Monday, October 27 12:00 AM ET

Newly Unemployed Miss Getting Paid to Surf Internet the Most

Washington, D.C. – A new survey of newly unemployed workers show that a majority list "getting paid to surf the Internet at work" the thing they miss most. The survey comes amid reports of more layoffs in all sectors of the U.S. economy.

"Sure, I could sit around and troll message boards or play Flash games at home, but my heart's not in it knowing I'm not shirking my duties at work," said Harold Borkins who was recently laid off from his tech support job at Initech.

The survey showed that "free coffee" was the next most missed aspect of work followed by "texting while taking a dump."  Surprisingly, a "steady paycheck" and "medical benefits" finished eleventh and fourteenth on the list respectively.

Jane Thomas, who was let go from Computronix Systems, last month said, "I try to make up for that lost feeling of leeching off the system by bothering as many of my still-employed friends during the day that I can.  Unfortunately, that list is dwindling."

The survey confirms that many sites could face a drop off in traffic from bored workers who instead of mindlessly surfing around the Internet can now turn to beer and DVDs previously unavailable to them in the workplace.

Economist said the recent layoffs could lead to a surge in productivity as the remaining workers have to pick up the slack.  "We could see the actual hours worked per week go from 12.8 hours to 13.6 hours," said Lehman Brothers economist Daryl Eswhipe.

One group unaffected by recent layoffs would be workers in upper management, who will be able to make an easy transition from three days of golf a week to seven.

"Filing weekly progress reports" was nowhere to be found on the list.