The Economic Downturn Support Thread

[A_Wanderer]

I'm diverting all the energy of not being able to bring girls back to my place (which is a couch in my parents house) into getting a job, it is an exponential amount of effort as time goes by.

In all seriousness how the fuck do you get a job, I have been sending cover letters and resumes off and I've gotten bugger all result, and this is with my first class honours degree and extensive people skills impressed through the letter and linked to the exact keywords in the advertisement, my long term prospects are brilliant, but getting a menial job is taking a lot of work, and in the immortal words of William Shatner "It Sickens Me".

Do I call, do I harass, do I just go door to door?

I'm registering with more temp agencies next week, but its been slim pickings thus far, and I rue the prospect of not having anything for the next 8 months - I'm just interested in suggestions of places to look, strategies to try, and people to lavish favours upon.

 

[anitram]

What are you looking for? Just something to pay the bills for the 8 months or do you actually want something in your field?

I never know really how to give advice to people because my profession is so regulated and we're basically recruited long before we even graduate, so I have limited experience looking for work in that sense. But as a student, I did all kinds of part time and summer jobs, and most of those I got because I had friends working at the place, etc.

 

[Pearl]

I don't know if its the crappy weather (NYC is starting to look like London and Seattle), or I am just losing it. I have little energy to get through my days, mainly because I have little to do but apply for jobs.

I've tried waiting on tables, but restaurants wouldn't take me because I was waaaay overqualified (I didn't tell them my past work experience, but I made the mistake of telling them I have an MA).

I've had a few freelance projects here and there, but not enough to financially support myself.

I'm starting to feel going to grad school was a huge mistake. If I didn't leave to get my master's, I still would have a job. Yes, there was no way of knowing the economy would falter when I left for school. But still...

The worst thing that is happening is that I think I am getting accustomed to being home a lot. I can't go out and be with my friends, because they all have jobs, and money! I don't have much cash to go hang out with them!

Ugh. This really sucks. I'm doing everything I can to get a job, trying to play the game right and write attention grabbing resumes and cover letters, but nothing.

I really do feel my MA was a waste. I really am starting to think it was not worth it.

OK, rant over.

 

[dsmith2904]

I read this great Q&A with Kai Ryssdal, host of NPR's "Marketplace" about what he does and how he got started. He had been in the Navy, worked for the state department and had a BA and MA, but was working at a bookstore and then took an internship before getting a job on the show. I think sometimes taking a chance on what might be a free or low-paying job can open new doors, especially if it's in a field that already interests you or benefits the world in some way. Good luck!!

Before going into radio, you flew planes off aircraft carriers, you briefed generals at the Pentagon, and you worked overseas for the State Department. Why did you give up that life of glamour to become a radio slave?
After eight years in the Navy, I'd done pretty much everything I'd joined the service to do, but I really wanted to keep going overseas and have the government pay for it. So I took the Foreign Service exam and joined the State Department, where I met the woman who would eventually become my wife. We got sent to Beijing. After a couple of years there, we said to each other, it's time for us to do something else. She wanted to go to graduate school, and by that time, I'd been in government service for almost 13 years. She got into the MBA program at Stanford. This was 1997. I said, "Well, gee, Silicon Valley. I'll get a job at some dot-com something." It took me about three seconds after we got back there to figure out I really had no interest in doing business, in being at a company.

To help pay the rent, I took a job at Borders Books in Palo Alto, shelving books. My wife was taking math refresher courses, and I was moping around trying to figure out what to do with my life. I was 34, and we were about to have a baby. She sat me down one day and said, "I think you ought to try journalism. You're this weird news freak who gets up at 5 o'clock on a Saturday morning to read The New York Times." I said, "Sure, fine," and didn't think much more about it. About a week later, I was in the bookstore, shelving books at closing time. I was in the Career & Counseling section. I grabbed a book to put back on the shelf, and it was one of those big, fat books of internships. I started flipping through it, and I found the name and the address of the senior news editor at KQED, and I wrote him a letter. He called me a couple days later and set me up with an internship two days a week.

I stuck around long enough that they finally put me on the air. When I was hosting The California Report one day, somebody down here at Marketplace heard me and called me about the Marketplace Morning Report job.

What advice would you give to someone who wanted to follow in your footsteps?
You have to do whatever makes you happy. You can't replicate what I did because I got unbelievably lucky. I was in the right place at the right time and willing to make a change and take some risks. When I came here to take the Morning Report job, I was married, I had two little children, and I was getting up in the middle of the night to go to work. You have to be willing to do whatever it takes. Never say no. If someone says, "Can you come in on Sunday and go to Chinatown to get us some tape for the Monday broadcast," you have to say yes. And that goes now more than ever in journalism, when it's so hard to find really good work. If you have an opportunity, you absolutely have to grab it.

 

[A_Wanderer]

I've decided to do a graduate diploma in philosophy next semester (and move onto a PhD) rather than get full time work, the job market is rather weak at the moment, and I don't want my brain to atrophy. Part-time work coupled with a student allowance should be easier to get than a decent geology job.

The swift kick up the arse that unemployment has given is useful, it's forced me to care much more about what I do, and reinstilled my sense of purpose. Obviously if I was a single parent struggling along, or an older systems engineer, or a 21 year old moron, the result would be different, I have the luxury of always having a couch in my parents living room (strangely enough not a place to bring girls).

 

[yolland]

^ Oh, cool! You're fortunate to live in a country where higher education isn't so exorbitantly expensive as to make such a plan near-suicidal.

Not that it's of much economic comfort, but the two most brilliant individuals I've ever met (IMO) were both double PhDs in philosophy and a hard science. And at least in the US, it's virtually a cliche that if you inquire into the academic backgrounds of a university's philosophy faculty, you always seem to find (particularly among the epistemologists for some reason) at least a couple people who have a master's in physics and planned on becoming physicists at one time, and they're usually among the sharpest minds in the department.

Best of luck with your plans.

 

[Angela Harlem]

I've decided to do a graduate diploma in philosophy next semester (and move onto a PhD) rather than get full time work, the job market is rather weak at the moment, and I don't want my brain to atrophy. Part-time work coupled with a student allowance should be easier to get than a decent geology job.

The swift kick up the arse that unemployment has given is useful, it's forced me to care much more about what I do, and reinstilled my sense of purpose. Obviously if I was a single parent struggling along, or an older systems engineer, or a 21 year old moron, the result would be different, I have the luxury of always having a couch in my parents living room (strangely enough not a place to bring girls).

You? Philosophy? Good luck with that! Nah, seriously, good stuff. Are you watching the budget? I turned it off to come upstairs and not think.

 

[anitram]

^ Oh, cool! You're fortunate to live in a country where higher education isn't so exorbitantly expensive as to make such a plan near-suicidal.

Good luck, A_W, it sounds like a good plan.

I may put in an application to do an LL.M. in 2010. I'm not totally sold on the idea, but the legal market (corp) is slow, so it may be something to do should the firms continue to cull. There are probably only 3 or 4 schools where I'd go to do it, though, otherwise I wouldn't be interested in spending the $50K or whatever it is these days.

 

[A_Wanderer]

^ Oh, cool! You're fortunate to live in a country where higher education isn't so exorbitantly expensive as to make such a plan near-suicidal.

Not that it's of much economic comfort, but the two most brilliant individuals I've ever met (IMO) were both double PhDs in philosophy and a hard science. And at least in the US, it's virtually a cliche that if you inquire into the academic backgrounds of a university's philosophy faculty, you always seem to find (particularly among the epistemologists for some reason) at least a couple people who have a master's in physics and planned on becoming physicists at one time, and they're usually among the sharpest minds in the department.

Best of luck with your plans.

I've gotten surprisingly hooked by going to the philosophy society, it definitely sharpens the mind and I find it improves my outlook on the world (I've also drawn in a physics PhD friend and we have some brilliant discussions). The philosophy of science, and philosophy of mind subjects really interest me (and logic is high on my agenda too), I anticipate that some of the skills I pick up will transfer into a more science oriented Palaeontology PhD (although there are other options out there).

As far as the economics of the plan goes, it would be very silly in a laizzes faire dystopia, I have developed a much greater respect for social democracy over the last year. I definitely need to learn how to write properly, and cultivate my own style, from what I hear this course should be useful to that end.

 

[A_Wanderer]

You? Philosophy? Good luck with that! Nah, seriously, good stuff. Are you watching the budget? I turned it off to come upstairs and not think.

I spotted the budget then retreated to see Star Trek at IMAX, I loved the idea of uncapping university admissions, a brilliant way to bring much needed mediocrity into bachelors degrees.

 

[A_Wanderer]

Good luck, A_W, it sounds like a good plan.

I may put in an application to do an LL.M. in 2010. I'm not totally sold on the idea, but the legal market (corp) is slow, so it may be something to do should the firms continue to cull. There are probably only 3 or 4 schools where I'd go to do it, though, otherwise I wouldn't be interested in spending the $50K or whatever it is these days.

It's always good to have productive backup plans ready to go, a sign of a smart and driven person

 

[Angela Harlem]

I spotted the budget then retreated to see Star Trek at IMAX, I loved the idea of uncapping university admissions, a brilliant way to bring much needed mediocrity into bachelors degrees.

they still gotta pass. don't feel threatened.

 

[A_Wanderer]

I only feel threatened by fellow PhD candidates in palaeontology

But I do love pretending to be an elitist

 

[Cactus Annie]

With all these stories of woe you'd think that we wouldn't have to put up with the shit that we hear. MP's claiming a fortune in expenses for so-called 2nd homes when they already on a very good wage. Other people who refuse to do what's in their job discription and rather just allow a producer to do the job they were hired to do in the first place and still get paid a fortune . At the begining of the year my mum was worried about whether she'd have a job come February because if the Co-op pulled out of its take-over plan for her company it would have gone bust. Yet she spends 45 hours a week at that place. She can't very well half complete her work then go home and leave someone else to do it for her.

Bloody greedy bankers still want their bonuses even though they allowed all the banks to crash . I thought getting a bonus was a show of appreciation of when you've done exceptional work, not a given. And they haven't done a good job. If they had we the tax payers wouldn't have to bail them out would we?