Unemployment figure tells just part of story

AP ^ | June 1, 2003 | Adam Geller

[sarcasm]

NEW YORK -- The nation's unemployment rate has edged up to 6 percent, but frustrated jobseekers -- shoulder-to-shoulder with so many others who have recently lost work -- are convinced the number is missing something.

They're right, experts say.

The unemployment figure, based on the government's monthly survey of 55,000 households, only counts those people who have made an effort to look for a job in the last four weeks.

[MacDorcha]

i mean, really. "oh no! a hard time in life! not that! i was told life is a cake walk!"

deal with it. it's life. keep moving.

[Jorge]

Thanks for the link!

[Jorge]

No. No significant news here....and most nations would die for our unemployment rates.

Thank you. In other words this article is just another attempt by the liberal media to make things look worse than they really are.

[clamper1797]

just thought id tell everyone i have two jobs that i get paid more than minimum wage for. i looked, and made myself presentable

Very good for you. And what, may I ask, industry are these jobs in and what do you do to perform your duties ???

[MonroeDNA]

The sky is falling! The economy is doomed, doomed I tell ya.

It's the Joooooos!

Go Pat, go!

Away.

[MacDorcha]

part time manager at a supermarket, and an clerk at a small video game retail store.

[MacDorcha]

an *a

[sarcasm]

Another absolutely worthless comment. I gather that someone of your limited intelligence has nothing material to contribute.

[clamper1797]

Manager at a supermarket is a full time job and requires a lot of skill and experience. I know because I worked for Luckys/Gemco ten years as a night crew manager. I earned the first 2 of my 5 degrees working the midnight shift at the grocery store. Problem is now ... when I was out of work last year, I tried to use that 10 years grocery store experience and my contacts to get back into the markets. My VERY good friend who is a district manager for Safeway told me that there is NO way any market is going to hire a laid off high tech worker ... especially a 52 year old. He said that the markets like other non-tech businesses are not hiring laid off high tech workers because they are afraid that the worker will return to the high tech industry should and when the economy turns around. They can't take the chance.

Luckily I'm back to work in the high industry ... but what do you think the MANY MANY other high tech workers should do to get employed given that other businesses won't hire them ?????

[MacDorcha]

that just means you're overqualified. ive seen a few people grab some part time jobs doing things like cashiering even though they have all that training. the trick they did was to not put in the resume what kind of training they have. they just applied and made themselves look like a standard middle mangament firee. someone that just baddly needed a job and some extra cash. a lot of them landed some manager and stock crew jobs.

the biggest problem my particular store now faces due to this type of hiring is that we now have almost to many. thankfully, we can give them to other stores, and by the time we reach a threshhold, we should be able to let them go again. nothing is impossible, just do what you can, and God will do what you can't.

[clamper1797]

So you would have the high tech workers lie on their resumes ... that would show good conservative values and ethics ... and get you fired if the falsehoods were to be discovered. All the job candidate has to do is account for the last few years of employment. What are they going to say ... "Well sure I worked in high tech for the last 25 years ... but I didn't learn anything and I don't have any education so I'm not over qualified for your job". Then of course the applicant has to act like he doesn't have the many many years of college required to perform a high tech engineering job. Of course any manager worth their merit is going to spot an out of place (over qualified) candidate in a hot minute.

Did it ever occur to you that you don't know what your taking about ????

[MacDorcha]

then you must not want a job baddly enough. so stop complaining. and sure any manager worth his merit would spot an overqualified applicant, but i would have to say less than 60% of them are worth much of anything. and face it, if one is going to whine about not having a job without trying to get one, then they dont have much to whine about.

and it isnt a lie to simply say you were in middle managment. you were, it just happend to be a part that got dropped massively. you still need a job like anyone else. or would you rather keep collecting on unemployment checks? which do you feel is more moral?

as for knowing what im talking about. if you feel i dont, then dont listen to me. ill just keep cashing in my paychecks.

[VOA]

bump

[clamper1797]

You just don't get it do you ....?

1. Engineers are NOT middle management. So saying "you were in middle managment." would be a lie ... ODD that you would suggest that I lie on my resume and mention God in the same post.
2. I have a job ... in the industry ... after dozens of interviews all over the country, hundreds of resumes and 9 months out of work. BUT I'm one of the very lucky ones.
3. High tech workers are NOT being hired for ANY job.

The manager at McDonalds thought I was joking when I applied. When he realized that I was not he said there was NO WAY that he or any McDonalds manager would hire someone like myself. It was obvious even to him that I was out of place
The district manager at Radio Shack was even more candid. He said that his company was going out of their way NOT to hire displaced high tech workers because the company wants "career minded" people and they believed that if and when the economy turned around that the high tech worker would leave.

Even the manager at Safeway, where my lady works as a Phamacist, said the same as the guy at Radio Shack ... they are NOT hiring laid off high tech workers. Even ones like myself who used to be a supermarket manager with ten years experience.

So bottomline ... you DON'T know what your talking about.

[clamper1797]

Let me put this another way ...

Do you REALLY want the guy who designed the computers in the Galileo space mission to ask you if you want to "supersize"??? Do you REALLY want the guy who designed the computers in a MOST of the weapons systems that so easily won the war in Iraq washing your car at the car wash.
Who the hell ido you think s going to design the next generation weapons systems when most of the experienced engineers are now greeting customers at Wally World ... the Chinese??? Tell you what ... you better start learning to speak Chinese if this trend continues cause all those nifty weapons systems are going to be obsolete soon ... and the people with the expertise to design the new ones are going to asking you if you want fries with that

[clamper1797]

Oh ... and one more thing.

or would you rather keep collecting on unemployment checks?

Unemployment chceks are payouts from an INSURANCE program that your EMPLOYER pays into ... like your health benefits ... as part of your COMPENSATION package. Drawing unemployment is NO less moral that using your health benefits to see a doctor. You as a tax payer do NOT pay for someones unemployment check. Granted ... the extention is payed out of the general fund .... but that is only 3 months. In my state it equates to around $1400 a month for a total of around $4200. I paid that in taxes every month for MANY years. So don't tell me that I'm living off the government for that stipend.

BUT if it were possible ... I would guarantee that most high tech workers would be HAPPY to pay it back.

How in the world did you get it in your mind that someone who would spend 12 years in college (in my case) and spend 25 years building a career (in my case again) would eagerly turn into a bum to live off a temporary measly $1400 a month.

[clamper1797]

payed = paid

[MacDorcha]

"So bottomline ... you DON'T know what your talking about. "

fine, as i said, you believe that, then dont listen to me. it's really quite simple. or did 12 years in college make you above simple judgement?

[clamper1797]

Who says I listen to you ... if I did ... I'd be "supersizing" right now instead of designing your next computer

[clamper1797]

Listen ... I don't mean to be rude to you. This is a VERY emotional topic with me. I had to live thru the misery of unemployment and the accompaning threat of losing EVERYTHING I have worked my whole life for. I have MANY close friends who are suffering right now because of the H-1B abuse and the offshoring fad. The answers are NOT as simple as "get a job". It is idiotic to think that someone who has worked their whole lives building a career will shuck it all and become a bum for nine months of $1400 payments. For the most part ... laid off high tech workers are NOT bums. They have tried to get a job ... any job for quite sometime. One very close friend who is a laid off nuclear engineer relates the story about how she could not get hired by Mervyns because she did not "fit in" another close engineer friend ... who has 14 patents ... tells of trying to get a job at the local bar and being told that they wanted a "long term" employee.

It is totally frustrating when someone who has no experience what-so-ever in what is going on tries to give advice as if we were to stupid to think of it ourselves. You are NOT talking to bums. You are talking to and about highly trained, highly educated, highly motivated people. We don't want to be unemployed anymore that you want to pay taxes.

What I'm trying to do is get people to realize that the problem does NOT lie with the unemployed high tech worker ... the problem lies with government policies ... including anti-business regulation, tax structures which drive businesses offshore and especially the corrupt H-1B and L1 programs.

Some people say we have a "victim mentality". That's like telling a rape victim that they have a "victim mentality".