Google’s famous for its perks — free gourmet food in the cafeteria, an on-campus climbing wall — but some of the best offerings at the company depend on its employees’ creativity. Take its 20% time, for example. Google employees are encouraged to devote 20% of their work hours to a project within the company but outside of their core area.

Eliana Murillo is using her 20% time reaching out to small business owners, helping them use Google’s tools to grow. Often businesses don’t know how to position their website to show up in Google search, or they aren’t aware of Google’s advertising opportunities and other tools.

The recent improvement in the job market comes as welcome news for President Obama as he struggles to answer GOP attacks on the campaign trail that he’s mismanaged the economic recovery. There are a lot of reasons, though, that it may be too early for the White House to start cheering about jobs.

There’s no shortage of issues vying for voter attention as the 2012 presidential campaign kicks into gear. But with unemployment stuck above 8.5 percent for the 34th month in a row, the job market likely will top the list until the November election.

The White House hammered on the issue again week, as the president rolled out yet another round of job-creation proposals at a meeting with business leaders in the White House. This one is aimed at “insourcing” jobs that have been lost to overseas companies.

The government offered fresh data Tuesday showing that the job market is gradually improving. But there still aren’t enough jobs to go around.

Even as hiring picked up in November, the number of jobs openings declined, according the Labor Departments’ monthly Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS).

Employers filled nearly 4.15 million jobs in November, up from a low of 3.6 million in October 2009 — the lowest level in the 10 years the government has tracked the figure. That pickup mirrors the improvement shown in the Labor Department’s monthly employment surveys of households and employers. But it still badly lags the pace in the three years before the recession hit, when employers were signing up more than 5 million new hires each month.

Private employers added 206,000 jobs in November, according to a new report released Wednesday from payrolls processor ADP.

The monthly number was better than expected. Analysts had expected a smaller gain in November. October’s monthly gain in private-sector hiring was revised up to 130,000 from a previously reported gain of 110,000.

Each month, ADP releases a report on whether private employers added any jobs in the prior month. The report is often used as a gauge heading into the government’s monthly employment report, which is due out Friday.

NEW YORK (CNNMoney) — Shares of McDonald’s are trading at a new all-time high after the global fast food chain managed to impress with strong earnings and sales numbers across all its markets.

Fast food chains tend to benefit during recessionary economic periods as many people scale back and trade down. Recent menu expansion and innovation is also a big factor, fueling McDonald’s (MCD, Fortune 500) growth.

Chipotle (CMG) is also a fast food chain in its heart, but the industry is not the only tailwind going for them. The introduction of naturally raised and hormone free meat in its products appeal to a wide range of customers and help the company to ride on its own secular trend.

Joel Rosenzweig wanted to do something extra special for his son’s Bar Mitzvah last year. The something special turned out to be a new toy, which isn’t much of a surprise. Rosenzweig is a 20-year veteran of the toy industry and heads i-Star Entertainment, a toy maker with eight employees. With just a few weeks to go before the family event, he got cracking on a prototype.

Taking two pieces of plastic tied together, tiny lights and string he created what would become FyrFlyz. The idea is to grab the ends of the string and spin the toy quickly until it becomes taut. The lights made different patterns with each spin.

Rosenzweig handmade 140 and gave them out at the Bar Mitzvah. “The kids started playing with them and immediately knew how to use them,” he said. “I knew I had something.” Two days later, he was on a plane to Hong Kong to find a manufacturer to make FyrFlyz.

(Reuters) – Wal-Mart Stores Inc Vice Chairman Eduardo Castro-Wright, who heads the world’s largest retailer’s e-commerce and sourcing businesses, will retire on July 1 to spend more time with his family.

Wal-Mart said on Tuesday it aims to name new leadership for those businesses by the end of January, after which Castro-Wright will assist in the transition.

Castro-Wright moved to California last year from Wal-Mart’s home town of Bentonville, Arkansas to be with his wife, who had a heart transplant.

NEW YORK (CNNMoney) — Economists gave generally positive reviews to President Obama’s jobs plan Friday, with some estimating that at least 1 million jobs could be added in the next year if Congress passes the package.

The payroll tax holiday for workers and small businesses was cited specifically for having a relatively good “bang for the buck.” And that part of the plan may have the most bipartisan support.

“This additional spending capacity in the hands of consumers should continue to foster improvements in aggregate domestic demand. And ultimately, it is demand and demand alone that will lead to more business hiring,” said Russell Price, senior economist for Ameriprise Financial Services.

Washington (CNN) – Economic fears are not diminishing. More than eight in 10 Americans think the economy is in another recession, according to a new CNN/ORC poll. One-third of those surveyed think it’s serious.

While the country isn’t technically in a recession because the economy hasn’t experienced two straight quarters of negative growth, the poll’s results highlight the importance of President Barack Obama’s jobs speech next Thursday night.

Full results (pdf)

Americans have “a bad case of economic jitters,” according to CNN Polling Director Keating Holland.

The news Friday that the economy created zero jobs in August is ominous, but it doesn’t necessarily mean we’re heading for another recession.

“Most of the releases that came out earlier in the week were a little bit better than generally expected and this one was a little bit worse,” said Mike Montgomery, U.S. macro economist with IHS Global Insight.

Instead, Montgomery said the weak employment report could be yet another sign that the U.S. is continuing to muddle through some serious economic doldrums. That may be better than a recession, but it’s still an extremely unpleasant prospect for the many Americans who have been out of work for months or even years

Think getting fired is hard? Try doing the firing.

And when you are a small business owner it can be particularly hard.

At best, it’s an uncomfortable face-to-face confrontation that can lead to hurt feelings. At worst: physical altercations, hacked servers and lost clients.

“Large corporations have a team of people who can assist with hiring and training new people,” said Roberta Chinsky Matuson, president of Human Resource Solutions, a Massachusetts-based consultancy. “Small businesses have much less bench strength when it comes to staffing and training.”

They don’t have much when it comes to firing either. Here’s what seven disgruntled employees did to small business owners after they learned they were getting pink-slipped.

NEXT: Hacked files

NEW YORK (CNNMoney) — The rift between Verizon and its 45,000 striking employees grew wider on Friday, after the telecommunications giant called in the FBI to investigate allegations of sabotage.

Verizon spokesman Rich Young said more than 90 acts of sabotage have taken place since the strike began on Sunday. Saboteurs have cut phone lines, affecting the service of several thousand customers primarily in New York and New Jersey but also in Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, and Delaware.

Acts of sabotage are hardly uncommon in contentious labor strifes, but Young said that these acts “cross the line.” A police station and a hospital were among those that lost service as a result of the sabotage, he said.

Full Story at Verizon claims sabotage, calls cops on strikers – Aug. 12, 2011

Verizon claims sabotage, calls cops on strikers