Crunch time in financial service employment

8,000 at Bear and more on the horizon:

Job losses at Bear Stearns are just the thin end of the wedge, as experts warn that redundancies across the global financial services industry are rocketing. The Experian research agency predicts that the total tally in 2008 could hit 180,000. In New York alone, 12,700 jobs have already been lost this year, primarily in mortgage-related work as the US housing market nosedives.