Depressing. Discouraging. Dismal. These are the words that people use to describe the present condition of the American economy. But for the class of 2008, there is nothing gloomier than searching for jobs in a wobbling economy plagued by a rising unemployment rate. For more than 1 million graduating college students across the country who will join the labor force this year, the job prospects are ominous. It’s like looking for a stone in murky waters.

Although there has been no official acknowledgment from the Bush Administration that the world’s most powerful economy has already slipped into a recession, the evidence of it is becoming increasingly obvious. According to the latest U.S. Department of Labor statistics, unemployment rose from 4.8 percent to 5.1 percent last March. For five months in a row now, the private sector has lost a monthly average of 80,000 jobs.

As people are feeling poorer due to job loss and soaring gasoline and food prices, consumers are spending less and the economy is shrinking, which pushes firms to cut back employment. Even Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke admitted to a congressional committee that output was not likely to “grow much over the first half of 2008 and could even contract slightly.”

For a graduating economics major like myself, such figures are absolutely disturbing. Not so long ago in my macroeconomic theory and labor economics classes, we were studying U.S. unemployment rates, which were very modest and reasonable during those times. Paradoxically, with the current unfavorable economic trend, I could possibly be a part of the already increasing unemployment rate statistics.

Whether it is a recession or not, college graduates will definitely be the biggest casualties of this economic downturn. Since there will be an enormous surplus of job seekers but scarce labor demand, employers could be more selective in hiring their workers. They could impose elevated standards and requirements such as the reputation of the school you graduated from and GPA competitiveness. Graduates of the UC system, for example, would have higher probability of getting considered for a position than graduates from an inferior and unknown school for that matter.

Companies could also limit their benchmark to just applicants with superior grades and reject those who have average or lower than average academic performance. This suggests that there is a mounting pressure on graduating college students to exert more effort in attaining excellent marks in what appears to be their last stand to impress employers academically.

In addition, human resource analysts are saying that one’s chances of securing a job with the current economic slowdown depend on his or her major. Some fields are suffering from the crisis while others are not affected at all. In the end, if your major belongs to a sector that is adversely impacted by the recession, you would still encounter a tougher job scene no matter how competitive your grades are and even if you are an alumnus of an Ivy League school or a top public university.

As hard-working students, we do not deserve to suffer the pernicious consequences of our government leaders’ futility in providing immediate feasible solutions to counter such a persisting economic threat. We did not spend four years of laborious coursework in college just to end up unemployed, or brutally compete for falling labor demand with countless graduates.

Although storms do not last forever, economic recovery does not happen overnight. It all depends on the resilience of the market forces and of course, on our leaders’ ability and resolve to avert further damage. Experts are confidently forecastingthat the weak economy will get better after the second half of the year. Hopefully, as youngbloods, our optimism could take us as far as that point.

REAGAN F. PARLAN welcomes your comments and suggestions at rfparlan@ucdavis.edu.

The 17th century political revolutionary Guy Fawkes once said, “The desperate disease requires a dangerous remedy.” Despite the fact that British historians may tell you that another notable quote from Guy Fawkes would be, “Hey, let’s blow up Parliament,” I believe his wisdom regarding desperate situations should not be overlooked.

Even today, in 21st century Davis, we can see how desperate situations force people to make rash and, at many times, foolish decisions. Perhaps the best example of this process can currently be seen within our own Davis Joint Unified School District. For anyone who has read my past columns, the desperate situation facing the DJUSD is clear –$4 million in cuts to next year’s budget. In past weeks, this seemingly bleak situation has forced the district’s school board to penny-pinch, and choose between several options that will each prove detrimental to the district’s overall performance.

Initially, the “dangerous remedy” chosen by the district consisted of closing some of the city’s schools and undergoing a massive restructuring in order to incorporate the students who were displaced as a result of the closures. The school board’s decision to forgo the closing of any secondary schools, along with a vote that will keep Emerson Junior High open for at least the next academic year, suggests that a less dangerous remedy may exist, and must be found if the district hopes to balance its budget.

However, last Thursday night, the district began to move in another dangerous direction that would inevitably prove harmful to the performance of Davis schools. At this meeting, the motion was put forward to roll back the salaries of teachers by two percent, effectively asking teachers to relinquish their yearly salary increases. The reasoning behind this potentially devastating motion is that lowering the salaries of teachers within the district would inevitably reduce the number of teaching positions that will have to be cut for the 2008-2009 academic year.

While the Davis school board is certainly faced with the difficult decision of cutting either salaries or jobs, the true victims in this scenario are the teachers. Most people would argue that primary and secondary educators are already paid sub-parwages in our country, and now they are being expected to bear the burden of widespread budget shortcomings by forgoing increases in their already meager wages.

Fortunately, this potentially devastating motion was not approved, as the school board decided it would be irresponsible to affect the salaries of teachers on such short notice. Unfortunately, the DJUSD is still faced with the monumental challenge of overcoming a $4 million budget deficit, while time and possible solutions are slowly running out.

Even more unfortunate is the fact that Davis is in no way alone in itseducation crisis. Across the state, hundreds of schools have received notice that their doors will be closing soon, and thousands of teachers have been released in order to deal with the drastic budget deficit. Perhaps it is time that Californians stop viewing educational spending simply as numbers and begin to view this crisis with the severity and attention that it deserves.

JAMES NOONAN cannot fully express how easy it is to write this column during California’s budget crisis. Tell him how well he’s doing at jjnoonan@ucdavis.edu.

There are two ways a relationship can begin: attraction first, followed by some sort of relationship, or friendship first, followed by some sort of attraction.

(Of course, there is a rare third way, wherein the guy kidnaps and holds you hostage at gunpoint for a month. As an unconscious survival tactic, you end up falling in love, get married, have two beautiful daughters and escape the law together for many years to come. Oh dad, thank you so much – if it weren’t for your gambling addiction that forced you to hold mom ransom, our family would have never been created!)

Anyway, many of my friends are in relationships that have started out either as a physical attraction toward a stranger or a growing affection between good friends. This got me thinking about how the nature of a relationship is really influenced by how it begins.

Yours truly has also had a crack at these two types of situations. Obviously, none of them ever went anywhere, but since I’mpretty ignorant about relationships, I’ll just use the tiny-ass amount of experience I’ve gained to tell you my take on it.

Back when I was in high school, everyone got with people who were in their own clique. It wasn’t like how it is now, when you get to meet people at bars, clubs, nude beaches, etc. So imagine my surprise when this random guy who worked at our local Starbucks who I thought was cute, called one of our mutual friends and asked for my number.

I thought it was kind of neat having accomplished that. I was a senior and he was a few years older than me and that’s all we knew about each other. It was the first time that I, or any of my friends, met some guy from out of nowhere and ran with it. It was attraction first, and then the getting-to-know-you part later. It was odd but exciting. After all, why did I feel like we already liked each other, but then we knew nothing of each other?

The night before our first and only outing, I prayed that he didn’t have a case of the crazies. Sure he was cute, but I liked all my limbs – I wanted them to still be attached to me when the night was over.

There was also this other minor thing about him. While we got to know each other via a little magic device called the telephone, he nonchalantly mentioned that he was bisexual.

Now I have no hidden qualms with bisexuality, it’s just that he related a little too much about his experiences with both sexes. He wasn’t promiscuous (all the sex he had was with guys and girls he was in serious relationships with), but he was very explicit about it. And besides, straight or LGBT, you just never talk about your exes!

He didn’t hesitate to talk about his favorite positions, whether he was a top or bottom, or what kind of virginity he lost first. On our date, he’d point out guys and girls he found cute. (Again, even if he were straight, why would you check out other people on a date?!)

If you haven’t gathered from my past columns, I’m pretty naïve about relationships, so imagine my breadth of knowledge back in high school. I was über-n00b status back then, and yet I somehow managed to challenge myself to take on all the complexities that come with dating a bisexual. It’s slightly more complicated. Kind of like never learning your ABCs and then deciding to enroll in English Honors.

What’s more is that we didn’t have much in common, which isn’t exactly ideal when forming a relationship. Well, we did have one thing – our taste in guys. During our date, I started to notice that every time he said, “Man that guy’s cute,” I thought to myself, “Dude he’s right, that guy is cute.”

I was also not secure enough with myself to date him. (Me? Insecure? Go figure). My friends and I figured that the only reason he thought me cute was because I looked like a boy. They had no problems with him or anything; they just loved teasing me about how I had the short hair and flat chest and everything. They said that because he swung both ways, it made sense that he found me attractive since I looked “both ways.” Besides me crying, it was pretty funny actually.

Anyway, the night ended with…

LYNN LA will continue her story later; right now she has to go to class. She’d also like to note the massive turnout for Picnic Day, unlike her Friday shindig, in which she got to meet all zero of you guys. To help keep her state-of-denial going, e-mail her at ldla@ucdavis.edu and tell her it was simply because “she was hard to find.”

Sacramento is not generally regarded as a sustainable region – it has grown in a sprawling pattern much like Los Angeles. However, Sacramento’s integration of more sustainable regional planning and small-scale improvements slowly reverses its previous reputation.

The city was chosen from a 30-applicant pool as a “solar city” for its development of solar energy policies and received a $200,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Energy to use toward putting photovoltaic systems on buildings. Solar parking meters can already be found in some areas of inner Sacramento, but this additional funding helps color Sacramento’s reputation a deeper shade of green.

City officials have also announced plans with the community college system to start a solar technician program and create a “green collar” job force. This addition to the solar panel project will be instrumental in helping the economic development of local communities, as green collar jobs are both environmentally and socially beneficial in offering renewable energy, job skills and job placement.

However $200,000 is a miniscule advance for such a lofty project. Sacramento will most likely get little outside help and must be self-motivated in itspursuit of achieving greener city life. This independent effort rings true at the local level – the city has been rezoning for higher density as well as making specific areas more conducive to having solar access. The general plan update for Sacramento includes many other sustainable components, such as increasing energy efficiency and renewable energy, as well as prioritizing urban infill over new growth.

Despite all the efforts in energy efficiency and planning, transportation is the most important issue to resolve in order for the city to function more sustainably. Inner city public transportation is still limited, and presents difficulty for commuters coming from the suburbs. In most regions of Sacramento outside of its core, it is crucial to own an automobile. It is commendable, though, that Sacramento is thinking about how to integrate neighboring areas into its master sustainability agenda. This needs to be addressed through better routes of public transportation to reduce automobile use between the city of Sacramento, outer suburbs and even the Bay Area.

This past Sunday was Apr. 20, a day commonly known by many as a cannabis culture holiday. Over the years, Santa Cruz has become a popular destination for many people looking to celebrate “4/20.” Last year, over 5,000 people arrived at UC Santa Cruz to smoke marijuana on campus at Porter Meadow.

In anticipation of the event, UCSC officials increased security this year. The campus restricted the number of outsiders and non-UCSC students from entering campus. Other security measures included requiring all vehicles entering campus to have a university parking permit for the weekend, requiring UCSC identification to gain entrance and not allowing overnight guests for students living on campus.

While some may see the university’s actions as infringements on personal liberties, the reasoning is understandable. Having thousands of non-students on campus poses a higher risk of incidents not only for those participating in the event, but also for others who are not. Visitors who may not feel connected to the campus community are more likely to cause disturbance than those who are part of the university. The safety of the students is on the forefront of the administration’s mind, as it always should be.

In addition, UC Santa Cruz had to take its own precautions in regard to campus liability issues. With so many non-UCSC students on campus, the university could have been held accountable if something serious were to happen. From the standpoint of UCSC officials, it was understandably necessary to be taking such serious measures.

While the university has outwardly condoned the event, they do not deny its existence. Rather than looking the other way and ignoring it, officials anticipated it and appropriately responded. While security was heightened, the actual police presence did not increase. The priority was not cracking down on the event, but controlling it and putting the university in more control of the safety of participants. Initial reports accounted for less people on campus than last year and no serious incidents.