By now, the only thing that should be surprising about economic bad news is that the experts are surprised by it.

Yesterday, the figure of 573,000 new unemployment claims blew past the 520,000 estimate from analysis firm Briefing.com. The payroll job loss tally from last week was a bigger shocker still. U.S. employers shed 533,000 payroll jobs in November, nearly 80 percent more than the 300,000 forecast by Briefing.com.

Briefing.com is far from alone in underestimating the severity of our troubles. Economists surveyed by the Wall Street Journal kept proclaiming the bottom of the housing market too soon, Salon.com columnist Andrew Leonard noted last year.

What’s an employer to do in the midst of this worse-than-expected recession? Business gurus call for counter-cyclicality—that is, avoiding layoffs or excessive cost-cutting; tapping the flush talent market; and stealing market share from competitors by going big rather than retrenching.

But as all the layoffs show, companies don’t seem to have the stomach for such bold moves. Or perhaps they don’t have pockets deep enough to pay lots of salaries now and wait for a payoff in the years ahead. Economically insecure consumers are following suit, reining in their buying just when the economy could use more shopping.

It seems clear government must kick-start the spending we need, and somehow reverse the pessimism that has come to grip both businesses and workers.

I’ve argued before that a stronger safety net can play a key role in righting the economy.

But only recently did I come across an eloquent defense of the concept by economist Alan Krueger. The Princeton University professor made his remarks in a New York Times essay back during the rough patch of 2001—but they have a prophetic ring given the series of billion-dollar government interventions this year:

“[U]nemployment insurance provides security for those who do not directly receive benefits. Just knowing that benefits are available in case of job loss inspires confidence. A strong safety net also makes it unnecessary to have industry-by-industry bailouts in response to adverse shocks.”

Little by little, the logic of beefier unemployment benefits seems to be sinking in. This week, Sen. Olympia Snowe, R-Maine, called for suspending federal taxes on unemployment payments this year and next. She has proposed broader safety net reform as well.

Lifting taxes on America’s relatively small benefit payments is a small step. But it could be a crucial first step toward economic news that’s pleasantly—rather than painfully—surprising.

There’s lots of talk in these dark economic days about learning from the Great Depression. One lesson we seem to be missing centers on beefier unemployment payments to those out of work.

Consider what people losing a job got back in 1938 and 1939, the tail end of the Depression. The average weekly benefit of $10.94 in 1938 may not sound like much, but it amounted to 43 percent of the average weekly wage at the time, according to U.S. Department of Labor statistics. The ratio dropped slightly in 1939, to 41 percent.

The corresponding figure for 2007 was 34 percent—and it has been 35 percent or less since 2004. A difference of six or seven percentage points can mean a lot of money. If the 2007 ratio had been 41 percent instead of 34 percent, the average weekly benefit would have jumped from $288 to $347 in 2007. Over a 26-week period, that $59 difference adds up to $1,534.

It’s quite possible those relatively higher unemployment benefits in the 1930s helped lift the country out of the Depression—along with the economic engine of World War II.

The Labor Department lays out the logic of the unemployment insurance system on its Web site:

“It was created in 1935 in response to the Great Depression, when millions of people lost jobs. They couldn’t buy goods and services, which contributed to more layoffs,” the Labor Department states. “Now, as then, the program helps cushion the impact of economic downturns and brings economic stability to communities, states, and the nation by providing temporary income support for laid off workers.”

Of course, exceedingly generous unemployment payments without any strings attached or efforts to help people get back to work can backfire. People can get lazy on the dole.

But the U.S., whose unemployment benefits are among the most miserly in the developed world, seems far from that dilemma. In fact, America may be missing a chance to bolster its faltering economy by boosting those stingy jobless benefits, which are part of an overall shoddy safety net.

According to The New York Times, economist Mark Zandi estimated several years ago  that increases in unemployment benefits produced about $1.73 in additional demand for every dollar spent, while tax rebates to all citizens generated about $1.19 for every dollar spent. Reductions in tax rates produced just 59 cents per dollar.

President-elect Barack Obama appears poised to launch big public works projects akin to the New Deal spending that Franklin Delano Roosevelt used to propel the U.S. out of the Depression some 75 years ago. But as hundreds of thousands of Americans find themselves out of work these days, let’s not forget the power of generous unemployment payments.

They may have chosen an inelegant label.

But the folks at employee recognition specialist Globoforce are on to something with their concept of psychic income—a notion that could prove to be vital to workforce morale during these tough times.

At first blush, psychic income sounds like it might refer to the take-home pay of a palm reader. But in a press release earlier this week, Globoforce defined the term as “the need for social acceptance, increased self-esteem and enhanced self-realization.” In effect, they are talking about the strokes bosses can give workers. Those are easy to give, and appear to be surprisingly valuable.

Globoforce cited a number of reports that suggest the value of a “thank you” can meet or exceed cash as a motivator. Among them is a study from Japanese researchers finding that a compliment triggers a reaction in the brain similar to that caused by a monetary reward.

“A strategic recognition program that thanks and rewards employees can lift workers out of the ‘recessionary rut’ that many are falling into,” Derek Irvine, Globoforce vice president of global strategy, said in a statement. “This approach is essential now as companies seek cost-effective, creative ways to spread good will among their employees, show their appreciation for a job well done and boost productivity.”

Irvine’s call for more kudos comes on top of other evidence that talk can have important results while big bonuses may be overrated. In a new report from consulting firm Watson Wyatt Worldwide and professional group WorldatWork, 48 percent of employers surveyed cited improved communication as one of the three most effective options to reduce employee stress.

In a New York Times op-ed piece this week, Dan Ariely, a professor of behavioral economics at Duke University, wrote about some fascinating experiments that indicate large bonuses can backfire. In one case, people were offered a payment for performing a set of tasks exceptionally well. The subjects were divided into three groups, with some told they’d get a small bonus, others a medium bonus and some a high bonus. Those given the chance to earn the biggest payment did the worst.

Ariely argues that money motivates people but also can add stress, and at some point the stress overwhelms the motivating effect. “If our tests mimic the real world, then higher bonuses may not only cost employers more but also discourage executives from working to the best of their ability,” Ariely wrote.

For his part, Stanford University professor Jeffrey Pfeffer has challenged the wisdom of pay-for-performance schemes.

“The evidence is overwhelming that individual pay for performance does not improve organizational performance except in very limited cases,” he told Workforce Management recently.

A cynical company might take this all in and decide to revoke raises altogether. That would be wrongheaded, even in today’s belt-tightening climate.

But it’s clear people aren’t driven by money alone. There’s something to be said for saying nice things to your workers.

Could the business world be taking the pay-for-performance idea too far?

Several points I heard at conferences last week raised that question for me.

For several years now, pay for performance has been a major push at organizations in America. The idea is to hold on to and inspire the top-performing, “A-player” employees while sending a clear signal to lower-achieving workers that they aren’t up to snuff.

Software vendors have embraced the trend, offering products that make it easy to track progress toward goals, rank employee performance and assign pay raises based on those figures.

But could the obsession with results be misguided? And could the drive to differentiate pay backfire?

Consultant Stephen Shapiro prompted the first of those questions during a keynote speech he made at the annual conference of the International Association for Human Resources Information Management professional group. Addressing a room of several hundred HR techies at a Walt Disney World hotel in Orlando, Florida, Shapiro cited a study of auto racing pit crew members. He said that after numerous efforts to improve the speed of a pit stop, the crew hit a plateau. They could get no faster with the tire changes and refueling.

But when told not to worry about speed, and to focus instead on doing their various jobs more smoothly, they managed to go faster.

Could helping workers get in the flow be more effective than focusing on particular results? Another Shapiro anecdote bolstered the idea. He recounted the tale of a retailer where all store employees except for one were asked to maximize sales for a particular period. The last employee was told to concentrate on serving customers well. That employee sold more than all the others.

Shapiro, formerly with advisory firm Accenture, also called attention to the way people benefit from working with colleagues of different personality types. Thus, someone who loves to dream up ideas needs a great “doer” as a partner. Shapiro said he used to hire people in complementary pairs to maximize the strength of his team.

At the annual customer conference of HR software firm SuccessFactors, Stanford University professor Robert Sutton reinforced the notion that focusing on individual stars can dim an organization’s overall performance. Sutton, author of the popular book The No Asshole Rule, said research has indicated that baseball teams with greater wage disparity experience a reduction in team performance. Sutton also pointed to evidence that pay disparity within the top management ranks can hurt an organization’s performance.

Yes, it makes sense to be clear about desired results. And yes, it makes sense to call out and reward excellent individual performance. But we seem to have taken these principles to an extreme.

Perhaps the pendulum is already swinging back. An executive roundtable at the SuccessFactors conference in San Francisco suggested forced ranking—a frequent ingredient in the pay-for-performance recipe—is losing favor. Diana De Walt, senior vice president of human resources at biotechnology firm Gen-Probe, said her company has dispensed with the mandatory distribution of performance ratings. And Godfrey Sullivan, former CEO of software firm Hyperion Solutions, said he strongly disagreed with the practice.

To focus so much on identifying top performers, he suggested, is to miss the firm’s forest for a few trees. “Life is made up of ‘B players’ who are trying really hard to do their jobs, and they need to be grown and developed and turned into ‘B+ players,’ ” Sullivan said. “They may never make the top 10 percent, but they are the lifeblood of a lot of company operations.”

Earlier this month, government officials meeting in Russia hashed out something dubbed the “Moscow Formula.”

It sounds, at first glance, like a name for the plan to keep Vladimir Putin powerful after his term limit as Russian president is reached.

But no. The Moscow Formula is a catchphrase for an idea of interest both to governments and businesses around the globe. The formula, discussed at the first World Social Security Forum, is that a broader concept of social security has to be brought to the public agenda. Rather than merely compensate against loss, the new face of social security aims to invest in people as it tackles the challenges of aging populations, health care coverage and deepening inequality.

The forum was organized by the International Social Security Association, a group made up of nearly 370 government agencies. But officials at the gathering showed their familiarity with business thinking and lingo, including the term “human capital.” Social security officials in the past may have focused on protecting the old and sick against poverty, but today they see themselves as vital players in the quest to create societies that are not only just but prosperous.

“Global economic growth is only sustainable if it is accompanied by social development,” Hans-Horst Konkolewsky, secretary-general of the International Social Security Association, said in a speech.

Michael Cichon, director of the Social Security Department at the International Labour Organization, echoed that point in a recent interview. “Above all, social security contributes to social cohesion, which is the prerequisite for any long-term investment,” said Cichon, whose organization is an agency of the United Nations. “Nobody invests in the long run in a socially unstable, insecure society.”

Cichon cited a study in Mexico finding that people who have been benefiting from youth and family health programs during their adolescent years showed labor productivity (indicated by the level of earnings) about 20 percent higher over a lifetime compared with those who have not benefited.

The ILO is pushing the concept of a “social security floor” that involves basic income security and universal access to health care. The agency is part of a growing debate about what sorts of safety nets are needed in today’s global economy, where workers often face greater economic risks and companies are retreating from traditional benefit plans.

In the United States, businesses for the most part have remained quiet on the economic insecurity question. But it may be in companies’ best interests to get out in front of the debate—both to stave off policies they abhor and to help create smart ones that foster growth. Business leaders, in other words, could be a key ingredient in the “Moscow Formula.”