"it's not that easy to get a job straightaway, you've got to write out your CV and everything" - Britain's Long Term Unemployed

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/7746174.stm

^ woman left school 28 years ago and has never done a day's work. No-one in her house works. Her daughter thinks having to prepare a CV is a barrier to finding employment.

I'm expecting great things from Have Your Say...

I sat in a KFC diner only last week, and four unemployed people sat at the same table as me lamenting how little money the state gives them even after being out of work for over a year, and how there was just no jobs to be had. Right above them on a notice board, and again by the entrance was a notice saying

"Staff Wanted, all shifts, full and part time, days, evenings and weekends, just ask a member of staff for an application".
Says it all really.

Steve Day

Recommended by 184 people

Dorms!

I accept that in a decent society we need to ensure everyone is housed, fed, clothed and has access to education and health care.

But it should stop there.

Put the long term unemployed in dormitories, feed them in canteens and hand out clothes.

If they want more in life, they should work for it like the rest of us have to.

Andrew Carter, London, United Kingdom

Recommended by 113 people

Mike hates hamsters

I'm sorry, but if you don't have a job, then you can't afford to have children, cats and a hamster. End of. Don't expect me to pay.

Mike, London
Recommended by 87 people

Reading Have Your Say isn't even funny any more, it's just profoundly depressing.

Let them watch television

I notice buying a decent televison did not 'pass you by' unlike the effort to join the army or go to college.

Tax Payer
Recommended by 85 people

^Tax Payer didn't read the article obviously, given that it mentions her son serving in the army for three and a half years.

i like the idea of dorms. if we can build some kind of self-contained dorm facilities, let's call them 'camps', then I'm sure we could even find some work for these people to do in there. we'll be helping Them and Us. it's such a simple idea i wonder why it hasn't been tried before.

You'd have to number people obviously, to make administration easier.

but what to do with the ones who can't work?

Looking at the top two threads on ILE right now, maybe we just need a rolling British thread for smugly patting ourselves on the back for being more progressive than the rest of the country.

yeah, none of that base twelve bollocks!

xpost * 2

TS: Smugness/Howling despair

Seriously though, how does one go about reducing the 3 million "workless households"? That number seems insanely high to me - maybe they're counting retired households in that.

I know a few people who have rarely worked in decades and they all have stories about how it just isn't possible for them to get/hold down a job. Their reasons always seem flimsy when put on paper but I suppose it feels bigger to them and maybe years of sitting at home nurtures a fear of the workplace.

maybe we just need a rolling British thread for smugly patting ourselves on the back for being more progressive than the rest of the country.

yes, one big thread for all 'reaction to reaction to reaction to british interest social issues' U&K now (if it wasn't before). same goes for general politics/Brown/Tories threads.

Petition for I Love Smugness board

Being more tolerant of others compared to Daily Mail/Telegraph/HYS posters is a bit like saying Mussolini was more tolerant than Hitler.

The issue of being unable to find a job that makes it worth coming off benefits is a big problem. The income of the family in the article is £270pw. If the woman found a job on minimum wage she'd get some income support/tax credit but would likely lose some benefits (e.g. Council Tax/Housing Benefit) or have them reduced so that in effect she'd be giving up 37 hours a week for little change to her income.

The "I've never missed a day's work in my life" crowd would say she should work anyway, just to pay part of her way in society, but I don't imagine it looks that appealing from her end.

(I know I kick started this with a couple of HYS quotes but I was actually hoping for a bit of discussion on the social & political issues)

maybe we just need a rolling British thread for smugly patting ourselves on the back for being more progressive than the rest of the country.

What do you suggest we should do, nod our heads and say, "Well, I don't agree with you myself, but you have a perfect right to hold that opinion and it would be arrogant and elitist of me to criticise you for doing so"? Fuck off to that.

Obv. increase the minimum wage and put the screws on employers to pay people proper wages

It comes with confidence doesn't it? If I'd been unemployed for a year my confidence at actually getting another job would be shredded, probably even more so if I had minimal education and no qualifications. I can't imagine what it would be like to be unemployed for a matter of years but I can't see how people wouldn't succumb to fatalism.

(Xpost - Tom, it was more eyerolling at what initially seemed to be yet another thread of C&Ping from HYS just to go 'idiots' with minimal comment)

I know a few people who have rarely worked in decades and they all have stories about how it just isn't possible for them to get/hold down a job. Their reasons always seem flimsy when put on paper but I suppose it feels bigger to them and maybe years of sitting at home nurtures a fear of the workplace.

Add to the workplace's fear of employing someone who hasn't held down a job in decades, and you'll find that it's a vicious circle that is very hard to get out of.

I can't believe for a second that that woman in the article went to the jobcentre as (1) a lone parent and (2) as someone who has panic attacks (therefore should be on incapacity benefit) and wasn't referred to an external agency for help. The jobcentre don't send you letters if something comes up, so that's a ton of BS right there. Also, this "i'm too old to sign on at 43" bollocks will stop sharpish when she stops being eligible for income support and it's sign on or get no money at all.

xpost onimo OTM about the financial benefits of coming off work. I don't have access to the exact figures any more, but based on similar circumstances, she'd be maybe about £50 better off overall.

So how long can someone claim "job seeker's allowance"? I assume this is like the US's "unemployment benefits". Ours has just been extended to an average of 10 months total (I think) and there's limitations on when you can reapply after that.

There are definitely larger issues at play here than just availability of jobs (untreated health issues, lack of training even for job-hunting) but I wonder how much of long-term joblessness could be caused by government-enabling.

Add to the workplace's fear of employing someone who hasn't held down a job in decades

OTM

(2) as someone who has panic attacks (therefore should be on incapacity benefit)

You won't get incapacity benefit for panic attaks

Aye you will.

So how long can someone claim "job seeker's allowance"?

I think it's 26 weeks. That's how much it was in 2002 when I was on it, anyway. The Fun Seeker's Allowance is unlimited however.

What do you suggest we should do, nod our heads and say, "Well, I don't agree with you myself, but you have a perfect right to hold that opinion and it would be arrogant and elitist of me to criticise you for doing so"? Fuck off to that.

go and say it to their face instead of muttering it under our breath sneakily, hoping they don't overhear and then beat us up

So how long can someone claim "job seeker's allowance"?

If you're keen to stay on it, it's pretty much unlimited, though it gets more of a hassle. I've done periods of 3.5 years and (twice) 2.5 years. The jobcentre you have to go to makes a difference to how bearable it. I got sick of it a couple of years ago - it's a young man's game -but I know someone who's been doing it for fifteen years, though he is an abominable moocher.

Obv. increase the minimum wage and put the screws on employers to pay people proper wages

Sounds easy but a) can employers afford it? (and I know this was the question when it was introduced - maybe we're seeing the long term effects of the answer being "no") and b) how do you persuade a politician to follow this path when it's clear that "cut their benefits and FORCE them into jobs (that may or may not exists)" is the clear vote winner with the HYS/Mail/cunt crowd?

(xpost) It basically can go round in circles indefinitely. Depending on the area you live in, you'll be sent off on "training courses", the length of which increases with the amount of time you've been unemployed. I think that after 6-12 months you get sent on a three day course, then a year after that a 13 week "Intensive Activity Programme", which means sitting in a room looking at newspapers and occasionally getting to use a computer. And remember, all the time you're claiming JSA, you're not counted as unemployed. You are not part of the monthly unemployment totals.

>can employers afford it?

I'm always suspicious of this argument because what's the definition of "afford"? I question whether people higher up on the food chain would be willing to cut their own incomes in order to provide a better one for people below them.

>you're not counted as unemployed. You are not part of the monthly unemployment totals.

Wow, how high would it be if you were, I wonder.

Is that true? I thought unemployment figures (as opposed to 'incapacity' or whatever) were defined as the number of people claiming JSA? How do they measure it otherwise?

woman left school 28 years ago and has never done a day's work. No-one in her house works. Her daughter thinks having to prepare a CV is a barrier to finding employment.

my sympathy machine is working overload here, i have to say.

the point about minimum wage employment simply not adding up is also a good one. maybe the real answer is to cut benefits?

the 'unemployment' figures are just the people that not even the government can find any excuses for.

The Labour Force Survey, isn't it?

xpost

(xxpost) sorry, I got that wrong. People claiming JSA are counted towards the unemployment totals. People who are claiming JSA and are also on a 13 week IAP course do not count towards the totals, despite being just as unemployed. The same applies if you are unemployed and on any kind of training scheme whatsoever.

If you're keen to stay on it, it's pretty much unlimited, though it gets more of a hassle. I've done periods of 3.5 years and (twice) 2.5 years. The jobcentre you have to go to makes a difference to how bearable it. I got sick of it a couple of years ago - it's a young man's game -but I know someone who's been doing it for fifteen years, though he is an abominable moocher.

― Eyeball Kicks, Tuesday, December 2, 2008 10:15 AM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark

what in the hell

go and say it to their face instead of muttering it under our breath sneakily, hoping they don't overhear and then beat us up

I would, if someone said it to my face, I trust you would too

This fucking country, man.

In general.

(xxxxpost) Example: you're claiming JSA but are also being sent to, say, adult literacy classes? Bing! You're not officially unemployed! Despite not having a job.

maybe the real answer is to cut benefits?

Yes obviously the answer is to fuck over those in genuine need in order to convince lazy/demotivated people to get back to work.

Sounds easy but a) can employers afford it? (and I know this was the question when it was introduced - maybe we're seeing the long term effects of the answer being "no")

You think the minimum wage has led to unemployment? I don't, but if there's any proof that it has...

Peter "One Dart" Manley otm :(

x-post

Perhaps in terms of that at a certain point you can't make enough at minimum wage to offset the costs of working. e.g childcare

Susan, there's a tax credit system in the UK that covers that - no idea how effectively.

what in the hell

This is not really that unusual. When you add in all the benefits you get for being unemployed, especially if you have kids and would need to fund childcare to get back to work, you are maybe looking at an average weekly increase in your income of about £30. Would YOU do 37 hours work for that?

You think the minimum wage has led to unemployment? I don't, but if there's any proof that it has...

I think the turnover/paybill ratio of any company is a factor in its success and there seem to be a lot of companies failing and unemployment is rising by any stick you choose to measure it with.
I'm not saying the minimum wage is a direct cause but if you're struggling with a small company and all your staff have to get pay rises because the government says so it must make you consider whether you can afford to continue employing everyone.

Yes obviously the answer is to fuck over those in genuine need in order to convince lazy/demotivated people to get back to work.

matt, there are no lazy, demotivated people! shame on you.

the real problem is the diagnosis of people that can't work- and it's far, far too easy to get on that list.

re: childcare- i know in ireland you can write off a certain amount of costs involved in going BTW, but it's nowhere near sufficient.

Put the long term unemployed in dormitories, feed them in canteens and hand out clothes.

I wouldn't mind this, I'm on under-25s JSA (£47.50 a week!!) and can't afford to both heat my house and eat. What's the rationale for the cutoff for that rate being 25 and not, say, based on circumstances?

That's what they said when they first introduced the minimum wage and I've never seen any proof to suggest that substantial numbers of business went under as a result (xposts)

which reminds me, I forgot to pay my council tax yesterday. OOPS.

Hey, they want us all to spend more money, well give poor people more money!

re. the minimum wage, I don't doubt it has contributed to unemployment levels - I know several folk who get paid less than the minimum wage cash in hand so that they can keep their benefits and their "employer" doesn't have to pay as much as he would have to in order to put them through the books/comply with the legal wage requirement.

comments about unemployment b/c of minimum wage applying towards my experience in the US. Other than a tax credit on your yearly income taxes (which you receive regardless of whether your employed) there is no such benefit towards childcare here.

That's what they said when they first introduced the minimum wage and I've never seen any proof to suggest that substantial numbers of business went under as a result (xposts)

It was introduced during a sustained period of growth. When things get tight jobs are lost anyway so it's hard to pin down a direct cause/effect but don't you accept the government pushing your company's pay bill up while your takings are going down might make you consider losing a few minions?

I know several folk who get paid less than the minimum wage cash in hand so that they can keep their benefits and their "employer" doesn't have to pay as much as he would have to in order to put them through the books/comply with the legal wage requirement.

So you're saying the job wouldn't exist if the employer had to pay the minimum wage?

The problem is that inflation is causing the minimum wage to actually fall in real terms. What's the point of having a minimum wage in the first place if the minimum standard of life it guarantees is deteriorating?

When things get tight jobs are lost anyway so it's hard to pin down a direct cause/effect but don't you accept the government pushing your company's pay bill up while your takings are going down might make you consider losing a few minions?

It might, it might also means there's far more money in the economy so companies are likely to be doing better

We keep getting told that poor people are more likely to spend money than rich bastards

This is not really that unusual. When you add in all the benefits you get for being unemployed, especially if you have kids and would need to fund childcare to get back to work, you are maybe looking at an average weekly increase in your income of about £30. Would YOU do 37 hours work for that?

― ailsa, Tuesday, December 2, 2008 10:31 AM (4 minutes ago) Bookmark

unless you know something i don't, it sounded like eyeballs up there was referring to being on the dole for 8.5 years mostly because he wasn't keen on getting a job. and, if you take out the part about childcare in your own post, you've pretty much said that the benefits of unemployment are too good to make working worth it! which is sort of a problem!

Well they don't spend more, they just spend all of it because they can't afford to save.

xp

TBH Tom I doubt pushing the minimum wage up is likely to have that much effect on the overall amount of money sloshing round the economy, due to the people who are on minwage in the first place.

(xxxxxpost)
http://www.hrmguide.co.uk/rewards/minimum_wage.htm
Minimum wage is increasing faster than prices.

LPA + Rent allowance for a single parent in my area- 397

You'd be doing very well to get a job that could beat that after covering your childcare costs.

Merdeyeux, I think the rationale is that you're salvageable to the job market at that age and paying you a pittance will get you back to work doing anything - after six months of that you'd get put on a New Deal training course for a whole extra £10 a week.

xpost to Tom D, pretty much, yes. It's a loophole that gets exploited a lot round here. If he didn't have to pay the minimum wage, he'd get some mug to actually do it for the buttons he pays above board, and that'd be one less person on benefits (not necessarily the crafty wee monkey that's doing it at present)

xpost again to gbx, that's exactly what I mean. Yes, it is very easy to stay on the dole forever, and why not if the alternatives are working a whole week for little more. (I have no idea if eyeball has kids or not, but i was tying it in with the woman in the BBC article to show it's a common thing across many different types of circumstance).

I'm not sure where you're getting me thinking it's not a problem from though.

(wee aside re poor people spending more - I once spent a hungover morning watching an boffin explain how the National Lottery was a drain on the Treasury as it only got 12.5p from every £1 ticket. His reasoning was that if the poor people who buy tickets didn't have lottery tickets to buy they'd spend that £1 on fags or booze which are both taxed at a much higher rate)

Yeah why bother with the long term unemployed when yer Eastern European will do it for half the cash and be grateful for it?

Without getting all Daily Mail/HYS/cnuty about it, there's a fair bit of that going on, tbh.

i wasn't sure if you did! i guess my question is:

a) are the benefits so GOOD that hey why work when i can just not, right? (ie - you can still go to the bar, see a movie, buy a video game, whateva)
b) is the pay so BAD that like what's the fucking difference anyway, may as well be broke-ass on the dole and have some free time (which I can do very little with) or be broke-ass and be yelled at by a jerk for 37 hours/week

Most employers won't even consider someone who is long term unemployed, regardless of their skills. They'd much rather interview someone who already has a job, and is prepared to screw over their current employer to switch jobs. Then the new employer complains that there's no company loyalty any more.

Yeah, people who go to work for a living are the real villains here.

I mean that HR departments and recruitment agencies have narrow ideas of who is "employable"

...and restrict access to job interviews to people who are already working.

LPA + Rent allowance for a single parent in my area- 397

Is that for a week?

since when is leaving a job for better pay screwing someone over (provided you left with plenty of notice)

b) (xxxxpost), I would say, but then I would say that

I don't want to be "that guy" here, but you people do realise there is no fucking excuse in this day and age for a person to be out of work for any period over, say, ten days, right? If you want to piss and moan that all the jobs out there are "beneath you", fine, but you probably shouldn't be clocking over three figures a week from the state if that's true.

gbx, it's a wee bit of both, tbh. I work, btw, and I should point out that until recently I used to be tangentially involved in booting skivers up the arse and back into work. I have no idea what the answer is to making it change, but anything that penalises people who genuinely can't work is not it.

it really does depend on the individual. i'm all for putting the boot in on the lot of them usually, but -

i meet lots of single parents that genuinely would much prefer to be working, that could get jobs in the morning, but they would be much worse off.

i also meet lots of people that wouldn't ever have any ambition of working for 35 hours every week, and would consider you a mug for doing so.

xpost to Ned- yes, that's for a week, in euros. bear in mind that that would rise or fall depending on the prevailing rent level (the vast majority of social welfare recipients in private rented accommodation pay no more than €13 per week)

If you want to piss and moan that all the jobs out there are "beneath you", fine, but you probably shouldn't be clocking over three figures a week from the state if that's true

Does everyone get three figures a week?

there is no fucking excuse in this day and age for a person to be out of work for any period over, say, ten days, right?

In a dynamic thriving economy like ours, you mean?

(xxxxxxpost) The employee isn't screwing anyone over. It's the gatekeepers who pick interview candidates based on bogus criteria, one of which is "have you already got a job". I don't know how it's happened, but in the last decade we've moved from recruiters asking "do you have a checkable work record?" to asking "are you currently working?". Possibly as a way of covering their backsides in case a new hire that they suggested doesn't work out.

>I don't want to be "that guy" here, but you people do realise there is no fucking excuse in this day and age for a person to be out of work for any period over, say, ten days, right?

My brother is poorly-educated and has had trouble keeping a job. He does graphic design and has gotten sporadic jobs, usually under the table, but they're hard to come by especially considering the current market and the better-equipped competition.

Any job that pays minimum-wage (service, retail, etc) is not an option b/c he and his wife have four children. The last-time he took a low-paying job and gas and everything was fit in (they have one car) they were paying more b/c of childcare than he was making. At this point unless he can get another decent paying design job, it's not worth it for him. His unemployment benefits have expired and he is trying.

Perhaps everyone should just move to London and sign up with Office Angels? Then we wouldn't need to bother with a welfare state at all!

Dom as That Guy. Now there's a shock.

Does everyone get three figures a week?
I think the only people who don't are single and childless and live with their mums.

Does everyone get three figures a week?

No they don't. BTW, you don't get housing benefit if you have a mortgage, it's just for rented accommodation, so that's a saving (and a fuckload of people heading for repossession) right there.

I don't know how it's happened, but in the last decade we've moved from recruiters asking "do you have a checkable work record?" to asking "are you currently working?". Possibly as a way of covering their backsides in case a new hire that they suggested doesn't work out.

yeah, that's teh situation here as well. i think it's fairly common to run a credit check on new hires as well (explanation as i heard it: "employees with bad credit history are more likely to steal/commit professional malfeasance"). requiring current employment AND a good credit history before getting a "good" (non-service) job pretty much eliminates ppl that NEED jobs from the hiring pool

Um a credit check would eliminate some of us with perfectly reasonable white-collar employment histories, not to mention.

Does everyone get three figures a week?

So that's at least £400 a month! Wow, sign me up now!

Seriously, anyone who thinks that being on unemployment or other benefits, or even a combination of benefits, is deluding themselves.

No they don't. BTW, you don't get housing benefit if you have a mortgage, it's just for rented accommodation, so that's a saving (and a fuckload of people heading for repossession) right there.

I thought you had the interest paid on your mortgage for x number of months if you lost your job (the thinking being that a fuckload of repossessions leads to a fuckload of unemployed families needing social housing).

Perhaps everyone should just move to London and sign up with Office Angels?

BTW, you don't get housing benefit if you have a mortgage, it's just for rented accommodation,

is there any kind of mortgage relief over there ailsa? you'll get relief to the level of the equivalent rent support here, but that may not be the case in the UK.

OK the 'be a graphic designer or live on benefits' thing is kinda fucked up, can't quite get my head round it. You won't (shouldn't) get a well paid job in that area without proper qualification/training anyway.

Sorry, not doing well today! x-posts to myself

Seriously, anyone who thinks that being on unemployment or other benefits, or even a combination of benefits, is a cushy number is deluding themselves.

meant to add a question mark after the 'shouldn't' there

(NB I actually agree that full employment should be the goal of any government that considers itself event vaguely left-wing, I don't agree the dole is a god-given right for people who won't go back to work but idea that there is one job out there for every person in this country is batshit, especially in a climate where there'll be businesses going bust left right and centre)

>You won't (shouldn't) get a well paid job in that area without proper qualification/training anyway.

Over here at least, as long as you had the skills and a portfolio to back you up in something like design or programming/web development, you were a viable candidate. With unemployment numbers so high now, even if you have a good portfolio, stacked up with someone who has that AND a formal education, you're probably out of luck.

Mortgage assistance. . .living in the UK is sounding better and better. But I'm sure you guys get taxed out the ass.

Seriously, anyone who thinks that being on unemployment or other benefits, or even a combination of benefits, is a cushy number is deluding themselves.

― Neil S, 02 December 2008 17:05 (44 seconds ago) Bookmark

that's what we're discussing. kids make it a lot harder, but in terms of purely getting by, as a single person with the ability to budget and a certain lack of social conscience, then you're flat out wrong.

meant to add a question mark after the 'shouldn't' there

― GSOHSHIT (blueski), Tuesday, December 2, 2008 11:05 AM (1 minute ago) Bookmark

i was gonna say.....wtf kind of certification does a graphic designer need, thought yr portfolio did the talking

xpost

i realize that daytime pub denizens are not a good representative sample of the jobless population, and that things may have changed a lot in the last 16 years, but my tenure as a barman in manchester gave me a sort of amused view of the dole. i remember one guy who used to come in, usually drunk by the time he got there (in the early afternoon), complaining about his job. turned out he cleaned one shop window once a week. i asked about other employment and he said, "nah mate, i'm 38, i'm done workin', me."

I don't want to be "that guy" here, but you people do realise there is no fucking excuse in this day and age for a person to be out of work for any period over, say, ten days, right?

this isn't even a contribution to the debate, but as a note: it is fucking hard to get a job, sometimes. i do shitty office jobs, with temp agencies, kind of like the clerical equivalent of turning up outside the dusty western oil fields a hundred years ago to see if there's any work, and i've gone stretches of time without getting new jobs. i have written out my cv, coolly mentioned my degree and everything.

i am not well enough acquainted with the issues to talk about the realism of how people should have to work to get money and what happens if they don't, but i don't think that not working should condemn you to abject poverty. whenever i've received any benefits, it's been a welcome contribution that slightly lessens the slide into debt, rather than something to subsist on.

ps extra: housing benefit forms (please declare your half-sister's income &c) made me want to cry.

that's what we're discussing. kids make it a lot harder, but in terms of purely getting by, as a single person with the ability to budget and a certain lack of social conscience, then you're flat out wrong.

No he isn't. Being poor is generally not much fun.

I quite liked being on the dole for a few months but it got pretty dispiriting after that. Mind you I lived with 2 friends and they paid for the broadband, so I could piss about on the internet downloading shitloads of music off Slsk.

xpost dunno how people afford to drink in pubs every day on the dole though

i had the impression it involved cutting down on discretionary expenses (food, clothing) and cadging a lot of pints and smokes.

Actually, if you really can't get a job, fuck it, keep claiming benefits until you die for all I care. It's because we have a benefits system for the long-term unemployed that they aren't living in Dickensian squalor. But the idea that there are huge numbers of people claiming the dole as a lifestyle choice is a right-wing myth.

what's poor for a single person tom?

matt, the idea that there are huge numbers of people claiming the dole as a lifestyle choice keeps me in a job where i meet these people every day.

You're a barman?

poor these people

ha! nope. working in the area of rent supplement/housing.

x-post yes Matt DC on the money, this isn't about choice it's about poverty traps that are very difficult to get out of, however much Norman Tebbit or his heirs say the unemployed should "get on their bike",

wtf

there definitely ARE ppl on the dole in both the US and the UK who are NOT what we can term the 'intended' recipients. it is these few (these happy few) that let the right-wing promulgate the spectre of the welfare queen or whatever.

Then's that's an administrative problem, not the fault of the welfare state per se.

THEN!

I wasn't talking about a happy few.

wtf kind of certification does a graphic designer need, thought yr portfolio did the talking

almost all design jobs expect an academic qualification (as well as sufficient experience natch) as proof of individual achievement. but if you don't have one (or much solid experience) and then impress someone enough purely with portfolio then good luck to you - don't suppose this happens very often tho.

I was temping a few weeks ago in a no-brainer job waiting for my real job to start (since I had to pay my mortgage, see my earlier post) and they were recruiting. For an office junior, someone to make tea, smile at customers and do a fuckload of photocopying. For minimum wage, which is £3.53 for under 18s, or £4.77 for 18-21. They were throwing in the bin everyone who wasn't currently working. Anyone on one of the training courses which give you work experience - in the bin. Jesus wept. They wanted someone with experience of being a minion to be their minion.

(Amusingly, this only left them with two people. One of whom was offered a better job before she came for interview, and the other one "forgot" to turn up. They phoned her and asked her to come in another time! I'm guessing there were a few keen and frustrated candidates who'd have bitten their hand of for a chance whose CVs went in the bin, but no, some dopey fucktard who couldn't be arsed going for the interview got two chances at it. I left before I found out if she turned up for the second one, or got the job). BTW, this job was only advertised in the jobcentre, which is a very stupid place to advertise if you don't want to attract unemployed people.

I thought you had the interest paid on your mortgage for x number of months if you lost your job (the thinking being that a fuckload of repossessions leads to a fuckload of unemployed families needing social housing).

you "may" get help. It also takes months to kick in.

xposts, MattDC, there are loads of them! There are something like 1 in 10 adults in Scotland claiming incapacity benefit.

x-post

haha, every designer or developer I know except one has no academic qualification.

You're a barman?

sorry, meant to type "batman."

(worked in a pub, years ago.)

(This is largely moot seeing as even the Tories weren't able to scrap it over 18 years of power so this is largely the preserve of Daily Mail hacks and menks on internet message boards)

nb: when i was hired on to the staff of a ski resort in colorado, they actually had a seminar when you got hired about how to go on unemployment during the shoulder seasons (spring/fall). the whole fucking town went on unemployment because the tourists stopped coming for a few months. now, for the ppl with families and the like, this was a lifeline that kept groceries on the table. for the twenty-something service class, it was a way to subsidize backpacking trips to costa rica

God, Ailsa, that's so damning.

xp needing (demanding!) academic qualification when you've already got an impressive portfolio is the ultimate in empty certification and cartoonishly classist, imo

This job is making me depressed and unable to work.

i should be studying :-/

I meant this thread, haha! Freudian slip perhaps. . .

if it was just in the recesses of my dark little soul, and the decision was solely down to me, then i would think very hard about hiring somebody that had been long term unemployment during ten years of a boom.

from an american perspective, what the absence of long-term unemployment benefits seems to mean is a large and persistently under-employed population, the working poor etc., who still end up needing help but it's in a diffuse and unorganized way (food pantries, emergency room visits, salvation army stores) that doesn't show up on government ledgers and so keeps the right-wing happy. (britain obviously has that population too -- presumably it would just be larger if long-term benefits were cut.)

every designer or developer I know except one has no academic qualification

needing (demanding!) academic qualification when you've already got an impressive portfolio is the ultimate in empty certification and cartoonishly classist, imo

man, only in America (and poor countries)

Yeah, religious and charitable organizations keep the working poor JUST barely surviving and still under the radar. Sucks to be them, I guess!

when i was hired on to the staff of a ski resort in colorado, they actually had a seminar when you got hired about how to go on unemployment during the shoulder seasons

yeah i think most seasonal resort areas operate like that. although in recent years they've also been flying in seasonal foreign workers -- there was a whole contingent of russians and east europeans at the cash registers last time i was in the outer banks.

??? to blueski

Laurel, were you being sarcastic? If so, about what exactly?

i don't think she was? i mean, tipsy was otm---the under-employment problem is a big one, and could reasonably considered another poverty trap that neil s alluded to

The entire staff of on- and off-Broadway shows goes on unemployment when their show closes and before their next gig starts. Ditto for construction workers between jobs their company is contracted for, and auto workers when the plants get slow, and probably a few hundred other job descriptions. Basically this is companies throwing the Care and Feeding of their employees under a bus, I mean, on the shoulders of the public.

xp Of course I was! It's a big debate here, as far as I understand it -- the right-winters want to cut social programs to help the working poor (and others) so private organizations step in to cover the gaps for people in need...and then those opposed say, "But we don't need to offer that program, the churches are taking care of it, and isn't that where community-building REALLY comes from?" like it's an overall BENEFIT to the COMMUNITY that takes care of its own.

the under-employment is basically the saem thing as scraping by on a minimum wage this side?

... nobody's talking about benefit provision to the working poor in this thread?

xp

I mean, it's nice to have a cause to fight for, but everything in it's place, yeah?

gbx if the designer (or developer) is good then why didn't they study it? maybe it's just that demand often exceeds supply over there to the extent that people can just teach themselves this stuff to a level that satisifes enough employers (and maybe this explains why there is so much poor work out there, not just in the US of coursel). but if you have a great portfolio but no relevant qualification prior to that...this just seems really strange (surely you can see why).

no, i can't

Oh excuse me, I must have mistaken the topic of under-employment for something that anyone gives a shit about in this thread.

in ireland, it's farmers claiming benefits/grants because they can't make enough from their saleable asset to survive.

gotta be another US/UK socio-cultural divide at work here (xposts to gbx)

Oh excuse me, I must have mistaken the topic of under-employment for something that anyone gives a shit about in this thread.

― One Community Service Mummy, hold the Straightedge Merman (Laurel), Tuesday, 2 December 2008 17:33 (41 seconds ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

... what on earth are you talking about?

i mean, to answer your first question: because they couldn't afford it? because their grades in high school were poor and tehy couldn't get accepted into a program? there's loads of reasons that ppl don't go to college.... you're forgetting, maybe, that education over here is significantly more expensive?

In order to get any kind of certification you'd have to...take classes from an accredited institution? That means paying tuition and having time to take away from your day job to be in class/doing homework. Or if you work only part-time to go to school, then you're uninsured...and so on.

I'd guess these would be some big reasons for people to get their experience in things like graphic design from books & the internet & just looking at a lot of other people's work.

Kind of like...creative writing?

haha xp to gbx.

so, if you can't get a job in what you'd like to do........

What is the cost of a specialist full-scale post graduate course over there? It cost me 4k to do a PGDip in print journalism, which'd be... $6k a year?

xxp

so, if you can't get a job in what you'd like to do........

― darraghmac, Tuesday, 2 December 2008 17:38 (10 seconds ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

^^^basically this, yeah

Dom, I only mentioned "the working poor" because someone else already used that term! And it's basically interchangeable with "under-employed"...which had also already been brought up in-thread. So I don't understand why you say that no one's talking about it...?

i mean, i'm not trying to be WHATEVER BRITAIN, but there are loads of careers/jobs/etc that do NOT really need collegiate training and yet we demand it anyway. (graphic design and programming are both highly skilled jobs, btw, but one can certainly do both at a reasonable level w/o formal education)

ffs we let ppl be LAWYERS in this country w/o any education WHATSOEVER

(well, Cali does, at least)

re: cost of training programs, 6kUS a year (which I think might be low) is a lot of money (or debt) for someone with only a high-school education or ged and the type of money those kind of jobs provide.

Dom, I only mentioned "the working poor" because someone else already used that term! And it's basically interchangeable with "under-employed"...which had also already been brought up in-thread. So I don't understand why you say that no one's talking about it...?

― One Community Service Mummy, hold the Straightedge Merman (Laurel), Tuesday, 2 December 2008 17:39 (27 seconds ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

Working poor implies people just above the poverty line: those who are pulling in 12/13k a year. Under-employed means, depending on what meaning you take, the seasonally employed or the long-term unemployed who occasionally pull a few weeks in. I don't see how the two groups share any concerns outside of "both have fuck all money"?

streets could do with sweeping round where i live.

full year of university level education is going to run anywhere from 15k-35k

Laurel and others, I think we're talking two different systems and problems here now, which isn't helping anyone explain anything to anyone else here.

Anyway, when I was actually working in this area, it was one in six of the working-age population age of Glasgow who were claiming incapacity benefit. I don't have the lone parents claimants stat to hand, but they are the benefits you get on when you don't want to go back to work. JSA has a requirement that you are actively seeking work, IB and Income Support don't. That's a LOT of people. Your average lone parent will be about £20 or £30 more a week better off working, but there's a great big gap where you're actually worse off working, so you go minimum wage for v little money, or you stay at home with the kids, or you go and earn loads and loads of money, which as we've seen is a piece of piss when you've been unemployed for years. I've never done the figures for JSA claimants, but I can't imagine it's that much different. Anyway, I know fuckloads of people who were more or less advised not to bother their arses going back to work. And no-one is really checking up on them because their benefits aren't dependent on them being able to get a job. That's how the woman that this thread was started about was able to get to the age of 43 without really having to bother her arse about it. And there are plenty more like her.

I'm not saying it's right, btw. Just that while there's a system for those that need it, those that don't need it will play it as well. Because it's easier than going out and working for it. (their attitude, not mine)

xsxpost

Well based on your description, under-employed people could be doing relatively well depending on what they do during those brief periods of employment.

You can get graphic design "accreditation" from places like ITT or online universities over here but I don't know if any employer would take that seriously.

xposts gbx sorry yeah I forgot how fucked up shit is over there sometimes (may read like a boorish anti-American zing but not meant to). I wonder what design college teachers over there say about the standard of the work from those without degrees (probably of decent standard in many cases, but interested in where the differences show and what it says about how they teach it, or whether books/internet can match college training in these cases).

xposts, ailsa OTM, but do we blame the parents?

Okay well anyway, I still didn't bring it up here, I was responding to tipsy and maybe others. And in any case I'm pretty much an incompetent in matters of economics b/c all my information is from anecdotal evidence like people's memoirs and Jonathan Kozol books.

xp no prob, blueski

w/r/t the quality of work: i don't know! i'm sure it's a mixed bag! i mean, qualification/certification/etc is like a good thing in that it allows an employer to get a rough idea of a candidates abilities beforehand. but that's also one of the problems that initially came up in this thread: how can someone w/o "qualifications" and a decent job history get employed?!?!

there are some 'learn to earn' type schemes out there to enable people to get qualification/train without losing benefit but obv they need massive funding

and i guess that's what irritated me? (oops xp to myself) like, if y'all think that EVERYONE needs a degree of some kind then loads of ppl will never, ever get jobs. it never ceases to be hilarious (in a :| style) to me how some ppl get out of college and get into an office drone situation and are like wtf how on earth did this require tens of thousands of dollars and four years??? i'm like making copies and shit.

everyone that works behind the counter at the post office is a secret genius, btw

Um yeah my English degree did not do shit for me in terms of doing a job in book production, except tell my employer that since someone else had given me their imprimatur, they would be less at risk in doing so. At the very worst, they could always say, "How could we have known? She got good grades in college!" LOL as if anyone cares what grades you made after the second you graduate. That's another one of the fictions of higher ed.

yeah but you can deploy the word imprimatur!

it never ceases to be hilarious (in a :| style) to me how some ppl get out of college and get into an office drone situation and are like wtf how on earth did this require tens of thousands of dollars and four years??? i'm like making copies and shit.

ha, true. the level of work i do here for last 5 years i really didn't need my degree for 90% of it either (as in i could've just relied on books/pirate software/internet). DAMN.

People who get a university degree and then go on to spend the rest of their lives working as office temps or video store employees or whatever

the first and last office-y job i had was writing for an ad agency, which was the most transparently emperor has no clothes situation that i almost couldn't believe it. my education qualified me insofar as it proved that i had read a lot (lol english) and might therefore be capable of also writing. but even then, the writing samples i had were academic, and the only reason i got an interview was because i sent them a video of me doing a christopher walken impression

And THAT should be how you get a job.

plz to post vid to YouTube...

this had better be either his pulp fiction scene or 'weapon of choice'

i think it has been lost to the mists of time :(

actually it just got eaten by my old computer's hard drive. srsly, tho, they called like 35 minutes after i sent in my application and one of the first things they asked was for me to do the impression. they put me on speaker phone

3 weeks later i was trying to make BMW extended warranties seem "cool"

Working poor implies people just above the poverty line: those who are pulling in 12/13k a year. Under-employed means, depending on what meaning you take, the seasonally employed or the long-term unemployed who occasionally pull a few weeks in. I don't see how the two groups share any concerns outside of "both have fuck all money"?

well my original point is that in the u.s. the population that might be "long-term unemployed" in britain falls under the under-employed and/or "working poor" label (since we esseentially don't have "long-term unemployed" -- although there is long-term disability, which is another place people wind up, if they can). and that a lot of them still end up being on long-term support systems, but since they are private/charity systems they keep conservatives happy.

I'm actually really upset this article was published and these pathetic people were highlighted, for they are surely the exception and not the norm - and the first gut response of mine is that these lazy people are awful (and makes me feel self-important for actually having a job which is totally ridiculous). Also, I am totally supportive of government-funded programs for the underprivileged and it's sad to me that those who abuse the system are flaunted in front of us.

Also, I don't think all graphic designers are required formal training, I work for a global ad agency and I'm always surprised by how many people don't have degrees.

Love, Homo 2

for they are surely the exception and not the norm

I think they are very much the norm for a large section of the UK population. Close to a million adults have been on incapacity benefit for more than ten years. 1 in 9 people adults of working age in the UK are currently on incapacity benefit.

PEOPLE ADULTS

okay then you are all just lazy sorry

get a job you punks

really wish dave q was here to sort us lazy chinless brits out and tell us what's what

as long as what's what involves loads of crystal meth and listening to Rush

i've been trying to find a part time job (while at uni) for what seems like forever (in reality, since about august) and even that is soul destroying. is this thread just hys zings?

Looks like it :-(

a hoy hoy

^ lj?

better not be

i was gonna say...
xp

No one's bothered to mention that the mother in the article was just that, initially - a housewife. There's plenty of women in her situation who never worked because hello, they're housewives, and then their fuckwit husband leaves them and they dont have the capacity to do anything useful about it.

Having said that I cant help but wondr why she doesnt take up some cleaning jobs or something.

because, hey, we all need our places cleaning, right chaps?

Can't believe more people aren't prepared to do hours of shitty work for a pittance.

Thank fuck the rest of the world is more fucked otherwise we'd never have anyone coming here and cleaning up out shit (no matter how awesome it is).

xpost

well, there's a lot of shitty work out there, and the going wages for these jobs is a pittance. so they shouldn't ever get done?

you support the idea that tesco/kfc jobs are beneath someone who is unemployed?

That's actually really unfair. You can't really start picking things apart like that, because at a certain point there needs to be people who do everything. I mean I work in a restaurant and at the end of the night we spend about an hour doing a ton of cleaning and if everyone didn't do their part we would be there all night. I know that sounds really obvious but its a jigsaw puzzle thing isn't it. I mean some people obviously don't feel like they have the time to do their cleaning maybe but they work hard in other areas to make up for it and it means that somebody else has a job. It shouldn't be for us to decide that some jobs are not good enough to be done, as long as the conditions are not bad and people are being properly rewarded for their work then its fair.

xpost i mean

Can't believe more people aren't prepared to do hours of shitty work for a pittance

Can't believe the world isn't a fair and just place where everyone is happy with each and every aspect of their life.

we could do a poll on how many people on ilx do hours of shitty work for a pittance?

did.

that's my point mark- i don't doubt that most people have at some stage.

I have more than a sneaking admiration for anyone who successfully avoids work and still manages to get by for a large chunk of their adult life. As someone whose "career" has bottomed out to the extent that I'm earning less at 40 than I did at 27, despite enduring far more stress and seeing far less of my friends/family, I yearn for long, aimless drifts through frosty suburban parks, curling up on the couch under a duvet to the sound of the washing machine's churn, immense, pointless personal art projects (field recordings in a greasy spoon in every London postcode, photos of manhole covers...). I may be romanticising the bone-idlers' lives a bit, but I'd hope some of them are reasonably content with their lot.

(I meant, we did the poll already)

actually, no, that was "what kinda money are you pulling in now, my bad

i could definitely do the lifestyle, but i sure would miss having my current girlfriend.

"field recordings in a greasy spoon in every London postcode"

The world needs to hear this!

I only did SE19. And then I got a job.

My point was that I completely understand why people try to avoid doing crap jobs, so moral indignation at this seems an odd reaction.

The deeper point is that poverty and unemployment aren't unfortunate by-products of our nation's economic organisation, they're necessary components of it. Capitalism needs people to be poor and out of work, it could not function without human slack. Which to me explains why people on Have Your Say bemoaning lazy dole fiddlers read identically to 18th century campaigners for reform of the Poor Law. This "problem" has barely altered in 300 years, except now we're a bit more circumspect as a society about actually letting people starve to death on the street.

is that really what michaelangelo would have done?

uh, xpost

Also, it's always nice when media outlets decide to switch attention away from companies who have spunked billions of pounds up the wall and bankrupted whole countries and focus on the real drains on our national wealth.

The deeper point is that poverty and unemployment aren't unfortunate by-products of our nation's economic organisation, they're necessary components of it.

I'm also pretty sure that there being personal drawbacks to not working is also a fairly important part of how the economy functions.

is that really what michaelangelo would have done?

I'm more interested in what Michael Angelis might have done.

I'm also pretty sure that there being personal drawbacks to not working is also a fairly important part of how the economy functions.

Yes, and the economy is intended to function in the interests of all the people who live within it oh wait

I think you'd be a great Thomas the Tank Engine narrator, Mike.
xpost

I dunno NV, that last one went above my head.

My point was that I completely understand why people try to avoid doing crap jobs, so moral indignation at this seems an odd reaction.

i think most of the posts agree with you in understanding why people try to avoid doing crap jobs. I'm not sure that I agree with you that it's hard to understand why it pisses others off.

I just don't know whether to start laughing or crying when morality and Capitalism get squished up together.

History of the World = history of the Many being robbed by the Few. The Not Quite as Poor getting all butthurt about the Poor skimming a little off the bottom, when they're being milked from the top, is just pitiful "this is why we are all fucked" blindness.

(xp to ST)

Episode 437: Fat Controller Crosses ASLEF Picket Line
Episode 438: Popular Support Throughout Sodor For Thomas and Percy's Go-Slow
Episode 439: Sir Topham Hatt Under House Arrest

Etc.

NV: no moral indignation here. Yes, I can understand why people try to avoid doing crap jobs; however, as Darraghmac basically points out, what's the alternative? Nobody works in Tesco because it's a bit shit?

I guess my attitude to this whole subject is all over the fucking shop at the moment. Without repeating my own circumstances (see work/careers/education threads passim), my general feeling right now is that pretty much all of us have to make the best of a bad job (pun intended).

I'm not saying there aren't people out there who have been absolutely fucking shafted from the off; from the moment they popped, screaming, into the world. There are: thousands upon thousands of them.

But there are also a lot of people, in every stratum of society, whose expectations far exceed what's actually practical. (As a paid-up and still proud member of the NUJ, I know this only too well. Until very recently, I was probably one of them.)

I'm also not saying I haven't been a lucky middle-class journalist cunt: I have. I'd be a churlish twat to complain about my own situation. But, you know, what's a dude to do? Sit on my arse going: "Not doing that, it's beneath me, fuck off" or go out and get another job -- one that might be a long, long way from what I feel I "deserve" or am "entitled to"?

Given that -- in all seriousness -- I expect I'll be applying for part-time work in Tesco long before my current studies are finished, you can maybe understand why I don't have much sympathy with the former viewpoint.

As an individual you can do whatever you feel like you need to do to get thru the world. I'm as conflicted about this shit as anybody, and mostly tend to agree that subscribing to the palpably mythological idea that we have to pull ourselves up by our bootstraps is preferable to subscribing to the palpably mythological idea that our fellow human beings ought to cooperate for our mutual benefit. Because it won't happen because we are heads down in our own shit all the time.

But the notion that the people on the bottom are somehow the secret rulers of the world tripping thru the daisies of their meadow-fresh lives while the rest of us keep them in the style of Czars is the oldest lie of the whole bullshit mountain.

In other words you have to make your own life worth living but let's stop pretending our victims are our enemies. That's how we got here in the first place.

History of the World = history of the Many being robbed by the Few

subtitle- competition works.

NV i think you've gone waay off here.

Ok so I have a question after reading this thread - my own upbringing has moulded me into someone with the following views which I have never really questioned but maybe should!

1) I am pretty much in favour of the government taking money from People Like Me (defined however) and giving it to Poor People (etc)
2) On the occasions when I would have been eligible for benefits (eg spending three months looking for temp etc work) I have never even countenanced the idea - it seemed like it was, gross, perverted, for me to do so, like stealing money from Oxfam.

Are these views defensible? Or even compatible? I would like to know what to think on this issue - I'm not happy with sticking to views that I think are basically daft, but I'm not sure what to replace them with.

xpost

I just think this boils down to believing that this is the best of all possible worlds versus not, darragh. I fully accept I might well be wrong, deluded and/or pathetic.

xpost

Those could be compatible positions if you don't think of yourself as a Poor People even if you happen to be unemployed for a while. There ought to be other ways of thinking about unemployment benefits tho - they started out as form of insurance, in theory, although they've never really been that because it was a form of insurance for people mostly too poor to insure themselves privately.

"From each according to his ability, to each according to his need"

Which is why you feel like not claiming, as you did not 'need' it, right?

But the notion that the people on the bottom are somehow the secret rulers of the world tripping thru the daisies of their meadow-fresh lives while the rest of us keep them in the style of Czars is the oldest lie of the whole bullshit mountain

Yes, couldn't agree more. I mean, there's a whole shitload of sociopsychological stuff to deal with here: we're now getting to the stage where, I think, the third generation is being born into families that aren't "working", and I cannot really begin to conceive of what their outlook on the world/society is going to be. Put it this way: I imagine it will be substantially fucking different from yer average Daily Mail reader's.

My problem is that I've no real conception of how many dudes are in this position, and how many are simply the kind of fuckers I've come across many times in my life who take great personal pride in (and devote huge amounts of time to) avoiding getting a job.

Yeah, but sadly people's personal fecklessness and dislikability can still be the result of fronting their way out of a situation they can't really escape anyway, and making a vehement virtue out of your loser status doesn't necessarily mean that you're not a loser.

Mark, Noodle - those are helpful thoughts, thank you.

the rest of us keep them in the style of Czars

no-one's saying that. but where do you draw the line at what people are entitled to from the state/society?

The % of people of any population that cannot or should not be expected to work is tiny.

I just think this boils down to believing that this is the best of all possible worlds versus not, darragh. I fully accept I might well be wrong, deluded and/or pathetic.

i think there's definitely more shades of grey than that in it- there's nothing pathetic about idealism, but i'm not sure that it can be just applied to everything as a handy rule of thumb either.

and reverting to type-

knit their tubes together, that way there won't be any third generation unemployed.

From each according to his ability, to each according to his need

it's a lovely thought.

who decides 'ability' and 'need' though- the individual? society? a government board?

isn't this the core issue here?

The % of people of any population that cannot or should not be expected to work is tiny.

Yeah, but as I said the logic of Capitalism is that people out of work keep labour costs down, amongst other things. You could also say the % of a population that ought to be expected to be poor is tiny but we don't organise our economic affairs that way.

making a vehement virtue out of your loser status doesn't necessarily mean that you're not a loser

Of course -- although, of course, it doesn't necessarily mean you are.

The % of people of any population that cannot or should not be expected to work is tiny

Who's doing the expecting here? You or them? Because, with each subsequent generation born into long-term unemployed families, the gulf between the two increases, probably exponentially.

I'm not saying that makes you wrong: if a dude is fit and healthy enough to work, why shouldn't they work? Problem is, if the very concept of work is something as intangible to said dude as Fermat's last theorem, we've got ourselves a problem, haven't we?

I guess my problems with Labour's approach to solving it can be summed up in three words: carrot not stick.

My problem is: Workhouses didn't work, ironically.

And where do we go here? The Gov is posturing, right? Because they haven't got the cajones to see people actually starve. If you want to consistently say "the lazy don't eat" you have to be prepared to back that up right to its final conclusion, I'd've thought. Otherwise any amount of threat is finally empty. But I'd hate to think MPs were simply saying shit to score points.

Let's see now.

Everyone thrown out of work because the Government and the banks misspent our money is now going to be punished by the Government and the banks.

Way to go.

^^^ Occam's Razor

But I'd hate to think MPs were simply saying shit to score points.

Hate away.

If you want to consistently say "the lazy don't eat" you have to be prepared to back that up right to its final conclusion, I'd've thought

but that's a real HYS opinion, not what the govt say- the govt position is probably more accurately 'the unemployed can expect to be able to live hand-to-mouth and no more'.

Problem is, if the very concept of work is something as intangible to said dude as Fermat's last theorem, we've got ourselves a problem, haven't we?

i'm not sure i believe that there is a huge amount of people out there that couldn't be brought around to the concept of work if necessary.

should point out that i'm only speaking from POV of the economic good times, where jobs are out there and available, if not particularly palatable. bringing the banks and subsequent shenanigans into it turns it into a totally different discussion.

Fair enough about hand to mouth but enforcing that without vouchers and tags and lots of things that they will bottle out of comes to the same thing. Their isn't a very long way for them to cut and they know this.

Gbx, it has been a policy of the current government, for the last 10 years for 50% of british school leavers to go to university and it has seeped into society that not going to university is somehow a very poor option. Because there are so many graduates around, even ones with po-dunk degrees from po-dunk universities, comapnies might as well use graduate/non-graduate as a filter.

The previous government eviscerated the polyechnics, making them univsities or FE colleges meaning that there is now very little opporrtunity to go and get more practical skills training for what skilled manual jobs there are left unless you are lucky enough to get taken on as an apprentice somewhere. I am fairly sure that the lack of a skilled labour base has led to a lack of well paying skilled jobs, why build your factiry here when the skills aren't here. We import our skilled labour from abroad when we need it because we don't train our own and so people are shut out from well paying skilled manual jobs which used to be a route to a comfortable existence.

should point out that i'm only speaking from POV of the economic good times, where jobs are out there and available, if not particularly palatable. bringing the banks and subsequent shenanigans into it turns it into a totally different discussion.

Yeah god forbid we talk about what's actually happening in the real world.

Is unemployment or globalization a more effective way of reducing wages?

If they put the working class in another country maybe they don't need one here anymore

i'm not sure i believe that there is a huge amount of people out there that couldn't be brought around to the concept of work if necessary

Absolutely: to take it down to basic behavioural psychology, it's all about reconditioning. Trouble is, that takes time, and necessitates a very different approach to the one the government is pursuing (let alone to the shit spouted by rabid HYS-ers, but fuck them).

And yes, as you rightly say: this entire thing is predicated on there being jobs out there in the first place.

Their isn't a very long way for them to cut

i totally agree with you here. i really think that the problems with the system hinge on "how many and who" are getting benefits- the amounts themselves are too low for genuine cases.

Matt- to be fair, the points raised in the thread really hadn't much to do with the economic downturn, apart from a few offshoots.

Ed I'm not sure I agree with you there - it's a chicken/egg thing really isn't it? Why build your factory here when it's cheaper to build it in another country? And why train people in skills for which there's a falling demand?

Likewise what we're really talking here is social mobility (or a complete lack of it for those at the very bottom) and nothing increases social mobility more than having more people going to university. I'm not sure reaffirming the class system on school leavers is the productive way forward.

Why build your factory here when it's cheaper to build it in another country?

Green tax! who'd have the balls tho

Very much chicken/egg, but you still can't have chickens without eggs so we import increasingly more chickens.

Likewise what we're really talking here is social mobility (or a complete lack of it for those at the very bottom) and nothing increases social mobility more than having more people going to university

Social mobility's all very well as long as there's something there for you when you've finished mobilising.

Grimly, yeah I know, that's part of the whole stupidity of the situation of the government thundering "get back to work!" at a time when tens of thousands of people are being made redundant.

nothing increases social mobility more than having more people going to university.

aren't there too many people going to university already? there sure is over here.

Wait, you mean we're importing more eggs, right? I am somewhat metaphorically strained here.

No we import full formed chickens. (Eggs being trainees or training colleges).

We say university is the key to social mobility but it wasn't so long ago that a job in a coal mine or a shipyard or on the railways was the key to social mobility and lifelong security.

That was before Thatcher decided they were all evil.

be fair, she hasn't conclusively been proven wrong there yet.

super xpost

i'm not lj.

i tried applying in the local tesco but they weren't hiring and i asked in kfc but the only hours they had going conflicted with uni. being a bit poor (ok sure its only student poverty but i'd like a bit of extra moneys), i don't think any job is beneath me (unless you were referring to the people in the bbc piece), it just seems bloody hard to find anything at the moment. I went into the uni jobshop about a week ago to ask and they said they had nothing going bar a couple specialist jobs (working with the disabled and stuff i'm not qualified for) and they said it was quite unprecedented as this time last year they were putting like 10 jobs a day on their website.

I was there before she decided and they were all perfectly fine.

jesus christ people, next you'll be acting like benefit fraud is morally wrong

I'm still waiting for the equivalent offshore tax loophole ad on TV.

I'm not sure that the inherent qualities of particular jobs is as much of an issue, as the lack of a social context that makes them meaningful. Most of us would regard shoveling shit as a thankless job, but shoveling shit on the beloved family farm is a very different proposition from shoveling shit at a corporate facility. More broadly, jobs that involve something tedious or unpleasant are a little easier to take if you're doing so in the service of something you think is worthwhile, or at least honest.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to romanticize an imaginary past in which shit-shovelers were considered noble pillars of the community. But there's no denying that modern life is atomized to a nearly unprecedented extent, and this takes its toll in myriad ways, some of which are described in this thread.

So I can't really blame someone for not wanting to sacrifice their time (which is, after all, the only irreplaceable commodity) for something essentially meaningless to them -- but meaning outside the self is a lot harder to come by if you're not invested in some kind of community. A Japanese-style corporation might be able to afford that (in both senses of the word "afford"), but that's more or less unknown in the Anglo-American business world, and on its way out in Japan.

In other words, the whole art school vs. shitty job dichotomy (as seen on Stuff White People Like) is at least partly a red herring. I don't think the key issue is people being lazy, or expecting to have fantastic jobs that are all about their own self-expression. Both of those things happen, of course, but they don't account for what I think is the real issue -- the profound sense of disconnectedness felt by so many people in the Western world.

Unless we intend to force people to work to survive -- something I think is ultimately unconscionable, in a society as wealthy as ours -- then making quote-unquote "drop-outs" into "productive members of society" will depend on giving them a good reason to rejoin. Material carrots and sticks might do for a while, but in the long run I think it has to be based on a fundamental belief in the transparency, integrity, and coherence of their own society -- or, at least, the belief that meaningful change is possible.

That is a great post, I think!

Well, guess I'll be applying for that job in Tesco a little sooner than I expected: I was effectively made redundant this afternoon, along with around 249 colleagues. 200 new jobs being created, with new titles, terms, conditions and presumably salaries; we're obviously able to apply for these, but whether anything will suit my unusual circumstances (ie trying to do an MSc at the same time), I've no idea. Oh, and there's the small matter of whether they'd want me back anyway :(

So: Grimly puts money where mouth is shocker, I guess. Still. Rats' cocks.

really sorry to har that grimly.

really sorry to hear that, grimly.

Ach. Thanks, man: I appreciate that. Such is life, I guess.

The 'long-term unemployed' are an inevitable consequence of the last 30 years of intended dismantling of productive and manufacturing industries, the atomisation of employment as a function, the neutering of organized labour (and removal of labour as an organized entity), and of increased globalization. This surely has affected every western nation the same - but the UK more than most

Above somebody stated that unemployment is a necessary component of capitalism, in order to reduce wage costs. this is of course correct (even more so when those jobs can be held overseas). A secondary function of the unemployed is to act as a repository for state spending - after all the money that goes to the unemployed is immediately spent back into the wider economy, the unemployed are not in a position to save. At a time when we are being exhorted to spend, this function is clear

In the past this may have been achieved through Keynesian style building of roads, bridges and hospitals. When the pubic will not/cannot spend, the govt must do it for them. Money can equally be introduced to and circulated via benefits.

Above somebody stated Thatcher's large role in this. Yes this is true but even there this was surely happening largely throughout the 70s - Thatcher merely increasing the pace

With the 'boom' of the late 80s the losers, the people on the other side, were manifest and clear, and still had a voice of some kind (though it was to be the last time they were to have a voice). With the 'boom' of the last 10 years, the losers were swept under the carpet, we were told they didn't exist, the unemployment figures massaged. The long term unemployed are surely the children of the working class that lost entire sectors of industry sold down the river by the wholesale outsourcing and exporting of work abroad over the last 3 decades.

But they wanted cheaper labour costs abroad and powerless employees

good luck grimlord.

yeah that sucks Grimly, hope things turn out well.

Keep on trucking, Grim. You don't strike me as a guy to let them bastards grind you down.

Sorry, Grimly. I remember you saying not too long ago you'd made a sacrifice in your work-life in order to do something more meaningful. I'd hate to think that was a bad decision, now, but hey, gotta look ahead not behind anyway.

man, sorry grimly. i know a good double handful of people out of work at the moment, in a range of industries (although concentrated in media). i expect i'll know even more by this time next year. (assuming i'm not among them, which is always possible.) it's gonna get transatlantic ugly.

Media industry's crazy right now. Back in February there were 50/55 jobs on national magazines on Gorkana. Currently there's nine.

Media Guardian thinner than I've ever seen it as well.

I dunno, in terms of London there seem to be quite a few media jobs, though that said I've been applying for stuff for about 4 weeks and no interviews yet. But the jobs are there. I feel v lucky to have BBC internal jobs available to me on top of reading the papers etc...

i'm tempted to sack off my admin job and just sign on benefits for depression or something. if the gov pays my rent, then i shouldn't be too out of pocket.

Sorry to hear, grimly, and good luck.

Going back some time here, but:
you people do realise there is no fucking excuse in this day and age for a person to be out of work for any period over, say, ten days, right? If you want to piss and moan that all the jobs out there are "beneath you", fine

Doesn't matter what "you" think, if the employer thinks the job might be "beneath you" (e.g. person with experience of supposed skilled professional career applying for temping, retail, manual work), your CV goes in the bin under the assumption that you wouldn't accept anyway / you'll quit after a week / there must be something terribly wrong with you to consider a change of career.

Which ain't great if your industry is going down the shitter, or you're so specialised that your exact role is rare, or you just plain don't like it and want a change.

Gravel Puzzleworth: note that if you sign on the NI contributions for a state pension are paid, and they won't be if you don't. You might get a letter prompting you to top it up at the end of the tax year though (got one of these from a few years back, must deal with it as it expires soon).

I've heard of people who sign on even though they have too many savings to get benefits, just to have their pension contribution paid. (I don't know if they still make you fill in all the paperwork and apply you for jobs which are never going to phone back because of that career suspicion thing up there. If so, doesn't really seem worth the hassle, but hey...)

that sucks grimly.

i've just had a very strange phonecall offering my christmas work at woolies. this should be ok to take yes?

Well, unless they do a fopp, and 1 day after christmas, shut all the shops and tell the employees to go apply to the official receivere for their pay...

sure.

Doesn't matter what "you" think, if the employer thinks the job might be "beneath you" (e.g. person with experience of supposed skilled professional career applying for temping, retail, manual work), your CV goes in the bin under the assumption that you wouldn't accept anyway / you'll quit after a week / there must be something terribly wrong with you to consider a change of career.

Which ain't great if your industry is going down the shitter, or you're so specialised that your exact role is rare, or you just plain don't like it and want a change.

Sorry to hear, grimley, I saw the report in the report in the paper and thought of you.

Thanks, everyone, for your kind words: I'm genuinely touched.

To be honest: whatever happens, I'll make the best of it. What else can I do? I've not got nearly enough information to work out what I'm going to do yet ... in some ways this limbo period is going to be the worst time (and is bound to make for an, er, unique office atmosphere over the next couple of weeks).

Whatever happens: I'm young(ish), dependent-free and have minimal outgoings. It's the older staff I really feel for. Negotiations, however, are ongoing ... we'll see what transpires.

Thanks again, though.

More sympathies Grimly. I know several people who have be "released" lately. My boyfriend, after 13 years with his company, was told his job was being transferred to Asia and he would be no longer needed.

To be honest: whatever happens, I'll make the best of it. What else can I do?

This is a good attitude, hold on to it. It sounds cliched but things like this often lead you to something better in the end.

Commiserations to your boyfriend, Susan: that's heartily sucky.

I should also point out that I'm not the only ILX0r affected by this (although I'm probably the most active poster at the moment).

I read that as "attractive" at first.

Oh, of course. That's a given.

(Actually: it's really not. But hey. Positive mental attitude in every aspect, and all that.)

Good luck stet too?

The main non-Murdoch newspaper publisher here recently rolled out 550 redundancies – inc 70 from the Sydney broadsheet and 55 from their Melbourne one – they aimed for voluntaries, but had two few reporters putting their hands up. So to meet the management quota, casual subs (of years’ standing) were offered ongoing jobs as reporters on the condition that they immediately take redundancy...

I had to read that twice to check I was understanding it properly. It seemed too utterly fucking crazy at first.

Wow. That's ... beyond fucked-up.

Sorry Simon, I've been lax with keeping up with this thread, a bloody shame but I hope you manage to get something out of it, even if not necessarily within the Record.

Back in 1980 I was offered (unsolicited) an apprenticeship as a journalist with the Herald but turned it down since at the time I was keener to get to Oxford and university. I've no idea what the current situation is with them but I still think I made the right decision.

Yeah, I went for a trainee journo post at our local paper.

Didn't get it, never regretted it.

I've no idea what the current situation is with them but I still think I made the right decision

Oh, you did!

Thanks again for your kind words. If anyone's interested in the details of this malarkey and can be arsed digging it out on iPlayer: Newsnight Scotland did a big "ooh shit the Scottish media's fucked, isn't it?" special last night.

I'm presuming Pat Kane turns up at some point...

... like a bad smell?

Heheh. I'm in touch with Pat still; I think he's well out of the Herald loop. To be honest, I'm not sure Newsnicht would even have bothered to contact him; if they did, I'm pretty much 99% sure he'd have said no. And been bloody glad about it.

ooh shit the Scottish media's fucked, isn't it?"

^ Absolutely true, but a) BBC Scotland parochialism; b) we're fucked at an interesting and exciting new level now.

(woolies obviously didn't work out. i wasn't expecting it to, really. its just a bit of a kick in the teeth when the only job offer i've had in forever is from a sinking ship. so glad i still have government funding.)

Sorry to hear that, but it's maybe for the best. Would have been interesting, certainly ;)

Hey Simon, hope you get fixed up quickly. I'm also unemployed, it's shit but there are the days where you feel happy to be doing nothing. FRIDAYS AND SUNDAYS!

(sundays because of having monday off, of course)

Ach, they've not booted us out on the streets just yet! That's the thing: they've not even issued us with redundancy statements. Despite how this has been reported (yeh, yeh, typical fucking media), the official line is that each and every job is "at risk of redundancy"; those of us who aren't re-hired on new contracts are out the door.

The question, as proposed on Newsnicht last night, was: er, if people aren't actively redundant, why are you wanting them all to apply for a reduced number of new jobs? Difficult one to answer, that.

At the moment we're in limbo, waiting for a) the list of new jobs; b) new Ts&Cs; c) notice of redundancy.

that seems like a really horrible way of dealing with things

if people aren't actively redundant, why are you wanting them all to apply for a reduced number of new jobs?

jesus yeah- where's the legal standpoint on that?

My understanding is that you can only legally be made redundant if your current post is going to cease to exist. I'm sure there's a million clever work-arounds for that tho.

so the new workers aren't going to be doing anything that they currently do. hm.

Sorry, been tied up with other stuff and neglecting my ILX duties ... no, hang on, that's not the attitude ... yes, fundamentally "clever workarounds" is exactly it. I've heard a whole heap of theories and so on in the last couple of days, none of which (obviously) I'm keen to go into on a public forum.

Darraghmac: that's one for the NUJ to consider, certainly.

Ultimately: it's actually all too utterly weird/unprecedented to get a handle on. And right now I'm still totally in the dark about any of it. All I know is we're expected -- in the short term -- to carry on working as usual!

At least there is the promise of new C on T's to look forward to

Way to go for Cameron to win the next election, not.

The Tory programme, modelled on a German scheme

chortle

'The Shannon Matthews case was a horrendous extreme and in no way typical, but it raises the curtain on a way of life in some of our most deprived estates, of entire households blah blah blah,' said Grayling.

They have work schemes for long term unemplyed here in Aus... they don't work terribly well. While I was on the dole some years back I *wanted* to use every program I could to make finding jobs easier - I figured hey, going to a free service where they'll sit down and chat to me and adjust a set of jobs to suit, sounds awesome! People pay rectruitment firms to do similar!

Of course in practice, they're hopeless. I didnt get any jobs that even *remotely* matched my skillset, but you're not supposed to turn down jobs sent to you. Luckily the ones they offered me (working in a printing factory out in the sticks!?) were so far off base I didnt even get asked to interviews but still. They focus purely on lower-run job stuff like shop staff, factory workers, etc. No one in IT or admin or other skilled professions wants to go anywhere near the welfare jobseek agencies... they all just use Seek and Monster.com and recruiters.

You'd think the dole office could work in conjuntion with actual recruiters and Seek and whatnot but thats too logical.

Certainly in this country, back to work schemes are awarded to contractors purely on results, and funded accordingly (i.e. those who can get people into work and people into sustained employment, which is more than 13 weeks off benefits) they concentrate on the lowest skilled people and the equivalent jobs because they are easier to get results from - people go into a call centre/factory for one day and that's your result, way easier hit rate than having to actually wait for someone to go through a proper interview process for a real job. None of them actually give much of a fuck about your long-term prospects, they are just after their own.

Trayce, my youngest brother is having exactly that problem with social services. He's autistic, so he has trouble finding jobs on his own, but the social services people really have no idea what's available apart from one janitorial work programs for more severely disabled people. They gave him interview training, which is useful, but in terms of actually connecting him with employers who are willing to hire people with disabilities...well, they got him a 2 hour a week job doing manual labor and consider that "employed." It's incredibly frustrating that they consider that a success, when clearly the goal of helping someone find employment should be to eventually give them means to support themselves.

Meanwhile, "Labour" decides also to put the boot into the easiest and weakest targets.

No mention of clamping down on the billions squirrelled away in offshore accounts.

People trying to survive get stamped upon; casino capitalists get a free pass.

If they just got rid of the pointless VAT additions this wouldn't be a problem.

Tabloid bullies rule once more.

Well, on GMTV they were talking about 'cash in hand' builders/contractors in a new light..

The building expert was "they should reduce VAT on 'refurbs' ('new builds are 0 rated) to 5% so peoeple would actually pay for real. (The builders do not profit from collecting 17.5% (as was) and the client can't reclaim it like a client business can.

The rep from the etaxpayeres alliance actually agreed.

Then thingy castle bloke says "oh and those big businesses that have whole departments DEVOTED to avoiding paying slightly more tax than they have to!"

Ah, fair cheered me up for once.

Ah, I'd gone out of the house by the time that came on but well done them!

Those most likely to avoid paying taxes include self-employed people who receive cash payments such as builders, individuals who trade on the internet and buy to let landlords.

Are you fucking kidding me?

anything about freelance music journalists?

there are more builders.

(aren't there?)

Maybe the 25,000 job cuts at HMRC mean it's more cost-effective to go sfter the easy targets?