Hiromichi Shirakawa, chief economist at UBS Warburg (Japan), said that even a meager increase in expectations for the current quarter could evaporate by the time the next poll is taken.

Economists also expect a decline in retail sales during May and a meager increase or even a decline in industrial production for the month.

President Bush, who says that education is his top priority, last month announced a tin-cup budget proposal that includes only a meager $2.5 billion increase for education beyond the $2.1 billion Congress appropriated in advance for the current school year.

Against this weaker economic backdrop, the Labor Department's report of an abrupt slowdown in job creation last month, which was accompanied by a fall in the average number of hours in the workweek and a meager increase in hourly wages, raised a question mark over the standard account of the economy's evolution.

He attributed the shortfall to "a pretty meager increase" in local ad spending from 2004, projected at only 2.3 percent, along with a reluctance among big national advertisers to keep opening their wallets ever wider.

Moreover, they complained that while the problems in both the banking and thrift industries had grown almost exponentially, the Office of Management and Budget continued to refuse all but the most meager increase in their hirings.

Though some industries - notably Germany's metalworking sector - may achieve significant gains this year, others are under intense pressure to accept meager increases.

Its chairman, John Medlin, attributed the meager increase in profit to weak loan demand and increased loan losses caused by the weak economy.

Median household income is very much in line with the meager increases in productivity over the last quarter-century - a prolonged slowdown unprecedented in the American experience.

But when the boss's raise buys a digital TV but a meager increase for subordinates leaves them stuck with black and white, a social problem is born - resentment.