eltanin

Take This Jobless Recovery and Shove It
By Genevieve Roja, AlterNet
August 11, 2003

In the larger scheme of President Bush's agenda, it's people like me
who don't really matter. And why would I? I'm no CEO of a big monied
corporation. I'm neither a fundraiser nor a politico.


It's worse * I'm unemployed.


While the President is horseback-riding around his Crawford, Texas
ranch during his month-long hiatus, my fellow unemployeds and I try to
land the job of today, rather than the job of our dreams. That's what
happens when you're out of work * you take the measly scraps and wait
for the steak dinner.


Some of us go back to school in the hopes that the economy will recover
by the time someone hands us a diploma. Or we move in with our parents,
sell our cars and apply for jobs netting half what we used to make.
There is no real feeling of optimism * just desperation. Our anxiety
makes others around us crazy. We want jobs not just for the money, but
to join the others out there who are contributing something to the
world, whether it's shoveling dirt or pushing paper. Take away
someone's job and you take away a sliver of that person's self-worth.
Sometimes, working, whether we like our jobs or not, validates our
sense of presence, of being a valued member of society.


It's too bad television news can't broadcast the life of the jobless
like they do soldiers duking it out in lawless Iraq. Joblessness is
rarely ***y or scary. What would the cameras capture if they could? How
about roads and highways bogged down by traffic, regardless of the time
of day? Try going to Whole Foods at two in the afternoon. Nightmare.
Bodies abound, jostling for sale-priced baskets of raspberries and
freshly cut samples of nectarines.


Ditto the scene at drycleaners, restaurants, pharmacies, coffee shops
and department stores. I can't go to the library anymore to job-hunt
online because there are too many people camped out at the computer
stations. They're like the ghosts of employed days past who refuse to
leave their haunting posts. There's the white-bearded hippie professor
type with his stacks of Chicano literature by his side. Or the polo
shirt-clad man with his weather-beaten briefcase sitting atop the table
of his workstation. He looks quietly displaced pounding away at the
keyboard; it's as if the library has become his new cubicle.


Since Bush took his cubicle, about 3.4 million Americans have lost
their jobs. Last month, 470,000 Americans became discouraged and
stopped looking for work. We have a 6.2 unemployment rate and the
highest level of unemployment in nine years. And how does Bush respond?
He signed a tax cut bill he claimed would create a million more new
jobs but in actuality, did not. He recently sent three Cabinet members
by bus to Wisconsin and Minnesota who reported "a positive feeling in
America about our economy."


Well, what about the sentiment of the other 48 states? As a
Californian, I can tell you a lot about the daily struggle of an
unemployed. It is a constant period of personal re-evaulation and daily
affirmation. It's learning to f****ve myself, telling myself it wasn't
my fault I was let go, that I'm good enough and smart enough, and by
golly, someone will hire me someday. It's difficult hanging onto hope
when you've been out of work for almost a year. Unemployment means
readjusting to job hunting too, maybe lowering your standards in the
process. I now click on part-time job postings and submit my name for
marketing studies that pay $20 for my cooperation. I explore volunteer
opportunities because that's always good for the soul and there's
virtually no rejection * everyone loves an employee who doesn't have to
be paid.


But it's still not a job. Nothing can replace that feeling of making a
important contribution toward the greater good. Also irreplaceable is
the feeling of waking up in the morning not in a state of panic, but in
a state of employed serenity.


There is much to be done about this Bush-termed "jobless recovery." It
may start with a bus ride survey, but it certainly doesn't end there.
Sure, the rest of America wants to have positive feelings about the
economy. But first of all they want to believe that the creation of
jobs is high on the agenda, not just an empty promise on the eve of a
presidential respite. Our leaders need to work hard to find real
solutions the way Americans work to find jobs and retain those jobs *
with integrity, intensity and with stubborn determination.


Genevieve Roja is a freelance writer living in San Francisco.

bucky kaufman

"Jobless Recovery" - A Republican term meaning that they have successfully
shielded the wealthy from having to pay their fair share.

bill bonde

The wealthy already pay more taxes than anyone else.

gus

Well, DUH!

harold

Actually, all recoveries are jobless for the first few months or
quarter. This one has been slower than usual, but not outside normal
range. WIth the tax cuts, the recovery should pick up steam before
spring. Too bad about the delays caused by not implementing the tax
cuts until this summer, though.

That makes no sense. You do not get a recovery by taxing people. I
would suggest a good economics text, if you would like it.

Regards, Harold (Capitalist Pig)
----------
"Men and Women Were Created Equal . . . And Smith & Wesson Makes
Damn Sure It Stays That Way."
-----Radical feminist Nikki Craft

bill bonde

Companies try to get by with the workers that they have, for example by
using overtime. This is logical. I've wondered whether giving the Fed,
with reasonable restrictions, control of the overtime rules might not
allow it assist in getting more jobs available earlier in a recovery and
allow them to turn the jobflation heat down later.

bucky kaufman

From whom much is given, much is asked.

bucky kaufman

Well cutting taxes for the rich sure didn't work.

bill bonde

Overtime rules are not changed to manage the economy, you kook.

bucky kaufman

Nobody said they were.