Two years after Ray Victoria lost his place in the old economy, he’s nearly finished rebuilding his career to ride out the uncertainties of the new one.

When factories around Bellingham, Wash., started shedding workers a few years ago, Victoria and scores of others sought retraining. This spring, the former mechanic at a Boeing Co. aircraft plant will graduate from Bellingham Technical College as a much-in-demand heating and air conditioning technician.

But he’ll enter an economy that continues to deliver limited returns. Victoria expects to earn only about 60 percent of what he did at Boeing. And while administrators at the college say new admissions are beginning to tail off, retraining enrollment remains roughly triple what it was three years ago.

The uncertain fortunes of the school and its students offer a window into the economy as 2004 nears an end. It was neither the best of times, nor the worst of times.

After the late 1990s boom and the steep drop-off that followed, the business climate is warming in a way that has been slow to reach many people. Some economists describe it as a transition year, but it’s unclear what the next stage will be.

Many workers remain skeptical, as many businesses remain cautious, especially about whether to expand their payrolls. While homeowners are enjoying surging valuations, the prospects of higher interest rates could temper the housing boom.

Factors ranging from record gasoline prices to the continued war in Iraq to rising national debt are exerting strong pulls on the economy.

“We’re not really sure where all that’s headed,” said Carl Van Horn, director of the John J. Heldrich Center for Workforce Development at Rutgers University. “This is the new normal.”

By many broad measures, the business climate during the past year has improved. In the quarter ended in September, the economy expanded at an annual rate of 3.9 percent.

Consumers are spending –maybe not lavishly, but steadily. Corporations are reporting strong profits and are expanding. A weak dollar is giving U.S. manufacturers a boost, making their products cheaper for overseas buyers. The stock market has delivered limited gains to investors.

With worries about terrorist attacks diminishing and corporate scandals fading, decision-makers and investors have regained some confidence.

“We transitioned from crisis to crisis to a more normal economic environment,” said Joel Naroff of Naroff Economic Advisors in Holland, Pa.

For the vast majority of people with jobs, the gradual recovery means only limited improvements in pay and other job opportunities, the measures most people use to calibrate their personal economic circumstances.

The nation’s unemployment rate — which peaked at 6.3 percent in June of last year — has gradually ticked down to 5.4 percent. Employers have added to payrolls intermittently. Through November, the economy had regained roughly 2.3 million of the 2.7 million jobs lost during the recession.

Meanwhile, average pay has edged up, from $15.45 an hour at the end of last year to $15.83 in November — an increase of less than 2.5 percent. That is behind inflation, and much of the small gains in pay are eaten up by surging gasoline prices and the steeply higher health care costs shouldered by most workers.