Power Breakfast: Job market improving, DeKalb schools indictment, Thrashers, UPS, light rail, Gulf, Apple vs. Microsoft

Three years of deep job losses should end in 2011 with the creation of 42,500 new jobs in Atlanta, according to a new economic forecast, AJC reporter Dan Chapman writes.

But the region’s recovery contains too many hard-to-gauge variables — the European debt crisis, the Gulf oil spill, consumer confidence, China’s continued purchase of U.S. treasuries — for Georgia State University economist Rajeev Dhawan to promise that the recession’s end will translate into robust employment.

“I’m optimistic, but I’ve downgraded my predictions because there are too many fragile things going on around the world,” Dhawan, director of the school’s Economic Forecasting Center, told a couple of hundred businessmen, government employees and students Wednesday.

Meanwhile, word comes today that metro Atlanta’s unemployment rate fell dramatically in April — to 9.8 percent from 10.4 percent in March, the state labor department reported.

Metro Atlanta’s rate is now lower than the state’s — 10.4 percent — and the nation’s — 9.9 percent, the labor department said. Until now, Atlanta’s jobless rate during this recession has generally been higher than the nation’s.

Also in the AJC:

• Former DeKalb schools chief indicted
• Filmmaker has interest in buying Atlanta Thrashers
• Owners of flood-damaged homes walk away
• UPS pilots mad over furloughs
• Funding key for Cobb light-rail proposal
• Marietta retailer sued over ‘J-Hey’ use

In other media:

• Gulf awaits word on move to plug oil well
• Apple passes Microsoft as No. 1 in tech
• Democrats scale back bill to woo votes for jobless aid
• World stocks rise on Asian, US growth hopes
• US chides Europe’s crisis response

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