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    BobbySeriousHamilton Nolan
    8/10/16 11:26am

    We need to tax the fuck out of the top 1/2 of 1 % (and hit Wall Street and the big banks hard) and put forth a massive, trillion dollar infrastructure bill. One, we desperately need it, and two, it’s the only way when nearly all the wealth is in the locked vaults of a few hundred families living on stock sales and dividends and the occasional real estate transaction.

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      butcherbakertoiletrymakerBobbySerious
      8/10/16 11:28am

      Goddamned commie.

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      Richard M TysonBobbySerious
      8/10/16 11:30am

      Get that common sense out of here. Those people all earned it and the fact that we tax job creators at all is a blight on the country.

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    Richard PunchHamilton Nolan
    8/10/16 11:24am

    For the laid-off Nurse:

    Please move to Colorado. We are in desperate need for Nurses and Directors of Nursing in Long Term Care in the state.

    Please. Our situation is dire here.

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      ARP2Richard Punch
      8/10/16 11:30am

      That’s a common refrain, but moving costs money. Traveling for interviews cost money. When you don’t have a job, moving for a job remains difficult.

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      Richard PunchARP2
      8/10/16 11:32am

      Look, I get it. And I’m not blaming him/her or anything like that. But there are a lot of nursing jobs available right now, and “traveling for interviews” is really more like “traveling to take the job,” these places are so hard up.

      Nursing homes, assisted living facilities, rehab facilities... they need people. Badly.

      It’s not just in Colorado. I just happen to know Colorado best because I live here and work alongside the industry.

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    MrsASRHamilton Nolan
    8/10/16 11:32am

    In the course of my 17 year marriage, I’ve been a homemaker. My husband has only been unemployed once. It was actually when we went back to his home country (UK). He spent 6 months interviewing, trying to find something in his field (software development). He was either over or under qualified for everything. We moved back stateside, and he had a new job in his field in a month.

    We have been exceptionally lucky, and my heart goes out to all my brothers and sisters who struggle.

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      HumpsterFireMrsASR
      8/10/16 12:11pm

      The under/overqualified thing kills me. Now, who amongst us haven’t applied for a neurosurgery job we weren’t qualified for? I can understand not getting those gigs, but when someone tells you that you’re overqualified, then you want to beat them with a desk and matching chairs...but apparently even THAT is against the law now.

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      MrsASRHumpsterFire
      8/10/16 12:19pm

      It's goofy. Under qualified I can at least understand (even though he wasn't). But over qualified is bonkers. Wouldn't a company want a guy with loads of skills? Beggars belief!

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    Gamblor JDHamilton Nolan
    8/10/16 11:31am

    After being self-employed for 20 years, I’m shutting down my business next month and am going to be looking for employment opportunities that are completely unrelated to what I do now. I wouldn’t call it burnout, exactly. More like I just want to do something different.

    What advice, if any, do you folks have for someone who is looking to enter a field for which they have no experience? My wife has a good job with insurance benefits and the like, so I have the luxury of looking around to see what’s out there that might interest me and this also allows me to start at the bottom and work my way up.

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      XrdsAlumGamblor JD
      8/10/16 11:50am

      First thing, identify skills that can transfer over from your current career to the new one. You’d be surprised how even specific expertise can be tweaked and modified to fit into a new position with brand new challenges and learning opportunities. If you have management skills (even if it’s managing clients or subcontractors) they may create a situation where, combined with your experience and age, you won’t be allowed to start at the bottom by a new employer or client base. So make your intentions and motivations clear in the interview that you really want to start fresh.

      Second, once you’ve narrowed things down to a few industries and careers that appeal to you, do a deep research dive into them. If you understand the terminology and jargon and industry conditions then you’ll go into interviews and consults already speaking their language and understanding their concerns.

      Third, get general letters of reference from your existing clients, asking them to focus on their opinion of your trustworthiness, work ethic, ability to learn new things, general affability, etc. Your new employers or clients may not care about your current skills, but they’ll care a lot about those things.

      I’ll let others add to this, and conclude by wishing you the best of luck in an exciting new stage of life.

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      toothpetardGamblor JD
      8/10/16 11:50am

      I was laid off from my field (blue collar) for the fourth time a few years ago, been doing my own contracting with NOAA since; I would like to come in from the cold and have all the things normal workers have, but it won’t be in a field in which I’ve worked for 20+ years. The job market has become baffling. At least I have an invoice out and a check due; I’ll work on some other electronics to sell in the meantime.

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    KyuzoHamilton Nolan
    8/10/16 11:28am

    There’s a six-figure salary waiting for anyone who becomes a certified welder and is willing to travel in the U.S.

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      ARP2Kyuzo
      8/10/16 11:30am

      Who pays for the school, moving, and interview travel? This notion of “just move” is often harder than you think.

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      XkjacobARP2
      8/10/16 11:33am

      The employer actually.

      Pretty common in professional fields.

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    IhpsdmHamilton Nolan
    8/10/16 11:31am

    That series was/is amazing. It really made me appreciate how good I have it and that I’m very fortunate to not have been born 5-10 years later.

    It also drives home the point of Malcolm Gladwell’s “Outliers”. A lot of success is due to being in the right place at the right time. The opposite can be said about “failure” for the most part.

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      MrsASRIhpsdm
      8/10/16 11:36am

      My husband and I have discussed that age issue recently. He's 42, and very stable in software development. But the younger developers are struggling. This current generation of 20 somethings are having a hell of a time.

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      IhpsdmMrsASR
      8/10/16 11:52am

      I was born in 1980 and struggled to find a job after college, as there was a recession from 2001 - 2003. It wasn’t until 2005 that I managed to get a job that had an annual salary and benefits. The salary was 28,000 a year, but I was beyond thrilled. That job propelled me to where I’m at now, which is someone making 6 figures and having a net worth of over 250k. Outside of my mortgage, I am debt free.

      I can only imagine how much I would have struggled or would still be struggling if I was born in the late 80s.

      That unemployment series scared me. I will never get married and have kids and I’m saving as much as possible. Even putting away 2,500/month in to savings doesn’t make me feel all that comfortable.

      It’s amazing how life can quickly turn on you for reasons that are beyond your control.

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    Progressive centrist, yes, regressive leftist, no!Hamilton Nolan
    8/10/16 11:28am

    Aside from a short 20 year stretch after the Second World War, were things ever really any different? Were they better before the Civil War, during Reconstruction, during the years of the Robber Barrons, the years leading up to World War 1, the Depression, the stagflation of the 70's, the Reagan Years, the years after the dotcom bust? Or, are we really just more conscious of the fact that a certain percentage of the population has always struggled, due to social media and our current ability to read 100,000 blogs at a swipe?

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      ARP2Progressive centrist, yes, regressive leftist, no!
      8/10/16 11:34am

      I would suggest things are different now because until recently: 1) a high school diploma was all that was needed; and 2) automation changed the job landscape, but didn’t really reduce the number of jobs.

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      Progressive centrist, yes, regressive leftist, no!ARP2
      8/10/16 11:38am

      Then why is it that cities in the US seems more bustling and prosperous than they’ve ever been. I remember a lot more run down, poverty stricken neighborhoods in the 70's and 80's than today. And, the majority of people I see living it up in cafes, restaurants, bars and condos certainly aren’t oligarchs.

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    bourbon.p.millerHamilton Nolan
    8/10/16 11:29am

    I remember this series well. It made me so worried about job security that, when I was laid off earlier this year, I took the first job offer I got with a well-known company here in Denver I won’t name because they are doing massively unethical and illegal things. I lasted a month, every day spending my time applying to other jobs instead of the illegal things they were asking me to do. Eventually, I realized unemployment sucks, but, if you can afford it, it’s better than damaging your professional reputation. If you can’t afford it, then hustle and rebuild your reputation later. I was unemployed 2 months and then hired on at a much better company with higher pay and no illegal activity yet. So, what I mean to say is thanks for giving me a complex, Hamilton.

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      TheLegalitiesOfEatingYouAreQuiteABitDicierbourbon.p.miller
      8/10/16 11:37am

      plz describe your degradation in greater detail. HamNo can’t, er, finish if you won’t give him details ;)

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      KittensInBoxesbourbon.p.miller
      8/10/16 11:41am

      I took the first job offer I got with a well-known company here in Denver I won’t name because they are doing massively unethical and illegal things.

      I worked on the consumer side of finance for a long while. This speaks to every experience I had outside of with GMAC... who lasted all of a few more years before they were bought by overseas investors.

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    pre-emptive sighHamilton Nolan
    8/10/16 11:28am

    America’s official unemployment rate now sits at less than 5%.

    I believe full employment is considered to be 4.6%. There will always be frictional and structural unemployment.

    It would be nice however to get unemployment numbers of those who would work, but stopped looking. No one has any idea what the actual numbers are and it just allows people like Trump to wildly speculate about how terrible things are even though unemployment has always been measured this way.

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      ARP2pre-emptive sigh
      8/10/16 11:32am

      It’s called U6 and its 9.7%

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      KittensInBoxesARP2
      8/10/16 11:40am

      I’m 31 and totally out of work. Not even looking anymore. I’m a housewife.

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    butcherbakertoiletrymakerHamilton Nolan
    8/10/16 11:30am
    How can a Welfare Office don’t see that.

    Because our public assistance system is, beyond being deliberately financially hamstrung by Congress, not a singular system. These benefits are administered by different offices and you can be damned sure they don’t talk to each other. It’s the American way.

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      CakewalkinDaddybutcherbakertoiletrymaker
      8/10/16 1:48pm

      Many welfare offices are directed to discourage clients and hassle them off the rolls. They will nit-pick and attempt to recover benefits as a way to enhance their metrics and prove they are fighting waste and benefits abuse.

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      butcherbakertoiletrymakerCakewalkinDaddy
      8/10/16 1:58pm

      If you haven’t yet, take a listen. It’s worse than we think:

      http://www.marketplace.org/topics/uncerta…

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