said Patrick seems to be taking a conservative approach to budgeting because of uncertainty in the European and U.S. economies. Pattison said that's in keeping with the national trend: "Governors have been very cautious fiscally, and I believe prudent, to be providing a cushion and prepared for a rather tepid growth."
 
Even though the economy is improving in Massachusetts, the survey authors said big challenges still loom. The federal government is scheduled to make another round of deep budget cuts in January 2013. If those cuts go forward, they would directly hit the state budget in the form of reductions in grant programs.
 
And even though there’s some revenue growth and some spending growth, the rate is very slow. At the same time, there’s no political appetite for tax hikes. So, the study concludes, state revenue improvement since the recession hasn’t been enough to meet the rise in demand for state services and spending over the past 2 years.
 

 
CAMBRIDGE, Mass. — As the weather warms up and tourists fill the streets, panhandlers appear in droves, asking for spare change at almost every busy square and intersection. The treatment they receive from pedestrians, storeowners and police varies widely, as does their income. Now there's a new effort in Cambridge to get panhandlers off the streets.
 
Please spare change
 
Justin Newton divides his time between two trendy and rather affluent areas of Greater Boston: Harvard Square and Newbury Street. He's 31, tall with shaggy red hair and a beard. He's also a panhandler. For up to 8 hours a day he sits or stands with a cardboard sign, usually scrawled with a funny message — for instance, one day in May, "Too Ugly to Sell My Body, Already Sold my Soul. Please Spare Change."
 
The shelter where Newton usually stays is closed until the fall, he said, so he and friends sleep on the street. You might see them in front of the Coop or in the Pit in Harvard Square. He said on a good day, after about 8 hours, he makes about $75. He spends his money on what he called homeless "gear."
 
"I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t using some of it to buy, like, pot," he said. "But well, I just bought these two foam mattress pads because my back’s been really bothering me and I needed a better surface to sleep on."
 
When asked if he'd tried to get a full-time job, he shrugged. "I was looking for work for 2 1/2 years before I became homeless. If I couldn’t find a job when I had a roof over my head, think of how much harder it is to get a job when you don’t have a roof over your head, when your address is a drop-in center," he said.
 
The scope of the problem
 
Newton is one of the estimated hundreds of panhandlers in Boston. There's no actual data, and the annual homeless census cannot account for panhandlers. Many of them are just passing through the city. In an informal survey in Harvard Square, those interviewed said they were homeless. On a good day they made about $80, on a bad day about $15. Several said they have caseworkers and collect Supplemental Security Income, the Social Security Adminstration's benefit for people who have disabilities and limited resources. 
 
But even as panhandlers work solo on the streets, they're organized. In Harvard Square, they stagger themselves. John Casey, 59, said he and his friends met each morning to divvy up territory.
 
"We talk in the morning and then we just decide where to go," he said. "I got three other friends who are doing it. We meet at Starbucks. We have our coffee then we head out."
 
What the police think
 
Panhandling is legal. In fact, it's a First Amendment right. But panhandlers can't follow people, touch them or become verbally abusive. It's a fine line, according to Cambridge Police Commissioner Robert Haas. 
 
"We have officers that are just dedicated to working with that population," he said. "And our officers are really good at talking to them, setting some boundaries with them, and oddly enough we've been doing this for 2 1/2 years, they follow these rules."
 
The business perspective
 
The real tension in Harvard Square is between panhandlers and business owners. Haas said Cambridge police have just started a "homeless ambassador program" to train business owners to interact positively with panhandlers and distribute information on local social service agencies. 
 
"What's been really successful is we really have struck a fabulous partnership with the business association and social service providers and we're really working closely together," said Haas.
 
There are efforts to empower panhandlers. For example, for 20 years they've had the option of selling a newspaper called Spare Change News. The police don't take a stance on whether the public should give money to panhandlers; the Harvard Square Business Alliance, however, encourages local residents and tourists to give instead to shelters and other homeless support organizations.

BOSTON — The University of Massachusetts Board of Trustees approved a 5 percent hike in student fees on June 6 over the objections of Gov. Deval Patrick.
 
In-state student fees will go up by about $580 next year, making annual tuition and fees $12,481. That doesn't include room and board, which is about $10,000 at UMass Amherst. The hike comes on top of increases in student fees over the past 10 years.
 
It left UMass Amherst student Steve Donahue wondering how he'd afford it all.
 
“How am I going to do this? I’m really anxious," he said. "I’m in college now. My sister's starting college next year. My family has to cover the fees for both of us.”
 
At the State House, Patrick voiced his opposition. “It’s a crummy time to ask students to pay more. The economy is tough; their prospects after graduation are uncertain.”
 
He said the university system had to do a better job managing its money so students don’t have to pay the price.
 
In a press release, university officials blamed the hikes on a steady decline in the proportion of education costs the state has shouldered over the past decade — from 61 percent in 2003 to an estimated 43 percent next year. They've agreed to freeze student fees for the next 2 years at the new rate if the legislature agrees to bring the state's commitment up to 50 percent of the burden.
 
The board of trustees took swift action on the fee hike — proposing it at a Dartmouth campus meeting Tuesday night and ratifying it first thing the next morning. University officials did not return calls for comment.

May 31, 2012
 
BOSTON — A video from the Future Boston Alliance takes shots at Boston's reputation for stodgy government and sleepy nightlife. The video has prompted support and skepticism, and It's put the city's entertainment options — everything from food trucks to T-accessible live music and art events — back under the microscope.

It's not a frivolous matter. Every year around this time, Boston undergoes a mass student exodus following college graduation. Young, talented students come here for school, but many leave afterwards.
 
Jessica Martin, a researcher for the Boston Indicators Project, said the reasons for this are easy to determine.
 
"Boston is a very expensive city, particularly in housing," she said. "Many young people, many households in general are spending upwards of 35 percent to 50 percent of their income on rental prices." And relatively high wages, she said, don't offset it. Martin said affordable housing geared specifically to new grads might help provide a better chance for young professionals to establish themselves in Boston.
 

The Greater Boston Housing Report Card for 2011 found that Greater Boston had the third-highest rents in the country, after New York and San Francisco. However, given the enduring popularity of those expensive cities, the vibrancy of city life may mean the difference in retaining the newly educated generation.
 
Does Boston deserve its reputation as a sleepy city, or has it gotten a bad rap? What can be changed? Tell us in the comments or vote on Facebook. Some responses so far ...

Julia Carpenter: "Interesting — but the devil's in the details."

Allan Danley: "With over 55,000 people who took a Segway tour in 2011 Boston should be supporting new and innovative ways to see the city of Boston. Not only carbon-free and green but fun and exciting."

Doreen Iudica Vigue: "It is not stodgy. It's like Paris. If you don't respect the culture coming in, you are not going to get a kiss on both cheeks or a hot baguette. Simple as that."

May 17, 2012
 
BOSTON — The Massachusetts unemployment rate dipped to 6.3 percent in April from 6.5 percent in March. It's the lowest level since October 2008.
 
While the state added 2,500 jobs last month, there's a renewed call for a major investment in higher education to create more jobs. A new study has found that an $800 million investment in higher education in the state would essentially pay for itself.
 
Co-author Michael Ash, head of economics at UMass Amherst, said that investment would produce an extra 11,200 graduates, 7,000-8,000 new jobs and $740 million in new income tax revenue. It's a better payoff, Ash said, than cutting taxes or putting the same dollars into casinos. In fact, he claimed that cutting taxes produces the worst results.
 

> > READ: "Economic Impact of Investment in Public Higher Education in Massachusetts: Short-Run Employment Stimulus, Long-Run Public Returns"
 

 
BOSTON — Forget "recession," forget "downturn." We're in a depression, Nobel-winning economist Paul Krugman says in his new book — and he thinks he knows how to fix it.
 
We may not recognize it, because we don't see the breadlines and dust bowls of the Dorothea Lange era. But with the bad times at 4 years and counting, and 4 million people out of work for more than a year …
 
"A recession is when you're going down. A depression is when you are down," Krugman said. "It's not as bad as the Great Depression — but that's hardly a recommendation."
 
He criticized President Barack Obama's approach to handling the problem. Rather than stimulus, the country backed into what Krugman called "anti-stimulus."
 
"You have unprecedented austerity. If we had continued to expand public sector employment at the same rate that it took place under George W. Bush … 1.3 million more people would be employed as school teachers, firefighters, policemen and so on," he said. "And that austerity is a major reason why we are not actually recovering from this depression."
 
Krugman's solution? Investment by the federal government.
 
"In 2009, there was a real question, what we should spend stimulus money on. Now it's just — let's restore those public services. Let's rehire those school teachers. It's actually very easy to come up with a quite substantial boost to the economy which we could do very quickly. We could be recovered from this thing faster than almost anybody imagines," he said.
 
The feds can borrow money cheaply — and it's not the time to focus on cutting debt: "When you're in a depression, when you're in this kind of condition, is a really bad time to do fiscal austerity." Once the economy has come back, he said, then you can look at shrinking the deficit.
 
But if we continue on the current path, he predicted recovery could take a good 5 to 7 years.
 

 
BOSTON — Hanscom Air Force base is fighting for its survival. Deep budget cuts announced earlier this year could mean the loss of hundreds of jobs there. And now the Pentagon has announced plans to close some of its bases around the country — and Hanscom could be on the list.
 
But salvation could be coming from Cambridge. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology has announced plans to build a $450 million research laboratory at Hanscom. It would design small electronic parts for use in emerging aerospace, communication and missile technologies.
 
Marty Jones of the agency Mass Development is a part of a state task force that’s trying to position the Massachusetts bases in a positive light to prevent closures. She said that MIT's planned project will protect Hanscom from additional cuts.
 
"I think everyone understands technology is important today," she said. "And having a facility that is really cutting-edge and innovative should be something that's important when they're looking at which installations to close."
 
MIT already does a lot of business at Hanscom. According to the Boston Globe, about 3,200 MIT employees and 500 private contractors work at Hanscom — and the university is among the base’s biggest tenants. The research facility is expected to win approval in Washington.
 

 
BOSTON — At a public hearing on April 19, city and town leaders pleaded with state lawmakers to fix the municipal unemployment system, saying that questionable unemployment claims are draining town budgets — and that Gov. Deval Patrick's plan to close loopholes doesn't go far enough.
 
They repeated a story, first published in the Boston Herald, of a retired police officer from Lynnfield who was collecting a state pension, then went back to work part-time at the department and got paid thousands of dollars for extra detail work. When he left again, he collected unemployment benefits too.
 
Jeff Beckwith of the Massachusetts Municipal Association said that taxpayers are being forced to pay twice: “Local officials, cities and towns, the people here strongly support having an unemployment system that fairly pays benefits to people who lose their jobs at the municipal level. But we also have to safeguard the taxpayer.”
 
Patrick has filed a bill that would prevent public employees from receiving both a pension check and unemployment benefits. Unions that represent municipal workers have raised no formal opposition to the bill. But municipal officials said the legislation needs to be broadened, pointing to abuses in the municipal compensation system. For instance, bus drivers can collect unemployment during school vacation weeks or during the summer. And people hired to serve on a local board or commission can get unemployment benefits when the commission's work is finished.
 
"Public policy should not actually be discouraging communities from ending panels when their work is completed," Beckwith said.
 
The Patrick administration has convened a task force to look into the unemployment compensation system. State officials said cities and towns can also appeal requests they find questionable. But oftentimes, they just don't.

 
BOSTON — Advocates and postal workers rallied Wednesday at the Massachusetts State House, warning of service delays and job losses due to planned post office and mail processing center closures in the state.
 
More than 40 post office locations in Massachusetts are slated to close this summer, including branches in Boston, Dorchester, Newton, Fall River, Medford, Springfield and Worcester.
 
But the bigger impact could come from plans to close five mail sorting centers in the state, in Brockton, Waltham, Cape Cod, Shrewsbury and Springfield. See the list of facility closures.
 
A significant portion of incoming and outgoing mail currently processed in state would be rerouted through Connecticut and Rhode Island, slowing delivery times.
 
Ramona Daniel, president of the Massachusetts Rural Letter Carriers Association on Cape Cod, said the closures would double and triple the amount of time it would take to deliver a package or letter:
 
“The post office would like to drop our delivery standards to two to three days instead of one day," she said. "That will impact every customer and that will impact all of my carriers because we will be the one customers will be yelling at because their mail isn’t on time or their card is late.” 
 
Thousands of jobs could be at stake. And not just any jobs, said Dennis Avery, who works at the Waltham plant slated to close.
 
“The postal service has already provided me with a decent wage, a livable wage, good benefits … something that supports me and my family," he said. "I was able to get married, buy a house, have kids, support them. And I mean, that’s being taken away.” 
 
The postal service has said the closures are on hold until May 15 to allow federal lawmakers time to come up with an alternative plan. The service has lost business in the email age. It lost $8 billion last year, and its debt is skyrocketing. The mail center consolidations and closures are part of a plan to save $20 billion by 2015.

Part 1:

Part 2:

We dive into a big debate about the economy with the authors of the widely-discussed book, Race Against the Machine, who argue that the stagnant unemployment rate may not be about to get better any time soon.

In fact, they say, computers may allow the economy to do perfectly well without ever getting anywhere close to full employment. But the consequences could be dire, turning us into a chronically-underemployed country, where some are helped by computers and others are displaced by them.

They’ll sketch out their vision for us and offer a potential solution. Where is this trend going? And will it lead to a great divide between the haves and the have nots?

Guests: 

• Andrew McAfee, author; principal research scientist, at MIT’s Center for Digital Business
• Erik Brynjolfsson, author; director of the MIT Center for Digital Business

More:

• Read an excerpt from Race Against the Machine

 
BOSTON — A bill aimed at lowering Massachusetts electricity prices spurred a debate on jobs Thursday at a hearing of the Legislature's Joint Committee on Utilities and Energy. 
 
Massachusetts has some of the highest electricity costs in the nation. In fact, State Rep. Randy Hunt of East Sandwich said electricity is so expensive that manufacturers are leaving the state, taking with them hundreds of jobs.
 
He’s backing a bill that he says would lower the cost of energy. It would require utility companies to purchase their renewable energy through a competitive bidding process — and go with the lowest of three bids.
 
"For almost everything that we spend money on publicly in this Commonwealth, whether it's at the town level, state level or community level, we’re required to get competitive bidding so that we make sure we have good costs, lowest costs — and sometimes not necessarily the lowest cost but best overall package," he said. However, "right now the Green Communities Act actually exempts these types of long-term renewable contracts from the competitive bidding law" to the detriment of consumers and businesses.
 
But critics, like Louis Antonellis of the IBEW, which represents over 10,000 Bay State electricians, said the bill would send green jobs out the state. In his view, Hunt's bill would essentially require Massachusetts utilities to sign contracts with large out-of-state projects, killing the local wind and solar industry. 
 
“We should stay on the path of helping workers in Massachusetts with clean energy projects and not encouraging utilities and electrical consumers to take their money and projects elsewhere,” Antonellis said.
 
The bill is also seen as a reaction to the recent purchasing agreement between NStar and Cape Wind. In that case, the contract didn’t go through a competitive bidding process even though Cape Wind Power would be more expensive than other renewable sources.  

The weekly roundup of business, technology and life science news from our partners at Xconomy.com airs every Friday on 89.7 Boston Public Radio.