Employee Participation

Officials say New York's unemployment rate dropped to 8.2 percent in December from 8.3 percent a month earlier.

Eighty-five percent of employers report finding it difficult to very difficult when it comes to finding new hires with the proper skill sets to perform the open positions.

Of employees who have ever worked on teams, 68 percent say they were part of a dysfunctional unit at some point, according to a new University of Phoenix national survey.

The number of Americans seeking unemployment aid plummeted to a five-year low last week, a hopeful sign the job market may be improving. But much of the decline reflects seasonal volatility in the data.

Employee stock-owned companies saved the federal government more than $37 million in 2010 during high employment, according to an analysis by the National Center for Employee Ownership and the Employee Ownership Foundation.

Fidelity Investments says it plans to open a customer service center that could employ as many as 500 people in the Denver area.

Michigan's Kresge Foundation is helping launch a $100 million fund that seeks to improve health care access and expand housing opportunities in low-income areas.

Companies are increasingly looking at wellness programs to cut rising health care costs.