5 ms·

Have kills that are in demand. Of course, that means keeping up with changes in your industry, but you should be doing that anyhow.

dangrossman 15y ago
If you were a 53 year old female inventory manager at a factory, where you worked your way up from unskilled labor to management over more than a decade, what changes should you have been keeping up with? Now you're tossed into a world where having no degree and no high demand skills, anyone that hires you (even into management) is going to start you at such a low wage you can't afford a one bedroom apartment in the community you've lived your entire life in, where all your relatives live. These one-liners aren't as useful as you probably think they sound.
- prostoalex 15y ago
  There are multiple wrongs with that situation, most of them not fixable by a quick fix 1) Education is a life-long process, not a 4-year-sprint. Agree that some skills (or degrees) are not as easy to pick up in spare time as others, but continuous development programs / community college evening classes / books from library do exist. 2) Savings rate of 0% is probably more integral to the reason one "can't afford a one bedroom apartment", than a low wage. Someone at 53 must have worked for over 30 years, saving even $100 a month would've yielded a financial cushion for situations like that.
  - ghurlman 15y ago
    Sure, so long as nothing came up over that 30 years.
    - prostoalex 15y ago
      Yeah, forgot that. US medical system is our best tool in fighting income disparity.
  - alsomike 15y ago
    You work 8 hours a day, then come home and study for 8 hours, which is really just more work for your employer. Life-long education is starting to sound like a prescription for non-stop labor.
- jakarta 15y ago
  The mom and her family should have been investing in side income streams along the way. My grandfather came over to America, worked in a box factory. At nights he took courses in accounting. When his kids were old enough he had them working part time jobs and they all pooled their money together. Eventually, they started investing in businesses where they could earn alternative forms of cash flow. First it was bars/mechanic shops/restaurants, then it went into rental properties whenever real estate markets got very cheap (e.g.: he bought 10+ houses in Texas post-S&L crisis). This worked out pretty well. Most of the successful immigrants I know did this. They came over, most were poor. They would sleep 4 to a 1 bedroom apartment. But eventually they found steady jobs, lived cheaply, and then invested the savings into a bunch of different things whenever the right opportunities came up. (The Patels in the motel biz are a good example of this). The idea that your job/your one career should provide enough for you the rest of your life is just foolishly optimistic. You have to diversify to build in a margin of safety for when life throws a curve ball your way.
  - alsomike 15y ago
    All true. Today's middle class are forced to act like newly-arrived immigrants, turning back the clock on decades of progress and rising living standards.
- enjalot 15y ago
  Here's a useless oneliner: The American Dream is now the American Nightmare :)
- calibraxis 15y ago
  Ideologies among tech workers have been studied. Carrie Lane's _A Company of One: Insecurity, Independence, and the New World of White-Collar Unemployment_ points out that tech workers often blame themselves for unemployment. If we blame ourselves, how much sympathy will we have with the 53 year old female? Jeff Schmidt's _Disciplined Minds_ is a very good explanation of ideologies among professionals. (http://disciplined-minds.com http://disciplined-minds.com) (Obviously, "unemployment" is a systematic problem of a peculiar economic system.)
- pnathan 15y ago
  Inventory management is a skill that is saleable. If your area has no work, it is stupid to stick around. Find a place that does have work, and go work there. Easy? No. But whining about how it's hard and how bad it is ain't gonna get you a job either. edit: I've seen a pattern: people who move and keep learning keep winding up employed. People who don't move and stop learning wind up unemployed, and stay that way. People need to be ready to start looking for work at all points in time, because at any given tomorrow, they may not have a job.
- blackboxxx 15y ago
  It's funny. I sympathise with laid off unskilled workers too, but they don't do any worse than most tech savvy startup entrepreneurs. Most of us, including me, are broke and in debt.
  - rjbond3rd 15y ago
    Just curious, can you say what your startup is (in the most general terms)?
    - blackboxxx 15y ago
      I have a few. In social media and a service based startup. 'Nuff said. They all make money, but my living expenses, taxes, child support are more.

dangrossman 15y ago

If you were a 53 year old female inventory manager at a factory, where you worked your way up from unskilled labor to management over more than a decade, what changes should you have been keeping up with? Now you're tossed into a world where having no degree and no high demand skills, anyone that hires you (even into management) is going to start you at such a low wage you can't afford a one bedroom apartment in the community you've lived your entire life in, where all your relatives live. These one-liners aren't as useful as you probably think they sound.

prostoalex 15y ago
There are multiple wrongs with that situation, most of them not fixable by a quick fix 1) Education is a life-long process, not a 4-year-sprint. Agree that some skills (or degrees) are not as easy to pick up in spare time as others, but continuous development programs / community college evening classes / books from library do exist. 2) Savings rate of 0% is probably more integral to the reason one "can't afford a one bedroom apartment", than a low wage. Someone at 53 must have worked for over 30 years, saving even $100 a month would've yielded a financial cushion for situations like that.
- ghurlman 15y ago
  Sure, so long as nothing came up over that 30 years.
  - prostoalex 15y ago
    Yeah, forgot that. US medical system is our best tool in fighting income disparity.
- alsomike 15y ago
  You work 8 hours a day, then come home and study for 8 hours, which is really just more work for your employer. Life-long education is starting to sound like a prescription for non-stop labor.
jakarta 15y ago
The mom and her family should have been investing in side income streams along the way. My grandfather came over to America, worked in a box factory. At nights he took courses in accounting. When his kids were old enough he had them working part time jobs and they all pooled their money together. Eventually, they started investing in businesses where they could earn alternative forms of cash flow. First it was bars/mechanic shops/restaurants, then it went into rental properties whenever real estate markets got very cheap (e.g.: he bought 10+ houses in Texas post-S&L crisis). This worked out pretty well. Most of the successful immigrants I know did this. They came over, most were poor. They would sleep 4 to a 1 bedroom apartment. But eventually they found steady jobs, lived cheaply, and then invested the savings into a bunch of different things whenever the right opportunities came up. (The Patels in the motel biz are a good example of this). The idea that your job/your one career should provide enough for you the rest of your life is just foolishly optimistic. You have to diversify to build in a margin of safety for when life throws a curve ball your way.
- alsomike 15y ago
  All true. Today's middle class are forced to act like newly-arrived immigrants, turning back the clock on decades of progress and rising living standards.
enjalot 15y ago
Here's a useless oneliner: The American Dream is now the American Nightmare :)
calibraxis 15y ago
Ideologies among tech workers have been studied. Carrie Lane's _A Company of One: Insecurity, Independence, and the New World of White-Collar Unemployment_ points out that tech workers often blame themselves for unemployment. If we blame ourselves, how much sympathy will we have with the 53 year old female? Jeff Schmidt's _Disciplined Minds_ is a very good explanation of ideologies among professionals. (http://disciplined-minds.com http://disciplined-minds.com) (Obviously, "unemployment" is a systematic problem of a peculiar economic system.)
pnathan 15y ago
Inventory management is a skill that is saleable. If your area has no work, it is stupid to stick around. Find a place that does have work, and go work there. Easy? No. But whining about how it's hard and how bad it is ain't gonna get you a job either. edit: I've seen a pattern: people who move and keep learning keep winding up employed. People who don't move and stop learning wind up unemployed, and stay that way. People need to be ready to start looking for work at all points in time, because at any given tomorrow, they may not have a job.
blackboxxx 15y ago
It's funny. I sympathise with laid off unskilled workers too, but they don't do any worse than most tech savvy startup entrepreneurs. Most of us, including me, are broke and in debt.
- rjbond3rd 15y ago
  Just curious, can you say what your startup is (in the most general terms)?
  - blackboxxx 15y ago
    I have a few. In social media and a service based startup. 'Nuff said. They all make money, but my living expenses, taxes, child support are more.