Posted on 09/16/2011 1:33:01 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
After 30 months of unemployment, 400 applications, and only three in-person interviews, I stood looking at my last unemployment benefit without a job in sight.
The temptation was to frame it, since it marks one of those transitions in life that merits being remembered. But I needed the money more than a memento, so I took my last unemployment check to the bank and deposited it -- $367 for some necessities. Food, rent, gas. My last unemployment check was $160 less than my usual weekly benefit, but still a welcome boost to my sagging finances. How I will miss those Tuesday trips to the mailbox and then the bank, one of the few regular events in my upended, irregular life!
I had always thought the unemployed were society's unfortunates, people unlike me lacking in education or training or experience or skills. Then in March of 2009, the Hearst Corporation quit publishing the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. I suddenly became a labor statistic, one of millions without work in the worst economic implosion since the Depression. I was more fortunate than many unemployed people since the Newspaper Guild negotiated a decent severance that yielded two weeks' pay for every year of employment. Since I had spent more than a quarter century underneath the P-I's landmark globe, my severance was a year's salary, although that lump sum check as I left the building forever had a tax bite from a Great White Shark.
Now my severance is exhausted, as is my unemployment, and I am scrambling every day for work. I had been a columnist, then the book critic for the P-I, enviable newspaper jobs even among my colleagues. Now I seek any writing or editing work that I discover,
(Excerpt) Read more at theatlantic.com ...
Well done! If someone with so little post-HS education can do technical writing... there is hope for this economy!
What kind of technical writing do you do?
“Visualize unemployed propagandists”
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
Skilled auto body technicians are always in demand.
At least that’s what Mr. TV tells me. Maybe you were made to weld.
Lower your standards, get out of the field you can’t find a job in and the door to a job will open quickly for you. When I dicided I needed a full time job to support my business and family (hopefully temporarly) I made 3 phone calls and was working the next day. I was hired by a company I never worked for before.
The only requirements of the job where a car (or van) and a drivers license with a clean record (last 3 years). My first check was 1400 dollars.
If I can do it, anyone can.
Today on craigs list there are 5-10 courier jobs posted. Some even provide the van for you!
IT.
I use a lot of Viso, Word, Excel, etc. I was downloading some after market stencils just today, actually.
None of this stuff is rocket science and it is easy to self teach, especially with samples of other people’s work and the internet. Then you bring samples of your work to interviews and that’s about it...
Well, I was a pretty good salesman back in the day and that skill actually helps quite a bit. I tell every young person looking for a job that the skills necessary to do the job are the price of admission. But if you want to actually get hired you have to leave them with the impression that you are a person they would enjoy working with. Otherwise, fuggetaboutit.
IOW, Attitude is everything.
The difference is you were willing to work. Mamy are not.
52K annually? That’s a heck of a nice salary. Good for your sister.
But if you want to actually get hired you have to leave them with the impression that you are a person they would enjoy working with.
Do the math. He sent out 3 applications a week.
Booo Hooo.
And for that he apparently got $527 / wk, normally.
Why do we bother working?
My uncle had an unemployed guy show up looking for job. He told my uncle that he would not work for him unless he was paid ‘X’ amount of dollars. My uncle quickly showed the door!
I could easily live $527 per week, even with my house mortgage to pay. Do these people on unemployment get free medical care and/or food stamps?
The number of applications struck me, too. He obviously only sent to newspapers/magazines. I knew college students about to graduate when the economy was flying who sent out double that amount of applications in their final semester alone.
Better yet....get a job as a truck loader with UPS or FedEx....pays a bit less but you will get fit.
And the grand prize.....Get a job just before Christmas with UPS as a "driver helper" then sign on for another 99 unemployment when laid off on December 26th.
So true.
Actually, if one can role play - get into the head of the interviewer - one can accomplish a lot. You can’t know everything about their needs, nor should you sound like you do. but the salt and pepper of humility and self confidence, with “meaningful” questions is huge.
And even though there may be some stuff I would really like, like showers for bike commuting, I’m sure as heck not gonna bring it up in the interview - unless the guy I’m interviewing with has a bike in his office and bike commutes. ;->
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