[Carlhole]

The Atlantic

The Great Recession may be over, but this era of high joblessness is probably just beginning. Before it ends, it will likely change the life course and character of a generation of young adults. It will leave an indelible imprint on many blue-collar men. It could cripple marriage as an institution in many communities. It may already be plunging many inner cities into a despair not seen for decades. Ultimately, it is likely to warp our politics, our culture, and the character of our society for years to come.

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '�')��We haven’t seen anything like this before: a really deep recession combined with a really extended period, maybe as much as eight years, all told, of highly elevated unemployment,” Shierholz told me. “We’re about to see a big national experiment on stress.”

[Armageddon]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'T')he Great Recession may be over

[heroineworshipper]

Better get good at playing Farmville.

[Rod_Cloutier]

I lost my job due to a work injury in Nov. 2008. After months of physiotherapy, I have had literaly 20 job interviews with no luck in finding replacement employment. After exhausing my credit cards, line of credit ect, and after missing 6 months of mortgage payments to the bank on the house, I finally sold the house before it went to foreclosure. I took the money from the house and paid off all my debts.

So now I am debt free, but in a rental situation again. Still not having employment I had to go onto the public welfare. This has helped, but I forsee a future where all kinds of entitlement programs and social safety nets are quickly unravelled. It will be nice while it lasts or until I can find employment.

I went to a job interview last week where I went into a trucking company for a 'entry level position'. It was in a rundown building underneath a run down 100 year old Bridge. When I arrived they first had me wait at reception for 15 minutes (standing without a chair), then the guy came out of his office telling me he had sent me an e-mail saying he cancelled the interview- but he guessed I didn't check my e-mail before I came. I then had the worst 6 minute job interview in my life. The guy was wearing heavy cologne, had a gold chain with a bronze medallion around his neck and looked like a mafia guy off the 'Soprano's'. His personality was the epitome of this. He didn't like me and I certainly didn't like him, I couldn't get out of his office fast enough. I was so upset when I got home I had to take a strong drink to dull down the humiliation and despair,

Its hard to believe in any kind of future when 'mafia' style employers are the only ones doing any hiring.

I saw Michael Ruppert's collapse movie yesterday. He is of the opinion that the only thing worth hoarding and stocking up on is seeds. Seeds can lie dormant for years, and unlike hoarded food, people are less likely to shoot you to get your stockpile. Seeds could be the hallmark barting commodity of the future. What little money I have surplus, I am buying up bulk seeds as a hedge against economic and social collapse.

Jobless recovery hides the reality that the new jobs that are being created are not the middle class stable jobs that will enhance social stability for society at large in the future. I think the existing situation, in the recovery after a financial collapse, is a forewarning of far, far, worse things to come!

[SeaGypsy]

Very sorry to hear that Repent. Might I make a suggestion? I was in a similar situation years ago and it worked for me. Buy a motorhome. Or build one. Even a little van will do if that's all you can afford. Then get moving, go where the work is. Usually in any recession/ depression there are still seasonal high demand areas. I know in the USA it is often difficult to compete with illegal workers for farm jobs, this is unfortunate, but I wouldn't let it stop me. Often the big farms need cheap labour for harvest work, but will pay a little more to the tractor drivers and overseers. A relative of mine over there just bought himself a small snow plough and has built up in the last 2 winters to be quite successfull. I don't know where you are in the States, but I certainly wouldn't be staying in a city waiting for the axe to fall. Sometimes it is necessary to sacrifice in order to get. Having to sacrifice home and familiarity for the sake of being able to see at least some light at the end of the tunnel is the choice I would make. Another advantage with this idea is that you can get out and check out some of the 'transition towns' and alternative communities; which may end up being much better places to be than any city.

[Rod_Cloutier]

Seagypsy: Sorry if I was venting a little bit. I live in a transportation city. 7 National trucking companies have their head offices here, as well as rail and intermodal companies. I've worked my whole life in transportation and I don't know how to do anything else, sooner or later something will come up here.

I also have 2 mentally challenced kids at home, so I can't just get up and move. I have to worry about their educations, and 'special needs' provisions before I can think of myself.

My point however was that joblessness, removes the dignity and integrity of hard work, and that is something that is hard to live with. In the future, as joblessness spreads expect of a lot of people sinking into despair from the loss of purpose.

Think also of all those workaholics who are working 15 hour days, saving for a rainy day and a utopian retirement, who are going to wake up one day (after hyperinflation), and realize all their work was for nothing. Then we will have a revolution of anger, frustration and grief and that's when things are going to get really ugly and scary. Those who have the most to lose, have the farthest to fall, and they will be far worse off than someone like myself, who is accustomed to doing without.

[SeaGypsy]

Wouldn't be Cleveland by chance? (No answer required!)

I gypsied around with 2 step kids for 6 years. We lived in 5 states and the kids went to 17 different schools. It didn't do them any harm at all. Stability is overrated IMO. When their mum and I split, I asked them which was their favorite school and went back there, got them a house to rent nearby. These kids have chatmates all over Australia.
I know this may be different if the kids are seriously challenged; so please don't take offense. Whatever happens I wish you all the best, I'm sure others here do likewise.

[Roy]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'W')hatever happens I wish you all the best, I'm sure others here do likewise.

[ian807]

Guy, I feel for you. I've been there.

These days I'm doing a little better and have rental properties and tenants. They're where you are now. What's worked for some of them (not all) is hiring themselves out for hauling, cleaning, delivery and in one guy's case, computer repair. It's not much money, but it's honest work and usually all cash. Not much, but it keeps the wolf from the door.

They all advertise on Craigslist, which is free, but you have to do it every day or your ad sinks to the bottom and out of sight.

Hope this helps. Take care, man.

[Ludi]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Repent', '
')My point however was that joblessness, removes the dignity and integrity of hard work, and that is something that is hard to live with.

[Ayoob]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Ludi', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Repent', '
')My point however was that joblessness, removes the dignity and integrity of hard work, and that is something that is hard to live with.

[Ludi]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Ayoob', '
')I guess if you've lived that way then unemployment must not be a problem.

Well, that certainly takes the weight off!

[culicomorpha]

Well, I'm partly tempted to leave this one alone, but I can't resist...

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'M')any working women struggle with the idea of partners who aren’t breadwinners. “We’ve got this image of Archie Bunker sitting at home, grumbling and acting out,” says Kathryn Edin, a professor of public policy at Harvard, and an expert on family life. “And that does happen. But you also have women in whole communities thinking, ‘This guy’s nothing.’”

[mos6507]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('culicomorpha', '
')simply a method to keep people from going out in the streets and burning down government buildings and pitchforking the rich.

[MarkJ]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', ' ')The weight of this recession has fallen most heavily upon men, who’ve suffered roughly three-quarters of the 8 million job losses since the beginning of 2008. Male-dominated industries (construction, finance, manufacturing) have been particularly hard-hit, while sectors that disproportionately employ women (education, health care) have held up relatively well. In November, 19.4 percent of all men in their prime working years, 25 to 54, did not have jobs, the highest figure since the Bureau of Labor Statistics began tracking the statistic in 1948. At the time of this writing, it looks possible that within the next few months, for the first time in U.S. history, women will hold a majority of the country’s jobs.

In this respect, the recession has merely intensified a long-standing trend. Broadly speaking, the service sector, which employs relatively more women, is growing, while manufacturing, which employs relatively more men, is shrinking. The net result is that men have been contributing a smaller and smaller share of family income.

“Traditional” marriages, in which men engage in paid work and women in homemaking, have long been in eclipse. Particularly in blue-collar families, where many husbands and wives work staggered shifts, men routinely handle a lot of the child care today. Still, the ease with which gender bends in modern marriages should not be overestimated. When men stop doing paid work—and even when they work less than their wives—marital conflict usually follows.

Last March, the National Domestic Violence Hotline received almost half again as many calls as it had one year earlier; as was the case in the Depression, unemployed men are vastly more likely to beat their wives or children. More common than violence, though, is a sort of passive-aggressiveness. In Identity Economics, the economists George Akerloff and Rachel Kranton find that among married couples, men who aren’t working at all, despite their free time, do only 37 percent of the housework, on average. And some men, apparently in an effort to guard their masculinity, actually do less housework after becoming unemployed.

Many working women struggle with the idea of partners who aren’t breadwinners. “We’ve got this image of Archie Bunker sitting at home, grumbling and acting out,” says Kathryn Edin, a professor of public policy at Harvard, and an expert on family life. “And that does happen. But you also have women in whole communities thinking, ‘This guy’s nothing.’” Edin’s research in low-income communities shows, for instance, that most working women whose partner stayed home to watch the kids—while very happy with the quality of child care their children’s father provided—were dissatisfied with their relationship overall. “These relationships were often filled with conflict,” Edin told me. Even today, she says, men’s identities are far more defined by their work than women’s, and both men and women become extremely uncomfortable when men’s work goes away.

[Ludi]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('culicomorpha', 'a') method to keep people from going out in the streets and burning down government buildings and pitchforking the rich. I think it's only a matter of time before that starts happening though.

[mos6507]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Ludi', '
')People keep predicting uprisings among the US working class. I'm not seeing it.

[Ludi]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('mos6507', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Ludi', '
')People keep predicting uprisings among the US working class. I'm not seeing it.

[culicomorpha]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('mos6507', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('culicomorpha', '
')simply a method to keep people from going out in the streets and burning down government buildings and pitchforking the rich.