Detroit is no tech hub for attracting talent:  Just five metro areas — Boston, San Diego, San Francisco, San Jose, and Seattle — snapped up 90% of the 256,063 tech jobs created from 2005 to 2017, according to a study from The Brookings Institution. The remaining 10% was divvied up among 377 urban areas.  The share of those jobs shrank dramatically in would-be hubs like Chicago, Durham, N.C., Philadelphia, Dallas, and Wichita, with the bottom 90% of U.S. metro areas collectively losing one-third of these positions in the same period. The research looked at employment in 13 innovation industries, which they defined as fields where at least 4% of the workforce has STEM degrees and where research and development investment per worker is $20,000 or higher. The industries range from aerospace to chemical engineering to software and data processing.  These positions make up just 3 % of U.S. jobs, but generate 6% of gross domestic product and a quarter of exports. A third of innovation jobs are concentrated in just 16 counties, the report found, and half are compressed in 41 counties. The concentration is tied to the nature of technology. Progress and productivity increase more quickly in small areas with a wealth of resources and talent.   Source: Washington Post 12/9/19

Year-end bonuses are expected to increase:  According to a Robert Half survey, more than three-quarters of senior managers polled (76%) said their company offers year-end bonuses. Of those respondents, almost all noted that their organizations plan to either increase these incentives (48%) or keep them the same (48%) this year. Only 4% of executives anticipate reducing the amount given to employees.   Source:  Robert Half 12/3/19

Are you having a holiday party – more employers are: Nearly 76% of companies plan to hold a holiday office party this year, the highest percentage since 2016, when 80% planned festivities, according to a survey conducted by outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas.  According to the annual survey on holiday party plans, conducted in November among 250 HR representatives across the country, of those planning parties, nearly 7% are having a party after one year or more of not having one. The 76% of companies planning to hold parties is up over 10% from the 65.4% who planned parties last year.  More companies plan to extend invitations to employees’ partners and families to their holiday festivities this year. Nearly 47% of companies will invite families and spouses this year, compared to 30% in 2018.  Most companies plan to hold parties on a workday or near the end of a workday: 60% in 2019 compared to 52% in 2018. Meanwhile, 53% of companies are offering alcohol this year versus 49% last year.  Source: Business Management Daily 12/3/19

If your company goes bankrupt, what happens to remote workers?  Celadon, a truckload carrier that grossed $1 billion as recently as 2015, will file for bankruptcy on December 11 or earlier, inside sources told leading industry publication FreightWaves.  It's poised to be the largest truckload bankruptcy in history - and its drivers are already getting slammed. The bankruptcy has the potential to leave more than 3,200 truck drivers stranded and away from home. Sources told Business Insider that Celadon truck drivers' fuel cards are already getting turned off, which means they're unable to get home without spending serious cash on gas or arranging their own transport by car, plane, or bus.  Source: Business Insider 12/9/19

Are you hypersensitive?  About 15-20% of people in the U.S. are highly sensitive (HSP), which means they have a more finely calibrated nervous system. That means approximately one in five people identify with thinking and feeling everything more deeply, sometimes to an overwhelming extent. Employees who are highly sensitive experience greater levels of work stress than non-highly sensitive individuals. Highly sensitive dentists were shown to be especially prone to burnout and more impacted by patients’ pain than non-HSP dentists.  Because HSPs are responsive to other people’s emotions, they are easily affected by criticism and can slide into detrimental people-pleasing.  However, sensitivity is not a weakness. In fact, it’s a strength, and correlated with high-performing behaviors like conscientiousness, empathy, loyalty, and diligence. Still, in order to leverage these upsides, it’s essential to balance out the downsides of being an HSP, including the tendency to overthink.  Source: Quartz at Work 12/9/19

Overall health spending is steady, but U.S. still leads in total health spending to GDP: A new report from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) shows the nation remains in a period of relatively slow health spending growth. Health spending in the United States rose by 4.6% to $3.6 trillion in 2018 — accounting for 17.7% of the economy — compared to a growth rate of 4.2% in 2017. Federal officials said the slight acceleration was largely the result of reinstating a tax on health insurers that the Affordable Care Act imposed but Congress had suspended for a year in 2017. Faster growth in medical prices and prescription drug spending were also factors, they said, but comparatively minor. The slower growth may feel at odds with the experience of many Americans, who increasingly report financial duress from health costs. A recent study from the Kaiser Family Foundation, a nonprofit health research organization, found that from 2009 through 2018 individuals who got insurance through their employers have been asked to shoulder an ever-higher share of their health bills through premium payments and rising deductibles. A typical employer plan for an individual now comes with a $1,400 deductible, up $900 from 2009.   Source:  NYTimes 12/5/19