Topic: Who do you know that is unemployed?

[Pandora]

The unemployment figures are regularly published, and revised, and republished, and I am very curious to know who among us knows someone who is currently unemployed; not somebody your brother-in-law knows, but of your known-family/friends/acquaintances who are not disabled/unable to work.

I don't have a very wide circle (according the above criteria), but I know of no one.

[Libertas]

The unemployment figures are regularly published, and revised, and republished, and I am very curious to know who among us knows someone who is currently unemployed; not somebody your brother-in-law knows, but of your known-family/friends/acquaintances who are not disabled/unable to work.

I don't have a very wide circle (according the above criteria), but I know of no one.

My friends/familiy are hard working self-motivated individuals, so of course we are employed.  I have a nephew who is underemployed and a new NIL who is set to graduate in the spring so we'll see.  His current job is nothing to write home about (Target grunt).  I do know a few more contemporaries who are underemployed.  That's about it.  But I know many small businessmen who will not be hiring more people and who are planning to reduce staffing next year.  ObamaCare, if it stands, will strand millions on the sidlines.  Plus, I think cyclical industries and manfucaturing always bear the brunt of downturns...just the people the Left professes to give a damn about...but then again their idea of giving a damn is unemployment benefits for life, free healthcare, subsidized union labor and government jobs...the very things that are helping to destroy the private sector one limb at a time!

[Predator Don]

 First, I'll preface my remark I live in a middle to upper middle income area ( median income 55K), relatively conservative, with low minority numbers. Since opening my business 4 years ago, I've had the pleasure to meet many good people. Hardly ever an issue collecting money ( I auto draft hundreds) with half my customers paying in full for the year.

Within the last two years, my collection issues went from maybe 5 to now at least 25 on a billing of around 320 per month. Billings are not large ( ave 32.00 month) Some have lost thier jobs, but most the result of less/ no overtime or a cutback in hours. I received a call Thanksgiving eve from a lady who recently joined, asking to cancel because her husband just lost his job......She was obviously distressed, I could hear it in her voice.

Since the summer of recovery, year 3, I've went from a robust 420 monthly billings and 390 paid in advance, to 320 monthly billings and 307 paid in advance.....With no new competition or different efforts on my part...If anything, I've literally tripled my advertising efforts to stay where I am today.

I've quit counting the people, after expiration of membership ( I contact everyone) who state they don't have the extra funds today. My membership has dropped 22% since the summer of recovery, ironically, mirroring the un and underemployed.

[IronDioPriest]

I am essentially unemployed, as I shared in a thread a few weeks back. As an independent contractor, I am always only as employed as I can make myself. I had too many eggs in one client basket, and they downsized and I lost their business. What's left over for me does not earn a living, and thankfully my wife's salary is sufficient. 20% of the people I worked with at that company who were FTEs were let go along with the contractors.

So, until I got axed, my circle of familiarity with the unemployed was pretty small. Now it's pretty big.

[Predator Don]

I am essentially unemployed, as I shared in a thread a few weeks back. As an independent contractor, I am always only as employed as I can make myself. I had too many eggs in one client basket, and they downsized and I lost their business. What's left over for me does not earn a living, and thankfully my wife's salary is sufficient. 20% of the people I worked with at that company who were FTEs were let go along with the contractors.

So, until I got axed, my circle of familiarity with the unemployed was pretty small. Now it's pretty big.

IDP....Why I am considering selling...... If obama wins re election, I feel I'd be screwed. Selfishly, it is one of the reasons why I will vote for whatever republican we trot up...I believe obama is this destructive. I can always start another business in a different location.

[Pandora]

Okay; so far there's one - IDP.

[Predator Don]

Okay; so far there's one - IDP.

Pan, I don't remember all the names....but I'd say I'm good for aroung 40.

[Pandora]

Okay; so far there's one - IDP.

Pan, I don't remember all the names....but I'd say I'm good for aroung 40.

I see what you're saying -- these people are your former clients/customers -- but this is not what I'm trying to assess according to the aforementioned criteria.  You don't "know" these people, some of them are cutting their memberships due to budget concerns, and the only person who specified a 'job loss' was conveyed as the husband's.

See my point here?

The economic suck has adversely impacted your business; I'm asking for the closer, more personal count.

[BMG]

I'm unemployed, but by choice so I can be the daycare for my kids instead of sending them off to some stranger. So this doesn't really count.

I have one friend that is unemployed but it may have been a choice, I'm not sure. He's been unemployed now for about three years and is staying at home as daycare for his kids. Don't know if he counts.

I have one other friend that is also unemployed and has been for about two years - though he's a lazy liberal SOB that campaigned for Obama so I'm not sure he counts either.

I have three friends I know that are unemployed and have been for about 2 years. Two of those three worked in the IT field...not sure where the other guy worked.

[charlesoakwood]

So if he could verify that x # of customers attritted because of job loss it would be acceptable?

Count one for me, my lazy axe 2nd cousin, of course he never worked much anyway.

[Delnorin]

I'm employed now.....

In 2007 I found myself unemployed and on a blacklist in my profession in Michigan because I fought the 'system' and won.  The State Courts proved they had shat all over me and were forced to give me my job back w/ backpay, etc.  Needless to say.. .those 10 months of fighting in court to get the job back and clear my reputation were spent by my opposition feeding lies and threats to all my fellow friends/employees that if they helped me they too would be fired.  They would rant about my 'evils', etc and in short.... after I got my job back they had egg all over their face.  Didn't matter though.. it's an old-boys club and I wasn't on the golf group.  The circle of friends that I just embarrassed ranged over the entire State of Michigan (city drinking water plants only have 1 supervisor/superintendent and those superintendents from all the cities are in groups/professional organizations that like to spend city money in fancy hotels getting drunk and visiting prostitutes down in New Orleans, etc.... I had embarrassed the inner circle 'one of the guys'... and I would no longer find work in Michigan.

It took several months of working minimum wage on tree-farms with people that couldn't speak a word of English, delivering pool supplies (seasonal job) for a company in a truck and working on a pig farm (again with people that couldn't speak a word of English).... finally even those jobs dried up and I had no options left.  About to lose the house....

I joined a company and went to Iraq to work as a civilian in sewer treatment.  I worked there 1 1/2 years.

I got back and started frantically looking for work again.. but outside of Michigan.. I was still blacklisted.

I found a job in Arizona for a town (where I am working now).. but working at $5 less an hour.. and here they mandatory take out $400 a month for State Retirement (OUCH !!) and have various other fees and 'benefits' which suck your check down even further.  I'm bringing home about a $12/hour paycheck instead of a $26/hour paycheck.

Though I am working 40 hours a week I would claim that I am still underemployed.  The town I am working for has stopped pay increases for 5 years now.  Not one single cost of living increase, not one merit raise, not one raise of any sort.  There has also been studies by the town to see about pay increases but again.. the studies always come back... yes.. we pay you crap... but we still don't have any money to pay you more.

As an example... Monday we have a new lady coming in to work (same job/position as I am in)... she's got 3x's the licensing and qualifications that I have.  I don't know her story or why she's taking a job with a take-home pay of about $12/hour when she should be at a job getting $40/hour.. she's more qualified than my bosses, boss.  But regardless... she's the new employee at the bottom of the ladder starting Monday.

People are so desperate for work that they are taking jobs they would have laughed at 5 years ago.  They're taking the jobs that their subordinates subordinates used to do.

----------------------

My brother in-law is underemployed.  Answering phones (customer service) from his bedroom in his parents basement from like 10pm-6am... getting paid peanuts.. just enough to keep gas in his car for going on job interviews... if there were any job interviews.

My father in-law has a job where he's getting about 1/3 of what he should be getting.  He's working for a third rate nursery (plant farm) that has a great deal of illegal alien hiring going on (which he keeps fighting management about to the point where he worries about losing his job.. but he refuses to take part in what they are doing)... but he's working in a place of ethical hell to try and feed his family.

My mother in-law is also working in a job getting about 60% of what she should be getting paid.  Having to fight to get 40 hours a week.

I have several neighbors unemployed.  The depression on their faces as you drive past them as they stand in their yards with their families is sad.  Their cars are falling apart and they are getting evicted as quick as they are moving in.  The turn over rate in the neighborhood of rents is staggering.  They think they're going to make it.. get a house to rent.... and before the end of the year they're getting another U-Haul.

[Predator Don]

The under employed may be a larger issue than the unemployed. I remember the Bush years when the lib complaint, during the time unemployment ran less than 6%, were the jobs were menial and not "real" jobs....Libs particurally complained about service employment. Hell, during the obama time, those are the good jobs.

[Sectionhand]

I am . Well , actually , I'm retired so essentially I get paid for sitting around doing nothing ... which is the best damned job I ever had . Seriously though , I don't know anyone who fullfills the criteria for membership in the ranks of the un-employed . That doesn't mean there won't be in the future . The few un-employed I have known over the last several years re-gained employment very quickly ... generally before receiving their first un-employment check . Several didn't even apply .

[BMG]

I get paid for sitting around doing nothing ... which is the best damned job I ever had

*GASP* OMGOMGOMG!!! SH is a liberal!!! 

/joke

 

[Weisshaupt]

The unemployment figures are regularly published, and revised, and republished, and I am very curious to know who among us knows someone who is currently unemployed; not somebody your brother-in-law knows, but of your known-family/friends/acquaintances who are not disabled/unable to work.

I don't have a very wide circle (according the above criteria), but I know of no one.

I lost a job in 2008 and was immediately offered underemployment at the same company as a contractor- which after 4 months of job searching, I accepted until I took a direct hire with thecompany that purchased my former company.   My Brother in Law sold his delivery business last year ( disputes with the bakery he was delivering for - with the forseen conclusion of a legal battleleaving him bankrupt  if he did not vacate )  and is now underemployed doing odd jobs. We had a friend, a divorced monther of two,  who was underployed teaching part time pre-school,  and  now has a full time one year contact teaching middle school.

You seem to be after something specific? Just proof that birds of a feather flock together and people who have jobs, and know good people, don't let them be (fully) unemployed long? That they are unwilling to be in that state when actual work (however "beneath them") offers itself?  I know OF some actually unmployed people, but they are liberal family and friends of other conservatvies that I know.

Yes, the economy is bad, but you w<WILL> find something if you are looking.  It may not pay as much as your old job, and it may not make the best use of your skills, but yeah, if you take it you will find other doors open for your later. That all still works the same as when we were teenagers looking for any job. Granted, I would hate tobe in that situation again, but yes if you have to start over those opportunities are still there, because in the end there are only two essential job skills: Showing up on time,  and working like you give a sh*t when you are there.  Those two skills will open doors for anyone and everyone. Sadly, liberals don't see any point to either- and choose to be unemployed rather than taking a job that isn'r "Right for them"  ( One of my friend's (liberal) nephews was offered a job here in Colorado building a call center from scratch.. he declined- Colorado is too cold and he didn't want the responsiblity- and he now complains about how now he is passed over for raises and promotions. )

[Alphabet Soup]

Okay; so far there's one - IDP.

After Random died her older sister came home to live with me. She lost her job a few months later and has been unemployed ever since. I staked her to some photography classes at a local community college and she has made some pocket change with senior photos, weddings, and the like but it's still at best an avocation and opportunities for steady work are few and far in between.

Unfortunately she's in that emotional space where she's lost confidence and afraid that it shows when she does get an interview.

My step-daughter had one crappy waitress job after another. She even did a stint at a Hooters. Having worked around the bar scene myself for several decades I knew the score and ran the risk of alienating her with all my cautionary tales. She finally quit her last bar job and became a stay-at-home mommy. I don't know if that counts but the take-home pay that her boyfriend makes is pretty slim and I know she would be working if she could find a decent gig.

[Pandora]

You seem to be after something specific?

Yes, and I wasn't able to explain it as well as I wanted.  I made reference to the unemployment figures we hear periodically, the "jobs reports" on the "news", the reports of this and that company preparing to lay off _______,  but we're not as able these days, as in the old, to tie that into what we see because we don't see it.  There are no long lines at the unemployment offices -- people get their checks in the mail -- as there were in the 70s.  I remember the lobbies being packed and long queus out the door and down the street.  So, the true numbers of unemployed are relatively hidden.

I thought by asking "who do you know", seeing as how we're all from different parts of the country, a tie-in could be made from what we're hearing to what we're seeing.  The people we "know", we keep up with; we get updated about relatives/friends who were looking for a job and either found one or are still looking, which is why I asked about them, not just people in general.

[Alphabet Soup]

When we were teens going into our twenties my brothers and I would joke about whose turn it was to be unemployed. There were four of us and it seemed that at no time during a 10-15 year period were all of us employed at the same time.

So the default state was that there was always someone in our midst who was just getting a job, just leaving a job, or out looking.

Another thing was that it wasn't unusual to game the system in these grunt jobs to work it for a year or so and then take a "vacation" when the seasonal layoffs came around. We would collect unemployment while we waterskiied. Of course all that was before any of us married.

In the years that have passed I have sought steady reliable employment, as have my surviving brothers. Even at that the impression of tenuous employment persists. Yes, I do know many people around me who are unemployed, under-employed, or among those who have simply given up and are scrounging off of their family, the government, or charity.

[charlesoakwood]

So, we're all under-employed and the high unemployment occurs most
in certain geographical areas and specific demographic groups?

[Weisshaupt]

So, we're all under-employed and the high unemployment occurs most
in certain geographical areas and specific demographic groups?

I don't know if we are all "underemployed", but a suspect that we on this forum, as a group, do not represent a demographic that is impacted largely by the unemployment.  That different groups are affected differently is a truism. Political calculations spends a lot of time looking at employment and who is employed..

http://politicalcalculations.blogspot.com/search/label/jobs

Teenagers, being the most unskilled,  tend to fare the worst in bad times.