Sorry, I need to vent a little bit.
A while back I posted a diary about my current situation. To make a long story short, all this time later not much has changed. I'm one of the fifteen million or so people who can't find work. I've been unemployed for two years and nothing seems to be getting better.
So I have to ask.... if the jobs aren't coming back, if there's something about us that makes companies not want to hire us, if we can't find work in the new economy....
What the hell are we supposed to do?
I'm on my last unemployment extension. Even if the current unemployment legislation passes, it won't help. That would just make the extension that I've already run out of (I'm currently on a last ditch state extension) apply to people who haven't been unemployed for quite as long as I have. All well and good, but what about it? I'm an able-bodied male in my late thirties. Welfare? There isn't any. I don't even qualify for food stamps. (Although when my unemployment finally does run out, I probably will. Unfortunately that won't pay my rent or bills, just food.)
What do those of us who can't get jobs or welfare do? It's not even a question of one or the other..... increasingly it's 'neither.' But our society expects that an able-bodied single person will work to support themselves. Society seems to have avoided thinking about what happens when we actually can't get work. The conservatives insist we should go into business for ourselves! That's the American way, right? Unfortunately I've got years of experience in a career that consists of working for other people. I've got nothing to sell. I don't have the connections needed to be a consultant.
I'm a good worker. A hard worker. A skilled worker. A worker that has spent years building a career in an area that's supposedly still in high demand. And frankly I'm goddamned good at what I do. But none of that helps.
'We want someone with more hardware experience.'
'We want someone with more software experience.'
(Never mind that my skills are a combination of hardware and software and that they require the identical skillset to support.)
'Well we're looking for someone with more experience with this specific hardware.'
(Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't realize you were so used to interviewing idiots that can't transfer skills from one device to another that performs the identical fucking function.)
'< crickets while weeks go by with no contact from an interviewer. >'
(Personal fucking favorite of mine.)
But even all of this doesn't matter.
What matters is that for millions of us we're faced with.... not even an impossible decision. Not even a decision between two unthinkable options, but with no options at all.
What exactly are we supposed to do here?