Millions can find only part-time or lower-paying jobs

[mike r]

Source: Los Angeles Times

Beyond the 15 million Americans who have no jobs at all, millions more are caught in part-time or limited jobs that don't pay them enough to maintain their standard of living — much less contribute to the strong consumer spending needed to power the nation out of the economic doldrums. Economists have a technical term for these people: underemployed. But there's nothing technical about it for David Linehan of Quincy, Mass., who lost his job as an analyst for an energy-trading firm during the recession, along with his $30,000 salary and benefits. The 43-year-old now tries to get by on less than one-third that amount as a driver for a rental car company. His new employer limits his work to less than 30 hours a week because any more would make him eligible for company-provided health insurance. The latest Labor Department report shows there are nearly 9 million people like Linehan who want full-time jobs but can't find them...

The lack of full-time work is both a hardship for individuals and their families and a substantial drag on the still-feeble recovery. With consumer spending accounting for 70% of the nation's total economic activity, having millions of underemployed workers means a loss of economic vitality — along with lower tax revenues and more budget problems for governments at every level. "It creates a huge macro effect on your ability to buy things and on the output potential for the country," said Andrew Sum, an economics professor at Northeastern University in Boston. Dan Stormberg, 36, knows the problem firsthand. The West Los Angeles illustrator strings together as many art projects as he can to make ends meet. When he came up short last year, he started working part time as a barista..."The security of having a paycheck and getting medical would be kind of nice," said Stormberg, who estimated that he's making less than a quarter of what he could earn if he worked full time. "There are so many candidates desperate to get jobs now. "They want you to be completely overqualified and be able to wear many hats, even if the job doesn't require you to wear those hats," he said...

The surge in underemployment that began during the recession cut almost evenly across all major industries and occupations and affected workers in all age groups, and hit especially hard older people — some of whom have reluctantly opted to file for early Social Security benefits. The number of involuntary part-timers — who on average worked just 23 hours a week in the second quarter — had been easing down since spring but rose again in August. The figure is double the pre-recession level and the highest since record-keeping began in 1955. The problem is even bigger than the official numbers suggest. Another group of underemployed is not tracked by the government but may be almost as large: workers shunted into full-time jobs that pay far less than their old jobs. These workers' new paychecks offer only a shadow of the middle-class lifestyles that their skills, education and experience once helped them secure.

Full time or part time, many of the underemployed are young adults with college degrees. Sum estimated that half of the college-educated workers 25 and younger who started work this year landed in jobs that didn't require bachelor's degrees — jobs such as waiting tables, bartending and retail sales. Only a few years ago, that figure was closer to 25%. Research suggests that underemployment is particularly menacing and long-lasting for new workers. They typically don't get the employer-supported training that can advance careers. And starting out at lower-level jobs and pay usually stunts earnings for years to come.... But serious as underemployment can be for the young, experts and government statistics indicate that older workers have been hit even harder. Among those 55 and older, the ranks of involuntary part-timers reached 1.3 million this spring, a 122% increase from three years earlier. By comparison, the number of part-timers ages 20 to 24 rose 90% over the same period, to 1.5 million...


Read more: http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-jobs-underemployed-20100907,0,6176613.story

[bushisanidiot]

1. AWOL Bush's recession will take at least a couple of more years to fix.

Actually, it will take longer with the know-nothing/do-nothing republican tea baggers constantly trying to set President Obama up to fail.

Here's hoping his $50B business plan for infrastructure improvement makes it through congress with at least a couple of votes from the "party of nope".

[Lost4words]

3. holly shit they are out in force today, hold your noses, hike your pants!

:puke:

[NickB79]

5. A couple more years? That's optimistic

Try the rest of the decade, IF we get everything right (and that's a big if after seeing the Repubs in action).

[bushisanidiot]

15. I agree, it is optimistic. Not only is President battling the "do nothing" republicons

but he is also battling the MSM which seems to be working overtime to bring him down.

[MineralMan]

2. Yup. We're in a recession. Bush's recession. It's going to

take some time to fix. That time will be shortened if we can hold our majorities or increase them. November is very, very important.

[Raster]

14. Yes we are in a recession and yes, it most certainly is Bush*'s recession.

And now it's up to President Obama AND US to fix it. The first thing that Team Obama can do is stop pandering to the corporatists and banksters. Their bloody hands are all over this recession. It's time to take a long, hard look at actions taken so far to lift us out of this financial morass and reinforce what is working and jettison that which is not.

It's time to help the homeowners stay in their homes. And this time, truly help the homeowners. Not the banksters, who are still limiting credit and hoarding cash. Those "toxic assets" are still on the books, they have not been dealt with, only band-aided for the time being.

President Obama's plan to spend $50 billion to upgrade and repair infrastructure is not enough. It should be TEN TIMES THAT AMOUNT, and that is just a start.

Another thing Team Obama can do is curtail military spending as much as possible. The Pentagon/MIC is bleeding this country dry--literally. And I don't mean limiting soldier's pay or Veteran's benefits. Far from it. We owe these men and women a tremendous debt, and shamefully, this country has not dealt fairly with them or their families.

And finally, President Obama: skip the bipartisan Kumbaya bullshit. Nice effort, but epic fail. The rethuglicans and their money masters don't give a shit about honoring any other agenda but their own money-grubbing agenda. They do NOT have the benefit of the Republic at heart. We are not republicans nor are we republican lite. We are Democrats. We are the party of FDR and JFK. We stand for the common man and woman. Learn it!

Oh, and it's time for your Chicago financial boys and politicos to go back to the Windy City. They had their chance. We want ours.

[speppin]

16. Nicely said.

[Raster]

19. Thank you! Welcome to DU!

[wordpix]

18. "their own money-grubbing agenda"---ain't it the truth about the r's & nice rant

[Raster]

20. Thank you. Far too often good people with good intentions see the rest of the world through their

...rose-colored glasses of good intention, wrongly assuming that everyone is basically a decent person at heart. Nothing could be further from the truth. There are entities--persons and organizations--that have no intention of sharing the wealth, the love or national power. They are sociopathic in nature and psychopathic in action. They see themselves as superior and without equal. They are truly wolves in sheep's clothing and should be treated as such. Two words: Dick Cheney*.

[Knight Hawk]

49. Actually No

They are NOT wolves in sheeps clothing .They are out and out wolves .They do not use any disguise.They are planing on eating your lunch and basically tell you that right to your face, and for some strange reason have a lot of backers.

[valerief]

21. In the ReversoWorld we now live in, we need a WAR ON WORK.

WAR ON DRUGS brings money to drug kingpins. WAR ON TERRORISM brings money to terrorists. Maybe a WAR ON WORK would bring money to workers.

[Raster]

27. No kidding. And to that I'd like to bring back the WAR ON POVERTY, the real LBJ War on Poverty.

Far, far too many people-elderly, people of color, young people, blue collar--are falling through the cracks. And unfortunately the safety nets to offer some protection get stretched further and further. And no longer are we just dealing with cracks, we are now dealing with chasms. The financial inequities in this country have only increased in their magnitude. This much change.

[Cobalt-60]

68. Yes! My sword is with you!

Let us burn the scourge of work from the face of the earth!}(

[HomerJay]

22. So true.

Thanks, great post.

[EmeraldCityGrl]

23. +1000

[Autumn]

36. Thank you

Obama has to fix it. And to do that he is going to have to quit playing with those bastards and realize giving them what they want is not solving the problem.

[Knight Hawk]

50. Too Late

IMHO he waited too late .Too many of his army has given up .He lost his MO Jo .As Napoleon said 50% of the army is morale.Our troops morale is very low ,our leader is weak and uninspiring .O ur best chance is to start at once looking for a REAL leader to run for POTUS in 2012.Obama is done.

[chervilant]

38. And

that includes Arne Duncan, who is spending much of his time blaming and shaming teachers, instead of exploring ways to bring our system of public education into the 21st century.

[Raster]

39. Unfortunately it appears that good, quality, ACCESSIBLE public education is being purposely...

...stamped out. Increasingly education is being used as a means of control and enforcement of caste and class instead of a vehicle for equal opportunity.

[chervilant]

43. hmm...

Here's a relevant post (mine) from Sept 4:

We are witnessing the Great Dismantling of Public Education. The Corporatists have a vested interest in this endeavor for at least two reasons, to whit:

***profitability drives myriad efforts by Corporatists to "privatize" public education, including efforts to define teachers' salaries as cost prohibitive, and efforts to define teachers' unions as hedonistic and obstructionist.

***too many workers competing for too few jobs means the vast majority of our children face the unenviable reality of a lifetime of servitude to the Corporatists, earning pathetic salaries for performing menial labor. Insuring that this 'vast majority' is uneducated or undereducated facilitates subjecting them to this stultifying future.

Since our species is now experiencing change exponentially, evidence of these two aspects of the dismantling of public education already abound in our disintegrating society.

I agree that we should support efforts to effect positive change in our species' evolution. However, with the appointment of Arne Duncan as Secretary of Education, Mr. Obama has demonstrated beyond a shadow of a doubt that his actions speak far louder than his words. "Education is a great equalizer," my rear appendage!

[PSzymeczek]

65. Arne Duncan

is too much in love with charter schools. I'd say, yank taxpayer money out of charter schools. If they want to speculate to make a profit, let them try to get private donations.

[SammyWinstonJack]

48. Instead he appoints a committee to trash SS and Medicare.

So there is no reason to believe that Obama will do any of what you listed, is there? :shrug:

[laughingliberal]

59. +1 nt

[Jkid]

52. Problem is that Obama actually does his job

The Tea Party will scream SOCIALISM! What can you do?

[xchrom]

4. Recommend

[blue97keet]

6. Nothing new, sounds like 1970 only worse.

[DeSwiss]

32. +1

[PSzymeczek]

64. 1970?

How about 1975-76?

[leveymg]

7. KNR

[Name removed]

8. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[ixion]

9. Mission Accomplished

and the class war continues, its progress unabated by the 'change'

[OhioChick]

10. K&R n/t

[marzipanni]

11. We invented labor-saving devices

but we kept going into labor.

[DeSwiss]

31. +1

[wisteria]

12. How depressing. And, not unlike Pres. Bush to do the most damage possible.

I am caught in the middle of this and it isn't a great feeling to know that I may have end my career and work years with a part time retail job just to pay my bills.

[Stumbler]

13. No shit, Sherlock

[McCamy Taylor]

17. And of course, teenagers can not find work at all, because companies

can now hire college graduates to collect tickets or sack groceries. In the old days, these "too highly qualified" folks would have been laughed at when they applied for part time work. Employers would hesitate to hire them, because they would know that that they would quit in a heart beat when a good job came along.

The fact that employers will now hire the over qualified means that they know that the jobs are not coming back anytime soon.

[HomerJay]

24. Yeah ,

now you almost need a PHD to flip burgers at McD. :banghead:

[Kevin1a]

66. Yep, that's basically me.

Teenagers and college students. And if your lucky enough to have a job, I am, the only people who are really making any money are the company higher ups. I'm 22, working at a movie theater picking up trash and cleaning puke and piss making just above minimum wage. This is the same job I had as a acne faced high-schooler over five years ago and I've been looking for something different for a good portion of those five years. I have a friend with a masters degree who couldn't find a job doing anything but delivering books between library branches. He got fed up with things, moved to Korea, and now teaches English to elementary school kids. (and loves it)

I feel like I have so much potential, so much insight, and so many skills that are not being utilized to make quality of life better for everyone.

Every time I get my bank account above zero, something happens to my car, or I have to pay tuition, or the bank charges me some kind of ridiculous fee.

There is one positive aspect to this all. More and more people are starting to see, what the poor and downtrodden in our country have been dealing with EVERY SINGLE DAY. Hopefully it will make us all more compassionate. As for the banksters and their goons: they're beyond hope.

Young people are citizens too, and our rights (and that includes high-schoolers) are just as important as those of everyone else.

[Skittles]

69. worthy of its own thread

I think about how I made it when I was your age (at age 22 my four year military enlistment was up) and I just KNOW I could not do the same these days.....things are much, MUCH tougher for the younger folk now. But Kevin1a, stay in the game - there's nothing wrong with you but a lot is wrong with what is happening today. We just have to keep fighting.

(P.S. as a HUGE movie buff I do appreciate the job you do :))

[Kevin1a]

79. Thank you for the kind words.

My father took the same route as you, though he stayed in for quite a while. My personality would not do very well in the military, I just don't work well when I'm confined by rules, timetables and things like that. I'm much more the creative type. If I did, the jobs that are available wouldn't seem quite so bad.

The reason I replied was because I do see a lot of my peers joining the military, not out of a desire to protect the country, or do their patriotic duty, but simply because they have to get money, and they're just not making it any other way. I think that, in itself, is a topic worthy of a thread, and I'm sure there have been threads on it before.

[proteus_lives]

72. Spooky.

I work at a movie theater too.

I work other freelance and part-time jobs but I'm always living by the monthly bills.

[alp227]

67. Neither can this college student

I did a job interview last week to be an usher at the local arena. Many older adults there too. This week I should know whether or not I'll be hired. Seems that every job I get has competition from older folks who'll end up underemployed anyways.

[Blue_Tires]

77. where i live, teens can't find work because companies actually INSOURCE

kids from eastern europe (Russia/Poland/Czech Republic, etc.) to work the hotels, resorts, parking lots, shops and food joints...

The businesses all love it -- Been bellowing for years at how "lazy" and "unwilling" our local kids are to work (i.e. unwilling to scub a floor full of toilets for $7.50/hr under the fear of having their visa yanked)

[Quantess]

25. How is this news?

Oh well, it's such an important issue, if obvious.

[AllyCat]

26. With no benefits. Those millions really need to be more responsible

so they can pay for their own private insurance and whatnot.

[CatholicEdHead]

28. What I see are good paying jobs, but they are too sort term

If you do find a liveable wage, sometimes in your degree of study, it usually only lasts a few weeks to a few months, a onetime project situation. After the short term demand drops, out you go. So you see more contract work opportunities mixed in.

[j420norcal]

60. I returned to the workforce as a 1099 employee

Only now I'm paid 20% less than what I was making in 2007-2008 as a regular W2 payroll worker, plus I get to pay 15% more income tax and guess what? No health coverage, vacation, sick/holiday pay... Nada. I cannot train in my favorite sport/hobby (MMA) for fear of injury and the medical costs included.

Oh yeah, it's not even full time.

I still can't pay my bills, but at least I get to live the illusion that life has gotten better <insert the "I'm happy to just finally be working again" part here>.

[eilen]

29. These corporations and employers who misuse their workers

will find themselves wanting as a new normal is reached. People are learning very well how to live without. The drive to accumulate more cheap overseas made crap will die. People adapt. When the pendulum shifts consumer demand will continue to be depressed compared to 1990-2008 levels. The stock market is a house of cards, pure illusion. As the number of jobs decrease, more owner operator business will come up-- underground or traditional and their money will be going to basics as incomes will be diminished and they will invest in what they care about (annual park passes, gardens, bus passes vs cars, theatre, schools)-- however, as people will adapt, they may find it better than before and discover that they don't need what popular media mantra states is necessary or important. Personally, I hope one of the first things people decide give up is the TV cable.

Also, as a result of discovering they don't need as much, a majority group will drive down housing/rental costs. We will quit on abusive employers.

Maybe we will find our principle, our dignity and demand labor councils that have political clout.

[Iowa]

45. Nope - not even close...

"...as a result of discovering they don't need as much, a majority group will drive down housing/rental costs. We will quit on abusive employers."

It is the basic necessities of of life that consume most of our income - by far. Wages are ALREADY failing to keep pace with the costs of basic necessities; that gap is growing and it will continue to grow in this country. Without a strong manufacturing base we aren't likely to see any change, nor will a surge in service-related micro-businesses change that dynamic. We'll likely see a dramatic decline in standards of living. People won't "adapt" en-mass - they'll just go without and that will mean significant suffering and misery. You can't just "adapt" to the absence of necessities. Furthermore, these small businesses you speak of have a history of being just as abusive as the large ones - even more-so. I wouldn't look to micro-businesses as a panacea for employees.

"The stock market is a house of cards, pure illusion."

Nope. While standards of living will decrease in the U.S., they will rise in other parts of the world. Meanwhile, corps will continue to seek out cheap labor, and the stock market will continue to churn out profits. Those in this country who rely on their labor to provide for their needs, especially unskilled labor, will see their standard of living decline. Those who manage to eke out an existence while simultaneously accumulating enough assets to (eventually) cut the cord will thrive. You can't just look at the U.S. alone. We're in the midst of a world-wide financial restructuring. The investing class will come out on top, as they usually do. However, the investors who thrive won't be the ones who have no clue what they're doing. And they won't be the ones who timidly invest in tiny dribs and drabs. The successful ones will take considerable time to learn the ropes, and they'll invest boldly, and for the long-term. Short-term investors will continue to get hammered, as they always have.

[DeSwiss]

30. Future Shock Is Here

In 1965, in an article in Horizon, I coined the term "future shock" to describe the shattering stress and disorientation that we induce in individuals by subjecting them to too much change in too short a time. Fascinated by this concept, I spent the next five years visiting scores of universities, research centers, laboratories, and government agencies, reading countless articles and scientific papers and interviewing literally hundreds of experts on different aspects of change, coping behavior, and the future. Nobel prizewinners, hippies, psychiatrists, physicians, businessmen, professional futurists, philosophers, and educators gave voice to their concern over change, their anxieties about adaptation, their fears about the future. I came away from this experience with two disturbing convictions.

First, it became clear that future shock is no longer a distantly potential danger, but a real sickness from which increasingly large numbers already suffer. This psycho-biological condition can be described in medical and psychiatric terms. It is the disease of change.

Second, I gradually came to be appalled by how little is actually known about adaptivity, either by those who call for and create vast changes in our society, or by those who supposedly prepare us to cope with those changes. Earnest intellectuals talk bravely about "educating for change" or "preparing people for the future." But we know virtually nothing about how to do it. In the most rapidly changing environment to which man has ever been exposed, we remain pitifully ignorant of how the human animal copes.

Our psychologists and politicians alike are puzzled by the seemingly irrational resistance to change exhibited by certain individuals and groups. The corporation head who wants to reorganize a department, the educator who wants to introduce a new teaching method, the mayor who wants to achieve peaceful integration of the races in his city—all, at one time or another, face this blind resistance. Yet we know little about its sources. By the same token, why do some men hunger, even rage for change, doing all in their power to create it, while others flee from it? I not only found no ready answers to such questions, but discovered that we lack even an adequate theory of adaptation, without which it is extremely unlikely that we will ever find the answers. ~ Alvin Toffler, Future Shock (1970)

So aside from these egregious efforts of the ruling classes to get at that last bit of marrow in our bones, this system of debt = riches is "once again" collapsing in on itself. In spite of all the efforts to jigger the system for another sputtering run at free enterprise which is never free. Communism, socialism and even the last man standing: capitalism -- all depend upon some type of convoluted monetary system to redistribute wealth, and yet none has been able to do so adequately. So we keep printing more fiat certificates in the hopes that if we continue long enough someone among our progeny will be smarter than we are. Smart enough to figure a way out of this paper bag we've wandered into.

Although intuitively we recognize that life means change, indeed a failure to change means atrophy and death. Yet we resist it. Even though we can now out-produce our ability to consume, still many go hungry, ill-clothed and destitute. Not enough debt to go around. Of all the great things that we think we've accomplished, the answers to life's essential problems do not lie within any type of economic formula. Nor any legislation, or a change agent bringing hope to achieve the solutions we aspire toward. Even when the answer stares in the face, we can't seem to translate the thought into action. Yet the answer is simple, if insurmountable. Apparently treating each other as we wish to be treated is beyond human capability. It can't just be a wonderful sounding pie-in-the-sky phrase, or some unattainable philosophical tenet. We have to make it real. But we're afraid of that idea more than anything else.

- So yeah, we're smart. But apparently not that smart. We have the answer in our hands and don't know what to do with it.....

K&R

[chervilant]

41. OMG!!!

I soooooo needed to be reminded of Alvin Toffler at this point in my effort to become a certified teacher! Thank you so much. (Quid pro quo: Marilyn French's "Beyond Power.")

[DeSwiss]

55. Ah yes. Marilyn French.....

...of "The Women's Room" fame. I'll put this one on my bucket list.

- Thanks!


And since turn about is fair play -- Enjoy!

[creon]

33. That is sad.

But, the governemt is not going much about it. The economic experts who have good ideas about how to get the economy fixed are out of the mainstream and ignored. Both parties ignore good advice.
People will have take of themselves. Unfortunately, that is the case.

[obxhead]

34. We need a real jobs program. We need a leader who is willing to

fight for it as well.

[Raster]

35. We need another FDR. And that leader has not yet risen to take his or her place.

We need a leader with courage and vision, not just great oratory skills. We need a leader able to gauge the successes and failures and continue the former and excise the latter.

[Iowa]

47. Exactly! Well said.

[obxhead]

54. Agree 100%.

Your post earlier in the thread was spot on as well.

:hi:

[Raster]

61. Thank you!

[w8liftinglady]

37. not everyone is suffering...the ceo paywatch

http://www.aflcio.org/corporatewatch/paywatch/

[Raster]

40. Of coure not. The upper 2% is doing quite well... they should be. They own most of the politicians

...that write the favorable tax laws.

[LibDemAlways]

42. After six months of looking for work, my husband found a job in

his field with more responsibility than he had previously - at a 40% cut in pay. Employers are taking mean advantage of the lousy job market by offering desperate job seekers really shitful wages, way below what they are worth or deserve. It sucks.

[chervilant]

44. Yet another way

they bend us over to give it to us up the a**!

[Glidescube2]

73. It's a buyers market right now

They are just getting away with shit like that because they know they won't get reported.

What do you expect from bloodless greedy vampires

[chervilant]

46. Well, now

I have been unemployed or 'underemployed' for the past three years as I struggle to transition out of mortgage lending and into teaching. (I refused to sell subprimes--can you guess how my manager reacted?)

As a 54YO woman, I can assure you being 'underemployed' is like having someone wave an ice cream cone in front of your ravenous face--several inches away from your mouth--as you struggle to escape the heavy ropes they've used to keep you immobile. You can smell the ice cream, you can see it dripping into oblivion as it melts in the summer heat, but you will never get a taste of that cone.

Teh Basterds!!!

[colsohlibgal]

51. Bingo!

This is rarely taken into account by wing nuts or Obama apologists. As a matter of fact, liberal talkers don't go there often either.

All jobs are not equal and so a lot of folks used to full time well paying positions are making $6 and hour for 20 hours or something like that at Burger King. That isn't going to pay the mortgage let alone anything else. Millions now have to choose between food/shelter/medicine/health care and that's a travesty when the gilded set is lighting cigars with 100 dollar bills.

Of course this particular fact not making news cycles is hardly an isolated case. Billions of dollars are missing and almost certainly, to some extent, embezzled in Iraq (checking Cheney's bank account might be a good place to start) - and that story died out quickly. There are tons of things about the official 9/11 narrative that don't really add up at all, but in the 9 years since all we have gotten so far was a watered down puff job of an investigation, and that only came about because of public pressure from the "Jersey Girls" and others.

America 2010, one completely messed up country now run by soulless corporations who don't want to pass out any more crumbs to the masses than they have to.

[Jkid]

53. This is just like the Lost Generation in Japan

College graduates will find out that the only jobs they'll find are part time ones, unless they know some one. They won't be able to start families, or own a home. They will be stuck in the part-time, shit job for years...

[judesedit]

56. Obama 2 years 3 million jobs, Bush 8 years 3 million jobs. Reagan recession 3 years

Obama's had the worst economic conditions to deal with since the Great Depression. 8 years of destruction to this country cannot be fixed in 20 months. We are moving forward. Let's continue that track. Keep the republicans OUT or else this country regresses 100 years and the middle class is extinct. Want to experience true hell??? Vote a republican into office. Want big government??? Vote a republican into office. Want to be told who to love, who to worship, what you can and can't do with your own body, when to take your last breath, what bogus propaganda you'll learn for an education? Vote for a republican. Want to watch your family and friends die from homelessness, starvation, sickness, mental illness, depression? Vote for republicans and see how fast they can destroy us.

[ut oh]

57. Coming off of 2 yrs disability....

I figure I'm going to be in the same boat... My wife and I are trying to figure out what's the absolute minimum I can earn without losing the house... But I fully expect my salary to be cut in half (based on what I'm hearing from others in my industry), if I'm even able to find work. How is that right?

[Glidescube2]

58. Another scourge of real full employment is the temp agencies

This blood sucking leech of industries hires young people seeking work to earn enough to pay a few bills, but the exploitation they endure because of the fact that there are no laws that protect them as much as regular employees churns my stomach.

Companies that use these services do so because they can circumnavigate unions and a good chunk of responsibilities a business is normally accountable for such as workers comp.

We need strong regulation of this modern day labor blight.

[soleiri]

62. I'm one of them

I have a college degree and I just got my teaching credentials this summer. Because I'm new and competing with teachers with years of experience for few teaching jobs I've only had one job interview.

I have an interview tomorrow for a job at a department store. It's not even sales. It may even be an on-call position.
woohoo. But I'll take it, if they offer.

[junior college]

63. I don't think we are in a recession

This is the new America. This is how it is and how it's going to be.

[raccoon]

76. I fear you are right. So many good jobs have gone overseas or just disappeared

over the last few decades.

More and more jobs are part-time, no benes.

[defendandprotect]

70. That's the GOP plan for a "third world America" ... isn't it?

I like to see LABOR/UNIONS/WOMEN help turn this into a 4 day week -- 5 hour day!!!

Everyone would have a chance to work -- and we have to demand a living wage!!

[proteus_lives]

71. I know that situation all too well.

[Hubert Flottz]

74. And that my friends is the union busting globalist plan in action...

When the wages are equal here to the wages in the Far East, the jobs will return. It's all about putting the middle class back into the state of poverty they were in 150 years ago. To a time without regulations, benefits, or any say so at all about your working conditions. The super wealthy have fought organized labor from the day it was created. The fight goes on to this day and it looks like the working man and woman are finally going to lose, if the GOP and the Blue Dogs have their way.

[orbitalman]

75. The ONLY way to solve ALL this...

will be to INCREASE the number of democrats in the senate and maybe, the house.

[rocktivity]

78. Candidate for this year's "You Call This NEWS?" award

This is why you should always automatically double the "official" unemployment rate.

:headbang:
rocktivity