Sectors that "shine"

Just a quick snippet that I thought I'd bring to your attention. Based on last week's BLS employment report, the economy has lost more than 8 million jobs since the start of the recession. There are some industries, however, that added jobs; among the unsurprising rises in the health care field, management and tech consulting was one of those contributing sectors.

• Home Health Care Services, up 10.8%
• Federal Government Except Postal Service, up 9.3%
• Oil & Gas Extraction, up 7.4%
• Pipeline Transportation, up 6.7%
• Outpatient Care Services, up 4.6%
• Hospitals, up 3.8%
• Computer Systems Design & Related Services, up 3.4%
• Nursing & Residential Care Facilities, up 3.2%
• Motion Picture & Sound Recording Industries, up 3.2%
• Educational Services, Excluding Government, up 3.1%
• Management & Technical Consulting Services, up 2.7%
• State Government Education Services, up 2.1%
• Utilities, up 2.0%
• Waste Management & Remediation Services, up 1.5%

And in another bit of news, word came out yesterday that the European Commission formally objected to Oracle's purchase of Sun Microsystems due to concerns about how the sale would affect competition in the database market. The antitrust division of the DOJ, which has already approved the acquisition, objects to the statement, claiming that the merger is "unlikely to be anticompetitive," and Oracle responded by saying that "the Commission's Statement of Objections reveals a profound misunderstanding of both database competition and open source dynamics."

The deal may still go through, however; the Commission has until mid-January to decide if it will block it. Most legal experts say the merger will likely proceed as planned, but that because of some of its concerns, the Commission may ask Oracle for certain divestitures to push the deal through.