The Pain of Coping When a Job Is Snatched Away

The New York Times ^ | December 1, 2003 | JILL ANDRESKY FRASER

[meadsjn]

Thanks for posting #142.

The "free-traitors" will be dogfood before they recognize their part in the communist cycle.

[XBob]

154 - " Got to stay at least 12 months ahead of the organization AND the industry. That takes homework and lots of networking."

If you are able to do this, why do you even need to get a job? You should be ruling the world.

[kezekiel]

Excuse me, it lose, not loses.

Excuse me, it's it's, not it. ;)

[commonerX]

Play nice Now

[kezekiel]

Yep, sounds like these two were spending it faster than they made it when the getting was good. It still doesn't make sense to me how you could have the capacity to make a quarter of a million one year and only 25 thousand the next. You don't think the Times would lie to us, do you?

I'll withhold comment on their spending, but I can tell you that thirty-fifty something professionals, if their sector crashes as tech did, may find it very difficult indeed to get jobs that normally go to younger or less experienced workers. Employers generally don't like to employ people who are totally over-qualified, no matter how desperate they may be for work. So, paradoxically, it can be just as hard to find a McJob as it is to find a job in your current field.

By the way, when the tech crash wiped out my career (both in components trading, which was my primary income, and tech writing, which was my secondary income), at one point I took a job cleaning grocery stores on graveyard shifts so that I could leave my days open for job interviews. One position I spent six months interviewing for just before the company imposed a hiring freeze.

Being out in the cold changes your perspective. Things are okay for us now--we are making ends meet, thank God--but we are still making only a third of what we were at our peak. Don't flippantly dismiss the trauma if you haven't gone through it yourself. It sucks.

[anniegetyourgun]

May explain why I haven't HAD to work for the last decade. I dabble in those things that interest me. Teach a class, sit on boards, identify and train leaders, invest, write, organize events, raise millions for various organizations, and so on. I may go back to "work" full-time someday - got another 10-15 years I'm willing to give a hi-pot organization before I "retire" again. (I hate that term....if I ever stop moving long enough to actually retire, I'll probably be on my deathbed.)

[rb22982]

Numerous times I have been told that since I would be taking pay cut, I would most likely leave at the first opportunity.

And it's probably true as well. Your best bet is convince the interviewer that you are more interested in stability than pay.

[mountaineer]

Where do you get your expertise? I am pretty darn sure I know a heck of a lot more than you about what's going on in the steel industry. Name-calling - for some silly reason I expected better from you, WG.

[John Lenin]

Lets start a 12 step program ....

[Willie Green]

Where do you get your expertise?

Family genetics.
Do you really want a list of all my ancestors and relations who sweated in Henry Clay Frick's coal mines and coke furnaces and Andrew Carnegie's mills? Or is it sufficient for you to know that my dad was a manufacturing engineer for one of the major mills and I grew up not only visiting him at work and listening to all his challenges and achievements, I decided to follow in his footsteps in my own professional education and career.

I am pretty darn sure I know a heck of a lot more than you about what's going on in the steel industry.

Unless you enjoy discussing the technical merits of various steel alloys more than Pittsburgher's like to talk about the Steelers or Permanti sammiches, I sincerely doubt it, sweetie.

Name-calling - for some silly reason I expected better from you, WG.

Yeah, name calling. You bash your neighbors and then whine when I've deliberately refrained from chastising you in more traditional 'Burgh fashion.

As we discussed earlier, there are no economic panaceas on the horizon for your region's prosperity. I strongly suggest you make some attempt at preserving what you have instead of rooting for further decline.

[mountaineer]

No more response from me. You've made a big enough fool of yourself.

[Malsua]

I have no sympathy whatsoever for a couple that makes a quarter million a year.

At that rate, unless one idiotically buries themselves in a deep hole of debt, one can be debt free in a year or two.

I make "high 5s" my wife doesn't work(enough to matter) and I've got nearly a year's worth of living expenses saved up.

If these people were making over two and half times what I make, there is simply no excuse for them. With their kind of salary, I would have everything paid off inside of 6 months. Mortgage and all..and I live in New Jersey and Commute to about 6 miles of NYC. It's about discipline and not needing a 3500 foot house. My house is under 1000 Square and I'll be out of my mortgage in 10 years and I'm 36. These people are idjits.

-Mal

[Willie Green]

No more response from me. You've made a big enough fool of yourself.

Hey, YOU'RE the one who is whining because your neighbors make too much money for what you ignorantly describe as manual labor. I have no idea what kind of "diverse" industry you think is going to bring prosperity to the region, but it sure as heck isn't going to be tourism, casino gambling and socialized medicine.

[stands2reason]

This is actually a very positive story. It shows that at some point in their lives even two stupid people can make $250K. This story should serve as hope for all stupid people out there.

LOL!!

I once asked an immigrant what he found most fascinating about the United States, and he replied (with total, sincere humility) that he was amazed to live in a place where even dumb people could earn a lot of money.

ROFLMAO!!! Thanks guys....

[shaggy eel]

I am pretty darn sure I know a heck of a lot more than you about what's going on in the steel industry.

,,, if you're in the steel industry, is your knowledge enough to save your job?

[Joe Hadenuf]

But at the risk of torquing anyone off -- everyone who got laid off at our plant deserved it and the company is better without them.

I agree. They're just more lazy American's that probably didn't deserve jobs anyway. Better to hire illegal aliens and people from India. They don't complain and work longer hours for less.

Go Bush!

[A. Pole]

An argument can be made that poverty is negative reinforcement - the wages of sin, as it were.

And wealth is the sign of virtue and eternal election. So what does the fall of the wealthy during the revolutions mean - the loss of divine grace? How it can be reconciled with the predestination?

[Euro-American Scum]

All I can say is, I believe there's justice in the world. If you believe in kicking the crap out of others while they're down, well... we'll see. It may well be that your time is coming, someday, to understand what it's like.

It's called payback. And these hardcase types will squeal like stuck pigs when it comes back on them.

[KC_Conspirator]

But I have said to interviewers that stability is what I want but to no avail.

[cherry]

I don't know if you are really a "Russian conservative", but what you state is so true....

we here in America and on Fr get so wrapped up in this false illusion called "free trade"....

there is no free trade....

all trade in one way or another is fixed...

remember, all of North America is supposed to be one big happy trading family EXCEPT when it comes to certain things...like prescription drugs.....then all of a sudden, we just can't let those Americans get the same drugs at discount prices as we let the Canadians....

I heard today that China now has an apple industry 10x that of Washington State, and they are now sending their apple juice here...

when we lose our farm industry, maybe then people will sit up and notice...