NEW YORK (CNNMoney) — The prospects for finding a job in most areas of the economy may be getting bleaker by the day, but one sector stands out: energy efficiency.

Over half the energy professionals surveyed recently said they cannot find enough qualified people to meet current hiring demands in this fast-growing industry.

And the problem is only set to get worse.

Over 100,000 people currently work in a variety of energy efficiency roles — everything from contractors fixing and installing windows to managers running efficiency programs at utilities.

BEDFORD, Ohio — Factory owners have been adding jobs slowly but steadily since the beginning of the year, giving a lift to the fragile economic recovery. And because they laid off so many workers — more than two million since the end of 2007 — manufacturers now have a vast pool of people to choose from.

Yet some of these employers complain that they cannot fill their openings.

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — You may have thought you were playing it safe by avoiding recently-recalled Johnson & Johnson products, but another drugmaker is now in the hot seat for some of the same problems, including the release of metal-tainted pills.

On Thursday, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration issued a warning letter to one of the world’s largest manufacturers of generic drugs, Michigan-based Perrigo Co.

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — Shopping for a new bank? It’s nice to have a branch on every corner, but that’s not the only quality that makes an institution worthy of your business.

More than half of consumers chose their bank based on a convenient location or ATM, according to a recent survey conducted by analytics company Compete.com.

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — Automakers and advocates for the blind have agreed on a plan to address an unintended problem caused by electric and hybrid cars: They endanger sight-impaired and distracted pedestrians because they make no noise when running on electric power.

The groups joined together to present Congress with a proposal for minimum noise levels that future electric cars would have to make.

NEW YORK – BP brands itself a friend of the environment, an energy company that goes “beyond petroleum.”

That image, worth billions of dollars, is being sullied by the company’s inability to contain a massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

As the expanding oil slick threatens marshlands and wildlife along the coasts of Louisiana and Mississippi, BP faces perhaps the biggest public relations challenge an oil company has experienced in the U.S. since the Exxon Valdez tanker disaster in Alaska in 1989.

SEATTLE – Boeing Co.’s giant 747-8 freighter should make its first flight Monday after performing well on taxi tests and reaching a top speed of about 103.5 mph, the company said.

At 250 feet long, the plane is the largest Boeing has ever built and about 18 feet longer than the existing 747-400 jumbo jet. The company conducted taxi tests on the freighter Saturday at Paine Field in Everett, north of Seattle.

“Based on early indications, the airplane is ready to fly,” said Mo Yahyavi, the 747 program’s vice president and general manager.

The agency, which insured nearly a third of new mortgages in 2009, will increase the premium it charges for its mortgage insurance and require those with weaker credit scores to come up with larger downpayments.

The FHA will also reduce the amount of money a seller can provide a homebuyer for closing costs, as well as tighten its enforcement of lenders.

“Striking the right balance between managing the FHA’s risk, continuing to provide access to underserved communities, and supporting the nation’s economic recovery is critically important,” FHA Commissioner David Stevens said in a statement. “Importantly, FHA will remain the largest source of home purchase financing for underserved communities.”

As the holiday shopping season kicks into high gear this week, it’s a good a time to ask: Are the toys we’re buying safer than the ones a couple years ago, when millions of playthings were recalled because of high lead levels and other hazards?

The world’s largest toy manufacturer, Mattel Inc., says yes, as do federal regulators.

But after spending a few hours roaming the Toy District in downtown Los Angeles, I’m not so sure.

In one shop, I found a package of brightly colored rattles and pacifiers manufactured in China. The package depicts babies in cribs playing with the contents, which include small pieces that could break or be bitten off.

It says in large print that the rattles and pacifiers are for ages 6 months and up.

College students who took advantage of a “deal too sweet to pass up” have run into a bit of trouble.

The $29 electronic version of Windows 7 Home Edition sold for Microsoft (MSFT) through Digital River (DRIV) doesn’t seem to install properly on some 32-bit Vista machines.

Apparently the download files weren’t properly packaged and when some users tried to “unload the box” they got an error that read:

“We are unable to create or save new files in the folder in which this application was downloaded”

A discussion thread with that title was begun on Microsoft Answers’ Windows 7 install forum less than 3 hours after the new operating system launched. By Saturday morning it had generated more than 500 replies and been read nearly 44,000 times.

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — A final proposal for new fuel economy standards was unveiled Tuesday in a joint announcement by the Department of Transportation and the Environmental Protection Agency.

The regulation requires all passenger cars and light trucks sold in the United States to get an overall average of 35.5 miles per gallon by model year 2016. By that year, cars will be expected to average about 39 mpg and 30 mpg for trucks.

Current fuel economy standards for new cars are 27.5 mpg for cars and 23.1 mpg for trucks.

The new standards were originally announced in May by the Obama administration, before some details were finalized.

There’s no question about it: When you go to a doctor nowadays, you’re more likely to be diagnosed with something, and sent home with a prescription, than you were a generation ago. A much tougher question to answer is whether or not these new diagnoses, and new tests and treatments that come along with them, are actually worth all the money they cost you and/or your insurance company.

As Darshak Sanghavi points out in an interesting piece in Slate, there are certainly plenty of people who think that they aren’t.