That’s one takeaway you can draw from a new study commissioned by an Internet publishing trade group, which concludes, astonishingly, that Internet publishing is an important and vibrant industry.

The data are being served up via the Interactive Advertising Bureau, which tells us the advertising-supported Web industry “directly employs more than 1.2 million Americans with above-average wages in jobs that did not exist two decades ago, and another 1.9 million people work to support those with directly Internet-related jobs.”

Note the “advertising-supported” modifier in the above paragraph, because that’s the real thrust of the IAB’s study/press release: The trade group is trying to get Congress and Washington to let members like Google (GOOG), Yahoo (YHOO) and Time Warner’s (TWX) AOL regulate themselves when it comes to hot-button issues like behavioral targeting.

Hence this quote from IAB boss Randall Rothenberg: “By understanding the total contribution of the Internet to the U.S. economy, we can more accurately assess the impact of potential legislative changes on the Internet’s operations, particularly the consequences of any actions that would alter ad-supported business models.”

OK. Fine. But regulation is tomorrow’s problem. Today, let us celebrate the fact that some of us have jobs! And also, according to the IAB, we’re providing the following:

• Universal access to an almost unlimited source of information
• Increased productivity (output per unit of capital or labor, or increased consumer utility at a lower cost)
• Innovation in business practices, consumer behavior, commerce and media
• Empowerment of entrepreneurs to start small businesses, find customers and grow
• Environmental benefits derived from saving natural resources lowering pollution through the reduced use of petroleum-based fuels and paper

Cool, right? And all this time I thought I was just blogging. You’re welcome! And please keep reading.

[Image credit: respres]

The U.S. economy lost 524,000 jobs in December, closing out the worst year for job attrition since World War II, according to the BLS. Total job losses for 2008: 2.6 million, the largest decline since 2.750 million jobs were lost in 1945. A 16-year high. Congratulations, folks….

Suffice to say, that’s quite a bit more than some economists were expecting. And that’s an ugly, ugly number, 2.750 million jobs lost. With the national unemployment rate rising to 7.2 percent during December, the first quarter of 2009 is also looking pretty bleak. “The job situation is ugly and is going to get uglier,” Richard Yamarone, chief economist at Argus Research, told Reuters. “There’s no reason to expect hiring anytime in the next three to six months. We are not going to see any hiring until the government steps in and acts. Talk doesn’t work.”

Robert Barbera, chief economist at the Investment Technology Group, was even more pessimistic–if that’s possible. “I would suspect that starting this past October and lasting through April, we will have really big job losses,” he told The New York Times. “We are not yet near the numbers of those earlier recessions,” he added, referring to the downturns of the mid-’70s and early ’80s, “but five more months like what we have been having and we’ll be there.”

“This is forming to be a perfect storm for the venture capital industry that may result in a significant contraction of firms and capital,” explained Steve Carnevale of Point Cyprus Ventures, who believes institutional investors will eventually put less money into venture capital. “This storm has two fronts. The U.S. economy and the long investment cycle associated with life sciences and clean tech. First, the economy as a whole. The U.S. is bankrupt as a country as a result of massive borrowing that has grown over 30 years. This borrowing created an inflated investment portfolio that made available capital to tertiary alternative investments like venture capital. We are at the beginning of a massive de-leveraging that has unprecedented consequences for the economy and the venture capital industry. … The industry will contract not only because of overall economic weakness, but because the fundamental investment cycle will be dramatically longer. … Now the majority of venture capital is going into life sciences and increasingly clean tech. These types of investments will take longer to produce returns then in the traditional VC investments in the computer industry. When institutional investors figure that out, they will reduce their capital availability for this kind of alternative asset. … Therefore, the VC industry will get sandwiched between the economy and it own fundamentals.”

Ugly times for venture capital. That said, as Sequoia Capital partner Michael Moritz often notes, the best time to invest is often “when people are cowering under their desks.” ‘Course it was Sequoia that just held that “RIP: Good Times” meeting last week. …

[Image credit: Sad Guys on Trading Floors]

And, of course, it will sooner or later. Certainly, the Semiconductor Industry Association, which provided the sales numbers above, thinks so. Earlier this week, it called on the U.S. House of Representatives to pass the $700 billion financial rescue package before it. “Consumer demand accounts for more than two-thirds of the U.S. economy,” said SIA president George Scalise. “A slowdown in sales of a broad range of consumer products such as personal computers, cellphones, and entertainment electronics would have an adverse impact on semiconductor sales in the fourth quarter, which is normally the strongest quarter for the chip industry. The entire supply chain, including our suppliers and customers, will be harmed if access to credit becomes difficult.”

And, of course, it will sooner or later. Certainly, the Semiconductor Industry Association, which provided the sales numbers above, thinks so. Earlier this week, it called on the U.S. House of Representatives to pass the $700 billion financial rescue package before it. “Consumer demand accounts for more than two-thirds of the U.S. economy,” said SIA president George Scalise. “A slowdown in sales of a broad range of consumer products such as personal computers, cellphones, and entertainment electronics would have an adverse impact on semiconductor sales in the fourth quarter, which is normally the strongest quarter for the chip industry. The entire supply chain, including our suppliers and customers, will be harmed if access to credit becomes difficult.”