Economic survey

Maybe the jobs outlook is improving. A survey of 78 firms shows more good news than bad, USA Today reports.

Responding to a National Association for Business Economics poll, more companies said they planned to hire new employees in the next six months. The firms outnumbered those that indicated they were cutting jobs.

Twenty-four percent intended to increase their work force, 20 percent planned to lay people off and 57 percent reported no change.

That's a step up from July, when the same poll indicated that 18 percent of the companies surveyed would add workers while 28 percent were eliminating jobs.

"It's a little ahead of what I was expecting," said Ken Simonson, economist at the Associated General Contractors of America, who helped take the survey.

This augurs well for the unemployment picture, which economists had predicted would peak at 10.5 percent in the second quarter of next year. Mr. Simonson said that the poll showed the jobless rate would peak earlier and at a lower level.

Service companies sounded the most confident, according to the poll: 31 percent said they would add workers in the next six months, up from 16 percent in April. Only 3 percent plan to cut back.

Customer demand is rising, says 44 percent of the firms, while 21 percent report falling demand. That has not happened since July 2008.

More companies showed profits rising rather than decreasing over the last quarter — for the first time in two years.

All this is positive. Keep it coming.