This is "The Livelihood Chronicles", a group-blog at DK4 to help unemployed/under-employed/under-paid folks find work or other means of income during this unemployment crisis and keep their heads held high in the meantime. This is also meant to be a warm, safe, comfortable place for unemployed folks to vent and connect and hopefully get something that will help them. Long term, or maybe sooner than that considering how dire things have become, I hope we can organize some political action for unemployed folks. If you want to be a contributor or co-editor or co-admin, please send me a message.
This diary previously existed on DK3 right here. I've edited it a bit and added some of the suggestions from the comments the last time around.
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So while political activism around unemployment may be part of the plan, the immediate problem is that unemployed folks need a way to make a living now and until they find that they need to survive on little or no money. This diary will hopefully turn into a collection of practical advice tips for finding a job or other means of supporting oneself and getting through the current piece-of-crap unemployment situation. I'll start this out with my own small bits of things that have worked for me, but I would very much like this to become a "community quilt" with contributions from lots of people. I will update this diary with useful bits from the comments.
Attitude Shift!
I think the most important thing you can do that will make all the things below easier is to drop whatever pride you had in never needing help and accept that you are now one of the low-income/no-income crowd. That means mainstream society will ignore when they're not mocking you for your poverty, but please take note that you are actually now part of a huge group of people you never knew existed before who can help you survive. Give yourself some time to grieve over the old life. This is not fun, this is not fair, but as Clint Eastwood said in Unforgiven, "Fair's got nothing to do with it".
Then take a deep breath and start building a new life. Talk to more people than you usually do. Tell them you're looking for work. Look for programs or discounts for low-income folks on all your utilities. Check your food bank. Talk to your church.
A comment from Paul from Berkeley in the last incarnation of this diary had some very to-the-point advice along these lines:
If you qualify for unemployment, great, go get it. Everyone has paid into the system to make that available, so don't be too proud to use it. You earned it.
Same for food stamps. You'd be surprised how many people, even working people, qualify for food stamps and don't even apply. You can look it up online to find out what the eligibility standards are. I think if you have less than $2000 in the bank, and are low income or no income, you qualify. My advice is that if you are unemployed, but you have more than $2000 in the bank, take some of that money out and put it in a shoebox under your bed. And then apply for food stamps and don't tell them about the cash in the shoebox. They don't need to know. But you need the help, so go get it.
Surviving on savings/no income
You need to be able to survive on your savings or no income. A huge percentage of our population has been living on near subsistence income so there's a wealth of knowledge about how to do this and do better than just survive. The first thing to do, and I hope everyone has done this already but I'm always amazed at how many don't, is IMMEDIATELY cut your expenses to the bone. What I say below is for middle-class folks who've never had to do this before; lower-income folks will probably roll their eyes at all this, so you go ahead and do that, :) but do let me know if you've got any other advice to help folks maintain some dignity.
- Cut everything til you're down to what you absolutely need, which at this point boils down to water, food, shelter, clothing, warmth, transportation, and the cheapest entertainment you can find. You absolutely need entertainment so don't think you can just excise it; you'll end up spending money on it anyway and you may as well try to it in a controlled and predictable manner.
- Your new mantra is "Free or cheap". With every single thing you need, the first thing to do is try to get it for free, if that doesn't work you try to get it for cheap.
Every expense should get down as close to "free" as you can get.
- Use your local library if you have one, for free books and CDs and DVDs and newspapers, as well as for computer access.
- Contact your gas/electricity company for any sort of program or discount for low-income folks.
- Learn where your local Goodwill stores are and don't be afraid to go shopping in them.
- Walk, bike, and take advantage of any free or subsidized transportation.
- Grown your own food, in your own yard if you have one, or find a community garden where you can grow your own food, or (if it comes to it) squat on a vacant lot to grow your own food, or find someone you can arrange something with who has a little space that you can grow some food on.
- Don't buy anything retail if you can absolutely help it. There are enormous bargains to be found and more than a little self-satisfaction in turning your back on the companies that are screwing the American economy. Use craigslist and freecycle for everything you can.
The DK diarist "Troubadour" put up an excellent diary back in June 2010 - Ways to Save Money Now, loaded with practical tips on saving money and living on less income.
Taking care of your physical self
You need to pay more attention to your physical self. Your attitude is now in intensive care and taking care of your physical self will help keep the attitude healthy.
- Keep a regular sleep schedule. You don't want to get into the habit of staying up all night, as it's a terrible habit to break and IMHO things always look bleaker in the middle of the night than in the middle of the day.
- Keep a regular eating schedule.
- Get more exercise than you were getting before. Walk walk walk every day if you can.
- Get as much sunshine if you can.
- Laugh as much as you can. Laughter is like free medicine. Laugh at the absurdity of your situation in the "richest" country in the world. Laugh that it may be the Egyptian protesters that have finally sparked a sense of protest here in America. Find stuff to laugh at. Orient your TV viewing towards comedies.
WebMD has a page on "Tips for Reducing Stress". They boil down to:
* Keep a positive attitude.
* Accept that there are events that you cannot control.
* Be assertive instead of aggressive. "Assert" your feelings, opinions, or beliefs instead of becoming angry, defensive, or passive.
* Learn and practice relaxation techniques.
* Exercise regularly. Your body can fight stress better when it is fit.
* Eat healthy, well-balanced meals.
* Get enough rest and sleep. Your body needs time to recover from stressful events.
* Don't rely on alcohol or drugs to reduce stress.
* Seek out social support.
* Learn to manage your time more effectively.
Practical job search advice
In my experience you are more likely to get a job through a personal connection than by responding to job postings as a face in the crowd. So you need to do everything you can to increase the number of personal connections you have.
1) If you haven't joined LinkedIn already, do so; put up your personal experience and start connecting yourself to friends and former co-workers. The value of LinkedIn is that you can dramatically expand your network of personal connections through your friends of friends, and even friends-of-friends-of-friends. Studies have shown that you are actually more likely to get a job through a distant connection than a close one because they won't feel as bad if a job lead they pass on doesn't work out. If anyone needs help with joining LinkedIn or using it, post a comment and I'll help ya out.
2) Next, I would turn my Daily Kos sigline into a job-wanted ad - because you never know who's reading who can help you out, and it only takes one person to connect you with a job. Boil down what kind of work you want and where you want it into a sentence, put it in your sigline with a link to your LinkedIn profile or other online resume. If you don't know how to boil it down to a sentence, post a comment and I'll be happy to help.
3) Next, consider joining a local political group. The leftist political groups tend to attract pretty smart passionate folks and IMHO smart passionate folks who have the same interests you do are some of your best bets for finding a job through. Don't go into it thinking "I'm here to find a job" but if you're willing to put in the slightest bit of work with the group, you'll quickly find a place on the organizing or steering committee where you can show people something you're good at. Democracy for America (DFA) is an absolutely terrific group, especially for folks who have never joined a political group before. That's the only group I have direct experience with but others may have recommendations for more groups to get involved with.
4) Also, consider volunteering for something you're very much interested in. You'll meet some new people who also presumably have the same interest who may ultimately be able to connect you with a job. Plus it'll give you something regular to do and get you out of the house, and it'll give you something to put on your resume for this time period.
5) When you've finished going through all the open jobs and you've done all your personal networking, consider researching the companies or organizations you would like to work for that aren't necessarily posting jobs right now. Get to know their products, their competitors, their problems. Keep your eyes and ears open for anyone who may happen to work there and find out what you can. Write and keep on hand a tailored resume for each company you want to work for, and explain what you would bring to the table to help them with a specific problem that you think they might have as a result of your research. If one of those places does open a position up, you'll be ready and waiting.
6) Above all, keep talking to people about the job you want. Paul from Berkeley said it like so:
there are plenty of people out there who want to help you find your next job, but they can't help if they don't know you are looking. So tell people. The hell with the "stigma" of being unemployed. Plenty of people are unemployed, and it has nothing to do with whether they are talented, or smart, or good at their jobs. More and more employers right now understand that people are unemployed for reasons beyond their control -- corporate mismanagement, the economy, etc. Any employer that doesn't understand that is a stupid fucking employer that you don't want to work for anyway.
So tell people that you are looking for a new opportunity, and enlist their help. Don't assume that they know how to help, either. Be prepared to suggest some things they can do, such as introduce you to people in companies or industries that interest you.
Some other possibilities:
- Post a comment to this diary explaining what kind of work you're looking for and where. Or consider posting a job-wanted diary to Daily Kos and tell your story, and keep posting it every week with updates until you find work. Again, we have to keep making it clear to the community that we have a crisis on our hands. Imagine the statement that would make to the DK community if we saw a thousand stories every week of people who were looking for work, who WANT to work but cannot find a way to. This whole situation is so tragic that we have to bring that to a wider audience.
- Be open to finding other ways of making a living than what you were doing for. Somebody on DK estimated that the US may have as many as 40 million people who are no longer deemed necessary to the jobs economy. Some people here are making money of selling their handmade goods on Etsy and other sites.
- Connect with other folks looking for your work in your area. It helps to know other folks are going through the same problems and you might be able to pass information back and forth. We could conceivably set up multiple "child blogs" to this group-blog to help connect folks in various geographic areas at various levels.
- Consider starting your own business. In the previous incarnation of this diary, Miep pointed out that starting your own business frequently takes a boatload of capital that most people don't have, so we started kicking around some ideas around micro-financing, including using Kickstarter and Kiva to fund new Kossack businesses. We can pursue this some more if there's some interest. I just want to point out that a restaurant that just opened up very near me, HomeRoom in Temescal in North Oakland, opened with the use of Kickstarter funds, essentially a community barn-raising.
- If you are a veteran, make sure you know about everything you are eligible for, particularly medical care. There have been diaries written about this; search for 'VA'.
Some strongly against-the-grain personal advice for what it's worth:
If you're using the "What Color is Your Parachute?" book, get a refund or give it away. A book like that is for trust-fund babies or people who have a few years' living expenses saved and no obligations, or when decent-paying jobs are far more plentiful. IMHO it is not for the rest of us right now. A far more useful and practical book for me at least was "The Wizard of Work". It talked about boiling down what you want to a 30-second pitch speech, handing out personal calling cards, conducting organizational interviews to help build your network, and more. Very concise, very practical and very down-to-earth. There's probably more recent books with the same approach. But for me at least, getting away from the WCIYP approach was the key to finding satisfying work.
What else, Kossacks?
If y'all have any other pieces of practical advice for unemployed folks, please post a comment here and I'll keep adding stuff to the diary. If you've got some brain-storming on how we can use DK4 to help more people out, I want to hear it. And for all the unemployed folks who need to vent that they've done all these things already and none of them has done a damn bit of good, well, post that too. :) I have no illusions that this will help everyone; I think we're going to have to get politically organized and active around the livelihood issue to make an impact widely felt. But this could at least keep some people from hitting emotional bottom. For all the unemployed folks reading, never doubt that there are many people who care about you. Our Kossack safety net ain't all in place yet, but I have a vision of us building one, and we will get you through this.