Other firms with double roles as gatekeepers and as advisers to stock pickers include Watson Wyatt Worldwide and Wilshire Associates.

FORBES: Pay For Play

Watson Wyatt Worldwide, a human-resources consultancy, says the proportion of American employers implementing either wage cuts or furloughs has risen sharply since October (see chart 1).

ECONOMIST: The recession and pay

Eighteen percent of the 1, 000 big companies with defined benefit plans had, as of last December, frozen at least one of their plans, with the majority of those freezes occurring in 2004 or 2005, according to consultants Watson Wyatt Worldwide.

FORBES: The Big Chill