New Yorkers will get a sneak peek at Target’s latest collaboration Wednesday.

And considering Liberty of London has crossed the pond to be here, it should be quite an event.

Target will launch a pop-up store of flowery goods, and this one has everyone covered: Men, women, children and even home goods go on sale starting at 11 a.m. Wednesday at 1095 Sixth Ave., next to Bryant Park.

The pop-up preview store will house the collection, which includes piggy banks, lamps, ties, bathing suits and even a bike ($199.99) decked out in the British brand’s signature prints.

Liberty, which started in 1875, collaborates with an international array of upscale brands that are carried in its stately London flagship store. But what they’re best known for are the prints - their archive holds over 43,000 designs.

Check out the pop-up Wednesday (11 a.m.-8 p.m.),  Thursday through Saturday (9 a.m.-8 p.m.), or in Target Stores this Sunday.

This could be a nice long term collaboration with a couple of heavy hitters in the retail world and could offer employment opportunities due to this expansion.

Instead of the Wall Street analysis number being 455,000 claims rose by 22,000 to the 468,000 number. I guess there is no accounting in down town New York for the weather. Construction companies all along the middle and upper east coast were halted by the weather as well as other weather sensitive related companies.

In addition to the new found additional 22,000, the four week average, used to maintain some semblance of lack of volatility, rose by 6,000 making the total out of work an additional 30,000. That’s a bad figure as it appears that companies are continuing to cut back on their employees.

Among the states, North Carolina had biggest increase in claims, with 5,897, which it attributed to layoffs in the construction, furniture and mining industries. Pennsylvania and Kentucky also reported large increases. The state data lags initial claims by one week.

California reported the largest drop in claims, with 5,540, which it attributed to fewer layoffs in services. Illinois, New York, Texas and Missouri recorded the next largest decreases.

There is increased hope that the new jobs bill will begin to level out the unemployment numbers and make some progress towards the positive as opposed to the increased unemployment numbers that are still trending the wrong way.

An unexpected rise in jobless claims hits us right in the face as filings for unemployment benefits surged to 473,000. It had fallen the previous week and we thought that there was a little light at the end of the unemployment tunnel. It is looking like the labor market is not going to see the improvement this year as was expected.

While analysts expected a small decline, we actually saw an increase by about 31,000 to that horrific number of 473,000. The drop of 41,000 last week was a nice life in the labor market… a market that has lost 8.4 million jobs since December 2007, the start of the recession.

Time to reboot and refigure the jobs market once again.

The explanation for the savings is that Americans are now saving up to buy larger ticket items as opposed to buying on credit.  Credit has been harder to come by for many and the general uneasy feelings about the economy and future employment has kept many from taking on new debt.

Good News?

Yes and no. Of course it would be beneficial for many to not incur new debt but holding off buying new big ticket items is hurting the manufacturing sectors which, in turn, affects new jobs. Crazy but the two are tied together like a ship is moored to a dock.

Although 95,000 new jobs per month sounds like a lot, and it is, we will still be mired in 10% unemployment numbers for some time and at that rate the unemployment numbers will not come down to 6% until 2015. That’s a five year wait and the projections can be altered big time during that five years.

With Americans saving at rates of 4 – 7%, the recovery from the recession is going to take some time and in all reality, a full economic recovery is unlikely until and unless the financial system is repaired.

The crazy thing is they are doing the exact opposite for those that are attempting to become licensed as a mortgage professional in the state. All indications are that if you have a score below 620 that they will deny you a license or license renewal no matter what your employment history is or whether or not you can pass the required tests.

One particular mortgage broker is shutting down his shop after 27 years int he business because he fell on hard times the past couple of years. A combination of illness and a turndown in the real estate market caused late payments on his home mortgage and credit cards and his score fell below the required 620.

He still knows how to properly serve a client, he can pass the state and national tests with no problem, he still gets calls from previous clients with referrals but the state, doing the two face shuffle, will not allow him to operate as a mortgage broker due to what many consider a flawed credit system.

Go figure.

UGLY.

We can expect to see a rise in job losses by about 800,000 with the total jobs lost during this current recession to a staggering 8 million.  Those numbers will be slowly offset by an expected 1.5 million new jobs over the next year and indications are that we are looking at three to four years before we start to see the job market come back to normal.

The report should also indicate an unemployment rate of 10.1% which will tie the record high which was set in October of last year.  Good news is that the GDP is rising but the increase in job activity is still slow to catch up as companies are being very conservative in their hiring.

The whole health care debacle didn’t help as that has also kept hiring managers concerned about what would happened to their payrolls if some kind of obscene government mandated health care program got passed that would cause an increase in expenses to companies.

Even with all the initiatives that the current administration is proposing to businesses, the projected unemployment rate is still going to be close to 9.8% at years end.

The Labor Department released Thursday that first time unemployment claims dropped 8,000 from the week before to 470,000.  Experts had expected that number to have dropped to 450,000.  The missing of the mark by 5 percent is showing that their is a weak spot in the economic recovery.

There are over 4.6 million Americans receiving unemployment benefits as of today.  That is a drop of 57,000 compared to last week.  The continuing claims do not include Americans that have used up their 26 weeks of benefits and are receiving an extension by the federal government.

There are over 15.2 million American workers looking for work, according to Fox News.  That is one out of every eight workers that is unemployed.

The proposal that we are going to see has some real benefits for small business and even a decent benefit for those starting a small business. For a current operating small business there will be a $5,000.00 tax credit for every new employee hired in the year 2010 and if you arestarting a small business the benefit will be about half that.

This is the kind of stimulus that could get our economy back on track as it will create opportunities for small businesses to invest in order to grow. That growth will generate new jobs and will bring down that outrageous unemployment rate that is staring us in our economic faces.

Whether it has an immediate effect is yet to be seen and the details need to be ironed out and the congress will have to approve it. Funding for the bill, which would end on December 31st of this year is expected to come from the repayment by the banks from the bailout program of 2008 and 2009.

The President is also asking that all capital gains for small business investment be eliminated as part of the small business stimulus plan as well as a tax credit for those businesses that invest in new equipment and plants.