Recession limits Americans' ability to find work by moving

— -- When it comes to the U.S. job market, there are few places to turn.

Every U.S. state and 95% of the nation's metropolitan areas will end 2009 with fewer jobs than they started with, while only two sectors — education and health services and government — will add workers.

That's the grim prediction from economic consulting firm Moody's Economy.com that illustrates how the recession is touching Americans in every corner of the country.

And it means that, unlike in prior downturns, most people who lose their jobs can't simply pick up and move to find work, an issue compounded by the housing crisis. Such an unprecedented lack of mobility will make the downturn longer and deeper, economists at Moody's Economy.com, Wachovia and others say.

"There really is nowhere to hide in this economy," Moody's Economy.com chief economist Mark Zandi says.

"If you lose your job, it's not clear where you should move to find one or even what training or education you need to retool yourself," he says. "The hallmark of the current downturn is that it is so broad-based across industries, occupations and regions of this economy."

Workers in some states certainly will be better off than others. Employers in six states — Washington, Texas, North Dakota, Colorado, New Mexico and Nebraska — and Washington, D.C., are expected to shed less than 1% of their workers this year.

At the same time, Ohio, Missouri, Florida, Connecticut, Hawaii and Michigan are forecast to lose the greatest proportions of their states' jobs. Michigan, hit hard by a rapid decline in the U.S. automotive industry, is expected to shed more than 175,000 jobs this year, a 4.3% decline, according to Moody's Economy.com.

Nationwide, employers are expected to cut 2.7 million jobs this year after eliminating more than 2 million positions in 2008, according to Moody's Economy.com.

The year is off to a bad start.

Firms cut 598,000 jobs in January, the most since 1974, the Labor Department said Friday. The unemployment rate rose to 7.6%, the highest in more than 16 years.

More than 11.6 million people were unemployed last month, up 54% from a year earlier and the most since December 1982.

Including people who were working part time even though they wanted full-time work, and those who had given up on finding a job, the rate of "underemployment" was 13.9% in January, up from 9% a year earlier and the highest since the Labor Department began tracking the number in 1994.

This month isn't looking much better. Already, household names such as Macy's, Electronic Arts and PNC Financial Services have announced thousands more layoffs.

'I'm very scared'

Graphic designer Fred Jung, 35, was laid off on Jan. 22 from his job in the marketing department at New York Life Investment Management. He was given severance pay, which is helping to supplement his wife's salary as a labor-and-delivery nurse.