7 ms·

I've met a lot of people who "couldn't" find a job. What they usually mean is "they can't find a job in the area they want, in the industry they want, doing th

• yummyfajitas 10y ago
  This guy seems to fall into that category: "There have been times where I’ve wondered if I should just get a temporary service or manual labor job...I would be too humiliated... It would be exceptionally difficult to work eight hours a day hoping with all my might that a neighbor or friend wouldn’t swing by to see me working the cash register or pumping gas." This is a definitive example of the prideful worker effect. It's kind of crazy how our modern culture substitutes "can't" for "won't". Meanwhile, this guy says he doesn't have skills with modern technologies and he spends 4 hours/day ("a quick glance at Twitter to see what’s going on in the world, and then I look up and it’s 1:15") procrastinating rather than learning those technologies. Hardly a surprise that no one wants to hire him, I certainly never would.
  • tjic 10y ago
    At one point early in my software career I was between jobs for a few months. I have construction skills, so I worked doing demolition and then framing an addition for a friend at $10/hr. To quote Pulp Fiction "The night of the fight, you may feel a slight sting. That's pride fucking with you. Fuck pride. Pride only hurts, it never helps." Over a couple of weeks I made a few thousand dollars, paid the mortgage, and got some exercise. ...and, besides, there's nothing embarrassing about using your hands and your back.
    • larksimian 10y ago
      But pride did help Butch in Pulp Fiction. He got to win the fight, keep his pride and keep the money(or even bet the other way and make bank? can't recall now). Personally, I agree with your point of view. There is, however, something to be said for people that never settle and by force of will reshape the world around them to conform to their expectations.
      • tjic 10y ago
        There is something called survivorship bias. IT means that the selection that you happen to see is the selection that is visible, because it accidentally survived. Steve Jobs is great an inspiring, because he did X and Y and Z and never compromised his standards. You know what? You happen to know of Steve Jobs because everything worked out well for him. There may very well be 20,000 other people who refused to compromise their standards...and perhaps that strategy really sucks and the other 20,000 of them went bankrupt and are working at used car lots now. "Never settling" sounds great. I'm not 100% convinced that it is.
        • jdbernard 10y ago
          Agreed. Generally I believe in shooting high, because how do you know where the limits are if you don't hit them? But... you have to be careful to stay in reality. Otherwise you end up tilting at the mills.
      • dpark 10y ago
        > There is, however, something to be said for people that never settle and by force of will reshape the world around them to conform to their expectations. Two years of unemployment should be enough to indicate that force of will sometimes isn't enough.
        • yummyfajitas 10y ago
          This guy openly admits that he isn't expending any force of will. He's sitting at home all day reading twitter while refusing to work jobs that he thinks might lower his social status. If you refuse to try a strategy for 2 years, that's not evidence the strategy won't work.
  • endymi0n 10y ago
    That being said, the prideful worker effect is very real though. I remember when my mom told me how her nightshifts in the sausage factory as a student made her more humble - and I thought "what a waste - I'm going to step in high and then get really rich so I don't have to do this!". Six years and three failed university degrees later, I started in night shifts myself in customer support because I had no other option and some guy from a mailing list had a heart for someone broke and desperate. Fast forward another seven years and I'm not just CTO of a profitable company, but also pretty thankful of all my experience in customer support, if only for a good chunk of humility. It's really hard to overcome your initial feelings about such a "downgrade" in socioeconomic status for a chance on a new beginning/industry though, don't know if I would have dared that after 40.
    • tjic 10y ago
      Congrats from working up from the bottom, busting your ass, and achieving your dreams. That's an inspiring story.
    • pavel_lishin 10y ago
      > I remember when my mom told me how her nightshifts in the sausage factory as a student made her more humble I was lucky to avoid having to work in the service industry - aside from occasionally having to work the floor at a retailer when we finished unloading/loading a truck early - but my wife worked as a server for a good long while, and we both agree that we will absolutely encourage our children to work jobs like those - aside from earning money, it teaches empathy and how to deal with difficult situations.
  • dpark 10y ago
    Even a half-time minimum wage job in Santa Clara county would bring in $11K/year. That's not a lot of money, but it would help tremendously if they're so strapped for cash that they are having trouble buying food occasionally. $11K/year would also pay for quite a bit of retraining. I've got no doubt that it would be really difficult to take a low-pay, low-skill job after working on the other end of the spectrum for decades. But after two years of no employment, it seems like the appropriate action. Two years of working as a cashier or a janitor or just about anything else looks better on a resume than two years of no employment. But I'm also aware of the fact that I'm fortunate to have an extremely good job and I would spend a lot of time looking for a similar job before showing up at Papa John's with my resume.
• vivekd 10y ago
  The problem is education is tailored towards particular jobs. For example if you have a degree in biology, sure you can get a job in a factory paying almost minimum wage. . . but it wouldn't pay enough for you to cover your student loans and still be able to move out. There seems to be a serious lack of jobs that let people actually have a life. . . and I'm not talking about picket fence in the suburbs dream home kind of life, I'm just talking about being able to afford basic necessities
  • tomschlick 10y ago
    Then they should stop getting degrees in industries that don't exist / have very few job openings. Get a degree in business, accounting, finance, engineering, or tech and your chances of finding a good paying job increase ten fold.
    • vivekd 10y ago
      But the guy in the article was in tech.
      • tomschlick 10y ago
        Right but you were talking about education. The guy in the article is in his 40s so the current educational mess doesn't apply to him. I was mostly talking for people my age (20s) that went to school for bullshit degrees only to come out 80k in debt and have no hopes of finding a job because they didn't do research into the market before they went to school.
  • xaa 10y ago
    There ARE jobs in biology. I have one. But IME, in fields like this, or creative fields like writing, graphic design, etc, students should know what they're getting into: extremely competitive fields where you can do very well if you're excellent at what you do, and can easily find yourself unemployed if you're only "good". It's like planning on the NBA or acting as a career: a high-risk proposition that requires total dedication in exchange for an uncertain chance of success. There are some people who are OK with that. I think the conclusion is that only very dedicated students should go into these fields, which would simultaneously reduce the supply of people trying to go into them, and reduce the number of unemployed people with these degrees. I have little sympathy for someone who chose a high-risk degree like biology and then complains it didn't work out (at least the author of the article didn't make THAT mistake). People who think they are guaranteed a job in any given field simply because they have a degree, or that all careers have equal odds of finding steady employment, are completely out of touch with reality.
• arcanus 10y ago
  > This is a highly overconstrained search Yes and no. It can speak to structural inefficiencies in the economy. For instance, I am a Computational Scientist with a decade of experience in scientific research, publications, etc. It would be a massive waste of my training to be working in an unrelated field, for instance. Underemployment is a very real thing, and it hurts the entire economy. We as a society have a vested interest in ensuring that highly productive roles (data science, medicine, etc.) are filled, because thelse positions are more productive and boost the aggregate economy. To say nothing of the likely higher salary and job satisfaction that comes with a 'good fit'.
  • tjic 10y ago
    > It would be a massive waste of my training to be working in an unrelated field This is an example of what I'm talking about. What's more of a waste of your training? To be work in a career field only 60% overlapping with your training, or to be unemployed (with 0% overlap) ?
    • arcanus 10y ago
      Great point. Better to be employed than not, and of course no job is a perfect fit. Would be interesting to count one as being only 60% employed, in the example you give. So if you had 100 million people all employed at 60% fit, that's an 'effective' employment of 60 million. Of course, I have no idea how one might measure that. But I am not an economist, there may be similar (or superior) measures for underemployment.
    • mcguire 10y ago
      https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_Prasher https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_Prasher
      • tjic 10y ago
        JFC :(
    • barry-cotter 10y ago
• kemiller2002 10y ago
  I remember talking to the father of a girlfriend's roommate at the time. He used to be an executive at an engineering company in Chicago, but he didn't survive the 5th round of layoffs. When I met him, he was working at a hardware store around the corner from his house. He was unhappy with ending up doing a cashier's job when he spent his whole life working towards what he did previously. He never once said he was ungrateful for the job and he certainly didn't say it was beneath him, he just wanted to go back to what he was doing, and he clearly didn't just stay unemployed for his next opportunity. While underemployed, he kept looking an interviewing and didn't give up until someone hired him. My point is, that you're absolutely right. It may not be the job you want right now, but it is probably the job you need right now. You can either take it and work on our next move or sit there pontificating if the perfect job will arrive next.
  • sireat 10y ago
    It is easy to advise from the sidelines but I too think the author should be looking outside the comfort zone. He should broaden his skillset while looking to sharpen those skills that are in demand. Also I would look into some hobbies that could potentially bring in money(twitter analyst?) If he was doing some sort of software support for obsolete programs there is a dwindling demand for such skills in US. (ahem outs...) On the other hand being underemployed in the wrong kind of job that saps all the energy could actually be counterproductive in the longer term. According to the article the author is applying to jobs, getting a mininum wage job would not really change that nor drastically improve family finances in SV. Disclaimer: I speak as someone who earns roughly the US minimum wage at my official job.
• cijt 10y ago
  I've met a lot of managers who "couldn't" find anyone to hire. What they usually mean is "they can't find an employee in the location they want, with the credentials they want, with the skills they want, at the salary they want, who's been trained by someone else." This is a highly overconstrained search. If/when employers loosen one or more of these constraints, candidates show right up. Like everyone, I prefer to get exactly what I want. ...but it doesn't always play out that way. When I've needed staff and my dream candidate isn't there, I've hired imperfect people that I had to train, raise the rate I was willing to pay, put together attractive relocation packages, etc., and I've never had a problem hiring in 20 years as a manager. (Both parties in an employment relationship may not have equal bargaining power, but I take issue with the implication that employers have no agency and workers no power.) EDIT: A point I wanted to include or imply, but couldn't really shoehorn into this inversion, is that just as employers set bounds on what they offer employees, workers set bounds on what offers they accept. Sometimes it's rational to hold out for the right role through an extended period of unemployment (while focusing instead on finding the right role and acquiring or sharpening marketable skills) than to take underemployment that leaves you with no time for improving your position.
  • tjic 10y ago
    Wonderful counterpoint, and I entirely agree with you!
    • mcguire 10y ago
      They're both true. Sometimes the supply and demand curves don't meet.
      • tjic 10y ago
        I think this is incorrect. Supply and demand curves _ALWAYS_ meet. It's just that the point where they meet tells you what the market-clearing price is. Sometimes this information makes one sad. Managers who "can't hire good people" are sad because good people cost more than they want to pay. Employees who "can't find a job" are sad because jobs that match their skills and other requirements pay less than they want to receive.
• swamp40 10y ago
  I just met a retired plumber when he charged us $500 to clear roots out of our main line. He said he had to shut down his business - couldn't find anyone willing to learn the trade. He said no one wants to get their hands dirty anymore. He said it's a shame, they could basically charge as much as they like - write their own tickets.
  • roflchoppa 10y ago
    yeah my dad made me learn all that shit at my uncles old house. was worth it, if you have kids and are reading this right now, teach them to fix stuff, its a gift that keeps on giving.
    • Perihelion 10y ago
      Agreed 100%. Growing up we didn't have money to hire people to do this stuff for us. I learned how to paint, how to hang drywall, how to do basic plumbing, how to lay flooring (tile, carpet, and wood), and odd jobs like replacing crown molding. I'd add basic mechanics to this list -- things like changing my own oil and replacing my own battery have saved me a TON of money and there's a satisfaction that comes from being able to fix your own stuff.
      • bwigfield 10y ago
        I grew up in a similar situation and thus gained the same sort of skills. However the area I grew up in is pretty depressed (Cumberland, MD for thoses who care https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-12-14/in-trump-country-the-brain-drain-takes-a-toll-bloomberg-index https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-12-14/in-trump-...). What I'm seeing is that now we are at a point where so many people do things themselves that the service industry is also struggling. Contractors are no longer doing good business in the area as there has been a race to the bottom. If people don't fix it themselves most turn to a low cost do-it-all 'handy man'. Because everyone is trying to save a buck money doesn't really move around much and we're in a downward spiral.
      • ryandrake 10y ago
• dsfyu404ed 10y ago
  This. I'd feed puppies into a wood chipper with a smile on my face if the pay was good enough.
  • yabatopia 10y ago
    I'd rather die from starvation than doing that. What's next on your job bucket list: operating the gas chambers in Auschwitz? If only it would pay a little bit better?
    • jimmywanger 10y ago
      > I'd rather die from starvation than doing that. Are you a vegetarian? Then doubtful. If you've ever had a factory egg before, they shove the male chicks into a woodchipper. > operating the gas chambers in Auschwitz? And we're at Nazi already!
• stefek99 10y ago
  Example: https://www.pinterest.com/mstefanow/jobs-in-london/ https://www.pinterest.com/mstefanow/jobs-in-london/ 15 minutes walk and I was able to find 8 retails job offers. It was 4G upload speed that was slowing me down adding new posts... Jobs are everywhere and I couldn't agree more: "they can't find a job in the area they want, in the industry they want, doing the kind of work they want, at the salary they want, working for someone else." Ditto.
• 1_2__3 10y ago
  You can't ignore the fact that once you get off the merry-go-round it becomes incredibly hard to get back on. There's something to be said for holding out for a job that fits with your skills, standard of living, and expectations. If we're a land so flush with opportunity and markets are working like so many of its adherents like to claim this should work fine, right?
• client4 10y ago
  I came to say exactly this, though the article touched on a thing I've never understood: why is it embarrassing to take a job that pays? If I only had $30 for a week, I'd dig holes for minimum wage 10 hours a day if that's what it took to get out of a bad financial situation.
• scarmig 10y ago
  There have always been people who can't find a job under those conditions. The question is why that proportion of men is higher now than it was a decade or two or three ago. Moralizing about how they're all too lazy and prideful to get a job is itself lazy. At least take the step to identify why you think the number of the prideful lazy has increased. Also: you said you've been in the workforce for 25 years. Have you considered that not everyone shares your particular history of entering into the workforce right before an extended boom time? That's a huge difference from people who entered in 2008, only found a paying job in 2010, and as a consequence of timing are behind people who graduated a year or two later than them.
• lordnacho 10y ago
  One thing I've heard of from other sources is that managers who offer menial jobs like burger flipping and supermarket checkout will not actually employ someone who can get a better job. Doesn't sound like the guy in the article has tried, but he may find his situation is a lot worse when it gets to that level of desperation. The reason is of course that if you're running a McDonalds or supermarket, you don't want a guy who you know is actively searching for something else and will leave immediately when he finds it. There's a cost to finding and training people, even if it's a lot less than finding a dev.
• ryandrake 10y ago
  I totally understand the desperation of not wanting to "ratchet down" in one's career. I remember being out of work for quite a bit of time. It was right out of MBA school (after working ~10 years as a software developer), I graduated into the Great Recession. Could not find anything--programming or otherwise. I started burning through savings, and was very tempted to just take any gas station job I could in order to make ends meet. It's like a game of chicken where you wait as long as you can before jumping out of the way of the truck. Through a great miraculous fortune, at the last possible moment, I found a mid level software job and took it with zero negotiation, being about 1 month away from insolvency. It was totally beneath me in terms of qualifications but when the alternative is going broke, you take it. I was pretty close to walking into McDonalds at that point asking if they needed a janitor.