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BushFungus Donating Member (77 posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jul-11-05 10:44 AM
Original message
Talk About Your Unemployment Situation HERE!!
I have seen several of these threads quickly go off the map, but I want to keep this issue in the forefront to put pressure on our President and Congress to let them know that the economy is NOT "strong and growing stronger," as President Bush always claims.

THE JOB SITUATION SUCKS THANKS TO FAILED ECONOMIC POLICIES AND THE 2004 WHITE HOUSE PROCLAMATION THAT OUTSOURCING IS SOMEHOW "GOOD FOR AMERICA." WHILE THEY REWARD COMPANIES THAT OUTSOURCE BY GIVING THEM TAX BREAKS, THE MIDDLE CLASS IS SLOWLY BEING WIPED OUT. LET'S SEND THEM THE MESSAGE THAT THE MIDDLE CLASS IS HURTING AND IS FED UP WITH THEIR LIES, DECEPTION, AND ANTI-AMERICAN POLICIES!


Please tell us about YOUR unemployment struggles and how your job search is going. And feel free to :kick: this sucker back up to the top. LET'S EXPOSE HOW POORLY THE ECONOMY IS REALLY FARING.

------------------------------

I have been laid off since 2001. I had a GREAT job which I LOVED as a tech writer at a telecom in Northern Virginia. It was the highlight of my career. Too bad I was only there one year.

The company had 3 rounds of layoffs. After the second, management PROMISED left and right that we wouldn't be laid off. When the announcement came, the Director brought us into his office and explained it all. He said he was sorry, blah blah, and that he swore he didn't know. I personally found that very hard to believe. How would upper management NOT know what is about to hit us?

Anyhow, my wife and I decided to move to Dallas because of the terribly high cost of living in the DC area. Well what do you know, we came here JUST WHEN the telecom industry crashed.

Dallas' telecom corridor, North Dallas/Richardson/Plano, was hot for telecom during the mid to late nineties. They were all here. Fujitsu, Nortel, Cingular, you name it. But now all I see, STILL, is empty buildings and empty parking lots. You can drive around parts of the area and it looks like a ghost town. These jobs either got trashed or outsourced to India.

Anyhow, the job search SUCKS. You can literally send out FIFTY resumes a month, and never hear from a one. You can network, respond to newspapers/Monster, and NOTHING. Why is that? It's because the job situation is SO BAD, that people are just applying to whatever. People from around the country are inundating employers with resumes, and the HR folks don't have time to respond to a thousand resumes per job posting.

SO WHERE IS OUR SUPPOSED "STRONG ECONOMY?" WHERE ARE THE JOBS?

About advanced degrees, this is scary. I have considered going back to school and getting an advanced degree in IT. But based on the responses here, it is obvious that it really wouldn't help anyhow, since 1) the job market sucks, and 2) All the "good jobs" are now located in Bangalore. Also, most of it is experience that they look for. On my resume, I highlighted my Telecommunications Analyst Certification. Thus far, it hasn't helped SQUAT. So I figure with this lousy job market, employers probably don't even care about advanced degrees, IF they get your resume to begin with.

If I were talking to a college student, I would tell them NOT to major in IT. It WAS hot, and now it's not. It is a strange thing in America to have an entire industry explode and then suddenly die off within the span of only ten years.

Incidentally, what got me questioning President Bush regarding his integrity was his constant repitition of the Orwellian catchphrase, "The economy is strong and getting stronger." I was so incensed with this lie, I refused to even CONSIDER voting for him in 2004. It's like he's slapping me in the face time and time again.
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Squatch Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jul-11-05 10:46 AM
Response to Original message
1. You should look into defense contracting...
especially in NorVA. I know a ton of tech writers up there.

Check out BAE, NG, Lockheed Martin, Boeing, GD, SAIC, Titan Corp, etc.
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Tandalayo_Scheisskopf Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jul-11-05 10:47 AM
Response to Original message
2. Why he says that:
Chimpington measures the strength of the economy not with jobs, but with the stock market.

Which tells you something about his depth of understanding on the subject.
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SlavesandBulldozers Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jul-11-05 04:41 PM
Response to Reply #2
7. and when he is concerned about jobs
he's comforted by the fact that some moms EVEN GET to work two jobs nowadays! He's creatin them thar jobs!
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Chicago1 Donating Member (560 posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jul-11-05 10:48 AM
Response to Original message
3. America's Work Stories ALSO has stories about job market problems
The stories we've ALSO received will make the hair on your arms stand up. The recruiters are HORRIBLE both in the corporate setting and in the agency setting. http://usaworkstories.blogspot.com.



America's Work Stories
http://usaworkstories.blogspot.com
usaworkstories@aol.com
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BushFungus Donating Member (77 posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jul-11-05 11:27 AM
Response to Original message
4. Kickin' It
:kick:
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Squatch Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jul-11-05 11:32 AM
Response to Reply #4
5. I noticed you said you've been unemployed since 2001
Edited on Mon Jul-11-05 11:33 AM by Squatch
Why? Is there something you're not telling us...criminal record, physical handicap, stay-at-home parent, choose not to work?

I was unemployed once, too. Quit a very lucrative job in the financial services industry and could not find work for a couple months. I ended up taking a job as an office furniture installer.

Yeah, it sucked. But at least I wasn't unemployed for 4 years and it was enough to put food on the table until I found more gainful employment commensurate with my experience.

The point is, there is work out there. A ton. Especially the IT-heavy area of NorVA.

On edit: oops...you're in dallas. But, the point remains the same: there is a ton of work out there, especially in metropolitan areas like DFW.
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applegrove Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jul-11-05 04:36 PM
Response to Original message
6. Canada's employment situation is the best it has been in 30 years.
We are winning the productivity battle with the USA because we have good public school education across the board and universal health care. Saves corporations money.
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JohnnyBoots Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jul-11-05 04:42 PM
Response to Reply #6
8. It sounds like a utopia if
they have good beer, cheap Rx and a national hockey night up there. (So glad the NHL is back in Oct).
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applegrove Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jul-11-05 04:56 PM
Response to Reply #8
9. Oh - it is not perfect. We have trouble with criminal freaks, poverty &
drugs. But much less poverty as our rich pay taxes.
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