The good news is, the industries below showed April employment gains, however meager. Click the links for job banks that specialize in or typically list such jobs.

• Retail trade
• Mining
• Temporary help services
• Engineering and Management services
• Health services
• Insurance
• Real estate
• Transportation

In retail, eating and drinking establishments hired 31,000 workers. But the gain was partially offset by the loss of 10,000 at food stores and 8,000 at apparel stores.

Mining showed an increase of 7,000 jobs, after losing jobs in each of the last 5 months for a total of 15,000. Oil and gas extraction suffered most, but gained 5,000 jobs this time around.

Temporary help services added 66,000 jobs. That's its third employment gain in as many months, after more than a year of sustained job losses. Considering that temps are among the first to get the axe in bad times, that's fairly good news. It's likely that employers are starting to hire temps again because they need help, but don't have the long-term commitments they do with "permanent" employees. If you're between jobs, now might be a good time to try temping to get by.

Engineering and management services added 14,000 jobs, four times its average gain in the last 12 months. Incidentally, NVidia Corporation, a semiconductor company specializing in 3D technology, has been advertising engineering and other technical job opportunities. Most appear to be in Silicon Valley (Santa Clara, CA), but some are in a few other cities in the U.S. and overseas.

Health services saw a gain of 15,000 workers. It was smaller than in recent months, but a gain nevertheless. If you're looking for a job, you might consider this industry. It's almost always hiring, even in bad times, and needs techies too. You don't need a medical background for some of the jobs.

Insurance employment rose by 9,000, after 6 months of sustained job losses.

Real estate gained 6,000 jobs, after a flat, 12-month period.

Employment rose by 18,000 throughout the transportation industry. The industry has been hurting for the past year, taking an especially big hit after September 11.