Living Without Work: The Long-Term Unemployed

[Dulcinea]

-snip-

Sustained high rates of unemployment could result in an unemployed underclass disconnected from the workforce, economist Kevin Hassett says. He tells NPR's Audie Cornish that it may be time to rethink the federal unemployment insurance program altogether.

-snip-

A lengthy stint without a job doesn't just take an economic toll, says economics professor Arthur Goldsmith. It has real physical and psychological costs. "Work organizes a person's day," Goldsmith tells NPR's Cornish. "It connects you with other people. It places you in part of something that's bigger than just you."

Workers who have lost their jobs may miss the structure of employment and feel a loss of agency, says Goldsmith, who teaches at Washington and Lee University in Virginia. For some people, it can result in anxiety and depression, as well as self-destructive behaviors such as drug and alcohol abuse, and even violent outbursts.

Goldsmith says that after a long period of unemployment, the jobless may experience drastic psychological changes, similar to going through stages of grief.

http://www.npr.org/2010/12/05/131813014/living-without-work-the-long-term-unemployed

And no one seems to care.

[Anakin Skywalker]

1. Of course no one cares! Americans are too busy shopping for xmas!

"The economy is strong", the Wall Street fuckers are saying.

[Cirque du So-What]

2. I'm sure there are some who just don't care about the plight of the long-term unemployed

but there are doubtless many others who are too concerned with their own precarious situations to get involved with helping those less fortunate than themselves. I'm thinking about people who may be holding down two - perhaps three or more - low-paying, part-time jobs in a futile attempt to make ends meet.

[NNN0LHI]

3. This is all true. I have experienced long term unemployment

And I will be the first to admit that I just wasn't worth a fuck afterwards. My attitude and outlook on life had completely changed after being laid off just short of two years.

I feel really sorry for those going through this now.

Don

[SoCalDem]

5. Our middle son is one of them.

Last week he got a call , out of the blue, and was really jazzed, but no job offer came from it:(

Yesterday was his 33rd birthday & he was not "happily" celebrating it..

What sad, is that he has no "extra" money to go from state to state, looking for work, and will probably be back to waiting tables soon.. His real job ...crane operator at a steel fabrication plant"... is not "happening" these days in Seattle..

[NNN0LHI]

6. I sure wish him well SoCalDem. I really do

I was about the same age as your son during my almost two year stint of unemployment. Reagan was president at the time. I was a 39 weeker. That is all the unemployment we were eligible for back then.

Man did I work some shitty jobs back then. Had too. Two little kids at home. I was working jobs that no one would take today. I washed semi-trailers for a while with an acid sprayer. Think I spent more money replacing my glasses that had become ruined from the acid than I made? My eyes are still screwed up from that too. I can remember burning them a few times pretty bad. Been squinting ever since. I think that has something to do with a lot of my edits here. Looks good when I post it but after my eyes clear up a bit I can see the mistakes.

When I finally got called back to Ford all I could think about was retiring so I never had that happen to me again. Current generation doesn't have the 30 and out retirement option that I had available to me and took. So they are going to be in really bad shape. They are going to be looking at this happening over and over to them until they die. Sounds like a bad movie.

I sure hope your son does OK. He may be stronger than I was? He may have to be?

Don

[SoCalDem]

7. Oddly , the ONE thing he has going for him is his "lack of a life"

no wife
no kids
no house payments
no car payments
no bills

He's damned near "off the grid":(

He shares a cheap apartment with 2 other guys
and his girlfriend ( a teacher who got laid off) does the same. (she has 2 roommates)

I am actually trying to convince them to be bold & load up a U-Haul & head out ...

They are close to Canada, and both have marketable skills and are not "too old"..

[Hannah Bell]

4. "an unemployed underclass disconnected from the workforce" already exists, and has

existed for ages.

present events will *expand* it, not bring it into being.

[Donnachaidh]

9. [phone] n/t

[leftstreet]

12. +1

[xchrom]

8. recommend

[lapislzi]

10. I care.

I have been helping out a long-term unemployed family for a few months now. Their situation is a combination of bad luck, bad times, and bad judgment (theirs; yes, they are partly to blame for their situation; punching a co-worker is a good way to get both fired and black-balled in a discretionary employment market).

I see the shame in their eyes when they drop by to do their laundry. They won't take my cash; I have to secretly stuff it in their coat pockets. They weep with gratitude when I hand them the big bowl of leftover pasta.

And yes, I get the whole part about fixing my own oxygen mask first. But it breaks my heart all the same.

[Dulcinea]

11. kick for the jobless. eom

[Celtic Raven]

13. K&R nt