Posted on 03/25/2014 10:15:34 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
Say it with me: The long-term unemployed are not lazy. Nor are they coddled, hammocked or enjoying a coordinated, taxpayer-funded vacation.
They are, however, extremely unlucky — and getting unluckier by the day.
Take Renardo Gomez of Fitchburg, Mass. In three years, Gomez ricocheted from a stable hospital job of 20 years that paid $34,000 annually to a sudden layoff to a series of low-paying, short-term gigs interspersed with longer and longer spells of unemployment. He expects an eviction notice soon.
“I keep putting in 110 percent and getting 10 percent back,” he says.
A new Brookings Institution study that tracks the fates of those unlucky workers who don’t manage to find stable new jobs in their first few weeks of unemployment suggests that this post-layoff tailspin is distressingly common.
It was already known that the longer workers have been out of a job, the lower their chance of finding work in the coming month. The Brookings paper — by the former Obama administration economist Alan Krueger and his Princeton colleagues Judd Cramer and David Cho — took this analysis a step further: What about (gulp) these workers’ longer-run prospects?
It turns out that from 2008 to 2012, only one in 10 people who were already long-term unemployed in a given month had returned to “steady, full-time employment” by the time government surveyors checked in on them a little more than a year later. “Steady” in this case means that they were working for at least four consecutive months. And the other nine in 10 workers? They were still out of work, toiling in part-time or transitory jobs or had dropped out of the labor force altogether.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
Lucky guy… getting something back.
[/bitterness]
My opinion of “them” is determined by whether or not I am paying them for not working.
He lost his hospital job. Could Obamacare have anything to do with that? Or was it Romneycare?
Or both?
Funny, the easier you make it for them, the unluckier they get.
But no one could possibly have foreseen this. /s
Oh please. It isn’t the problem of finding a job. It is a problem of finding a job that meets the expectations of the person searching for it. There are always jobs out there for those willing to do them.
The problem with these high expectations is that the UIC’er quickly finds that they LIKE the weekly payments, the ability to get SNAP, TANF, WICs (for those with kids), Section 8, and the EITC yearly bonus. With these discouragements, the job that will satisfy them quickly becomes as scarce as a Unicorn.
[This isn’t an attack at or on those who are legitimately out of work and trying to find employment - any employment to meet their financial obligations. It is primarily meant for Obama voters, and those of you out there who fit this know who you are.]
You are correct there are always jobs to be had, but trust me it is not like it used to me. I told my 17 year old son he needed to get a job, he applied at about 20+ places, all entry level work, only got called into an interview by 1 place and did get that job... but it took him nearly 2 months.
All of these places were entry level places, places you would expect a teen to be able to go and find work. 25 years ago, I would have likely had a job inside of 2-3 weeks after putting in no more than a handful of applications.
Reality is the long term depression/recession and the complete instability of things due to government actions, has made the labor market far tighter than it used to be, and employers, even the most basic ones far more leery to hire and picky about who they are willing to. Instead of HS kids working those minimum wage jobs as the rule, they are now more the exception.
I do agree there is always work out there, but its definitely a different and worse world than it used to be. Reality is at the end of the day employment in America today is probably the hardest, for the longest duration of my life. Those jobs teens were doing are now being done by adults who cannot even get a better job.
Reality:
In 1999, slightly more than 52 percent of teens 16 to 19 worked a summer job. By this year, that number had plunged to about 32.25 percent over June and July in 2003.
Sorry that should be 2013 not 2003
Due to inflation (which averages 3%) if you are not doubling your net worth every 20 years... you are losing ground.
Which means all these people living off the government teat, and falling further and further behind.
Don’t know your location but here in Central PA I see many help wanted signs in grocery stores, convenience stores and fast food shops, some advertising $10-12/hr. Believe me some of those places need good help.
Thre is definitely a cohort of people that have gotten used to being paid not to work. That said, a major part of the job market is filtered based upon how recently you’ve had a job, with six months, and again at a year, being significant markers.
Mcdonald’s isn’t gonna hire me nor would I want to work there.
I went through the application process for Michael’s (arts and crafts store here). It was a holiday position.
So I answered their 200 questions on the site, took the 10-min quiz and never heard from them. Everywhere you go, it’s apply online.
This is what the POS in charge wants. Lowest common denominator. Can’t lift up the savages, so reduce us all to their level.
I’m’ in full agreement with you..
In the past, if you had a clean record, there was a job waiting for you. All that had to happen was a solid education and then things would work out fine.
I do know that there is little to no chance that the young can even get a basic teen job like restaurant work since illegals are sinking their merry claws into that.
Full agreement. Working at a crafts store isn’t going to pay the bills. McDonalds is for those who aren’t planning on sticking around or plan on being in a managerial position and that’s not going to really benefit anyone long term.
Sorry, while I provide it as anecdote the numbers bear out what my anecdote is showing.
You have teen employment at the lowest levels of my lifetime.. You have the lowest employment participation rates since the Carter Administration. This isn’t simply an anecdote of one... its a trend that is the reality of the world today.
The last two times I was out of work, it took over a year each time to get back to work. I was applying to anywhere that I thought would take me, from night security at a hotel to taking calls in a call center. All I ever got back was the standard response of “We think you would make a great employee, but you are just too overqualified.” I would dumb down my resume, but as soon as I opened my mouth in the interview, they would know. Plus here in Austin, several businesses just outright won’t hire prior service. Sometimes there just is not anything to find.
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