Disposable People: The Unemployed Need Not Apply

[paft.livejournal.com]

From Clickorlando.com 6/1/10:
Job hunters are facing a new hurdle: businesses asking recruitment companies to keep unemployed people out of their job pools.

Video here.

Yes, you read that right. Some businesses are now placing job ads that exclude all those icky unemployed people. A trend I first mentioned back in July of last year is continuing and, according to this story, growing.

So, many of the unemployed face, not only the cutting off of their unemployment benefits, not only potential employers holding bad credit ratings, (often a byproduct of not having a job) against them, they now are increasingly being barred by potential employers from applying for job openings -- because they are unemployed.

Apparently in today’s society, more and more, once you’re out, you’re out.

Think of the weapon this hands employers. The saying, so beloved of free market types, “If you don’t like the job, quit and find another one,” is becoming not just a platitude, but a mocking sneer. Quitting is no longer an option, being fired, or laid off, no longer a relatively minor blip in someone’s working life.

If this trend continues, unemployment itself could become a catastrophe that knocks someone permanently out of full time work.

Comments

[paft.livejournal.com]

bs: all this time I thought that was only used so people could hide their true (racist) intentions.

Example?

bs: I like how it's "question dodging" when it's something you disagree with, but it's "nuance" when you do it.

Example?

bs: So let me just ask the question: are a person's education level and income level generally related to each other so that those with greater levels of education tend to have greater levels of income: Y/N?

Yes in some fields, No in others. I know many writers, filmmakers, performers, teachers, artists, and activists who have advanced degrees, but lower incomes and more modest lifestyles with people who have undergraduate degrees. Hell, I have a masters -- but my MFA in writing does not put me on the same income level of an MBA, or even someone who has a bachelors in, say, computer science.

bs: Semantics ARE fun!

I don't consider language a word game.

bs: you say you do not equate education with income and then later state that good education requires income?

Well, acquiring a good education often requires money (or more often, parents with money.) But actually having an advanced degree does not guarantee an "advanced" income once you've graduated and hit the working world. The fact that someone twenty years ago acquired a PhD does not mean they are well off today, or pulling in a high salary.

bs: Should we maybe use the word "correlate" instead?

"Correlate" would certainly be a better word to use than "equate," but even then, it would depend on what kind of graduate degree a person had.

bs: Is it just that you were using such an extreme level of nuance that I couldn't understand it?

I think it more likely that you are feigning obtuseness in order to avoid conceding a point.

bs: Was it that you said two exactly opposite things

No.

bs: If you have "no idea" why people tend to use thin paper

I didn't say I had "no idea" why people tend to use thin paper. Your question was not "why do people use thin paper?" Your question was "do you really think that the majority of people use thin paper because they lack $7, or do you think that the majority of people use cheap paper because they don't think the expensive stuff is worth it."

My answer is, I have no idea whether the majority of people use thin paper because they lack $7, or whether the majority use cheap paper for some other reason. I have no idea how, statistically, that would break down.

bs: regardless of what you think, it's easily demonstrable that two things can both be classified as errors in judgment even though they're not the exact same kind of act.

Sure, they can both be errors in judgement. The question is whether they are comparable errors in judgement.