Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Let's say you've been unemployed, or only marginally employed, since the meltdown of 2008. By now, your emergency unemployment compensation has long since ran out, you've exhausted your savings trying to keep the house while trying to find employment, and your car was repossessed. Maybe you have an older, unreliable but paid-off clunker, maybe not, but you don't have consistent or reliable transportation. Even getting to an interview is a real hassle, assuming you can get one in the first place. With the house gone, you rely on public WiFi and perhaps a Skype or Google Voice number, as you're too poor for a phone.
What do people in this situation do? Do they stay permanently at a shelter or with family and friends? Do they get fed at soup kitchens or simply beg? What would you do in this situation?
Gosh, if it was realy that bad for someone and they could not get any sort of job to make a living while looking for a better one to make a better living, I would depend on my wife to support me I suppose. If not for a wife, I would then move in with my mother, if not for her, probably my brother.
But really, if it was really that tough and I could find nothing for a long time I would have went to a vocational training program of whatever sort and worked my a$$ off to be the best I could possibly be at whatever vocation I thought was most in demand and appealed to me.
Bottom line I think is that there are not only plenty of excuses, but plenty of options.
Getting a temp job nowadays is not easy. Most temp agencies are just stockpiling resumes and hoping to poach your contacts especially managerial references. I've had temp agencies send me to interviews even more vigorous than a company would give a direct hire one was all day and I met with 6 different people. I even got rejected from one for HR horse crap I interviewed for several hours and they claim eh he didn't seem ethusiastic enough.
The days of anyone with a pulse getting a temp job are over.
I would have gotten a temp job before the unemployment ran out and those things happened.
Bingo. You have had over 5 years to get it together. Also, if the house had some equity in it, it should have been sold in order to keep the car. Even people without a job can rent, although it may have to be privately done, not via rental firms.
Bingo. You have had over 5 years to get it together. Also, if the house had some equity in it, it should have been sold in order to keep the car. Even people without a job can rent, although it may have to be privately done, not via rental firms.
Temp jobs are just that - temporary and often low paying. You may be working two weeks, out of work for six, working for four, out of work again, etc. They are a last ditch effort to stay afloat, and with no regular income and no real assets, what landlord would rent to you?
Also, if someone is in this bad of a position, the odds are that they were in one of the hardest hit areas and are probably underwater on the home.
Some people commit suicide. Being long term unemployed is depressing, and destroys your self worth when you constantly get rejected for jobs you are qualified for. Looking ahead and only seeing low paying misery when you used to be better off is the kind of thing that can send some people over the edge.
If it got to that point I'd have gone to work on an oil rig, gone to work in the oil fields in Alaska, tried the Deadliest Catch thing, tried to get back in the military...I don't know how hard these jobs would be to get but I'd be willing to try to get them for my family even if it meant I probably wouldn't be seeing very much of them for awhile.
Some people commit suicide. Being long term unemployed is depressing, and destroys your self worth when you constantly get rejected for jobs you are qualified for. Looking ahead and only seeing low paying misery when you used to be better off is the kind of thing that can send some people over the edge.
I certainly think there is a lot more of this than is known, studied, or reported upon. It seemed as if in the past people could reestablish themselves whereas today it is difficult to impossible.
Although you may have had five years to find a job or income of some kind, I can't entirely blame the OP or the person who the OP is describing. Getting a job now a days is tough, it really is. As that unemployment gap gets bigger it starts to hurt you more than help. Hopefully you would have some kind of contingency but so many people lost their jobs in 2008 and struggled. I would look to family and friends for help, apply to EVERY single job you can, temp agenices, talk to headhunters, talk to social workers, go to your local church, talk to half way houses, maybe even contact local colleges and talk about any connections they may have and how they can tweak your resume and so on, even talk to people who work with felons and see what they do to help get them work. If they can get hired, so can you.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
