Gerry Crispin and Mark Mehler of CareerXroads recently reviewed the staffing pages of Fortune Magazine's annual list of America's 500 Largest Public Corporations. Their goal is to examine these sites from the perspective of a job seeker and determine each one's ability to target, engage, inform and respect the prospective candidate. According to Crispin, "Only 10% of the Fortune Magazine list offers an experience that truly enhances their staffing goals."

We had two noteworthy conversations last week about benchmarking. The first was via telephone with a huge retailer who processes 350,000-450,000 applications a year to achieve about one tenth that number in actual hires. The second was over lunch with an elite consulting company that processes 3,500 applications annually to fill 350 openings. Again, about a 10% yield.

Both companies are internationally known brand names that have high and positive marketplace recognition, the ear of senior management, no problem attracting applicants, robust professional staffing operations, good measurement controls, and money to spend on problem analysis and solutions. From the outside, their staffing operations appear to be highly successful, yet they are both confronting difficult, complex problems as they work to raise their benchmark scores.

Prosperous times seem to be gone for the moment, and when we’ll see them again remains an open question. An exclusive Rockefeller Foundation/TIME survey conducted in late June indicates that an overwhelming majority of Americans, concerned about their financial situations and economic futures, are calling out for more government help.

Throughout the ranks of employed Americans today, very much including your U.S. citizen workforce near and far, there is a new set of worries, fears and concerns. These are not lurking or latent. They are manifest, and prevalent, right now. They do not result from your staffing practices, but they may in significant measure drive or redefine them.

You thought you had to play to those 18-29-year-old Gen Yers, giving them everything they want as they cherry pick your jobs and make arrogant demands? You do. But understand the difference between demands and expectations. Understand that this demographic, which a prestigious new study suggests is another depression-era generation in the making, is in its own way scared stiff:

• 49% of them say America was a better place to live in the 1990s
• 46% say America is a lot less financially secure now than a decade ago.