The Youth Unemployment Bomb

Post by gaius » Tue, Feb 08, 2011, 5:32 PM UTC

pzxc wrote: post #47

ylem wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have a sister who is unemployed in California (Pasadena), so I will make a few anecdotal observations. She was an honors student in college and taught special ed for some years before moving on to manage some group homes for the mentally impaired. She then went into home health care and became unemployed when a job offer fell through. During this time (over 1 year), she has applied for many jobs (including an inter…

I've never understood how being "overqualified" is a problem. No one says you have to list your degree or make mention of it. Just pretend you don't have one? What am I missing here? Are people too egotistical to accept a job at McDonald's when they have a degree? It has always been my opinion that any job is better than no job. If you need money, take what work you can. There's nothing that says you can't keep looki…

Post by gaius » Tue, Feb 08, 2011, 5:36 PM UTC

bartonfink wrote: post #75

kevindication wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One piece of advice: don't let the job ad make you think you're unqualified and stop you from applying. Employers often a) don't know what they want/need b) throw everything they can think of in that ad. It may be a challenge to get past the naive recruiter without all of the skills mentioned on your resume, but it can be worth it because the interview will bear out whether you'll actually be useful to the hiring man…

I find it very hard to understand how an employer could not know what they want or need in a new employee. I understand that it happens, but I have no idea how someone decides "hey, we need a new person" and has no idea what they would like that person to do. Hiring is a hard enough problem without handicapping yourself out of the gate by not having and expressing a clear idea of what you're looking for. How hard can…

Post by ianhawes » Tue, Feb 08, 2011, 5:57 PM UTC

pragmatic wrote: post #60

The simple answer is: These kids are training for the wrong jobs. College (in many areas) is a waste. Trade schools (vo-tech) offer a (almost 100%) guarantee of employment. A trade is a gateway to self employment (once you have your hours in for licensing). My brother has his master electrician's license in two states. He has more work than he knows what to do with. I have two friends who recently went back to school…

Post by bartonfink » Tue, Feb 08, 2011, 6:03 PM UTC

vaksel wrote: post #104

bartonfink wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know of one person who got a job that way. He was pretty damned good, and had the benefit that he was 18 at the time and didn't know that going door to door "never works."

was it for a real job or for a minimum wage type job(McDonalds etc)

Post by jamesbkel » Tue, Feb 08, 2011, 6:19 PM UTC

_delirium wrote: post #3

patio11 wrote: post #2

I'm most worried not for the numbers as for the corrosive effect long periods of unemployment have on employability. You lose the simple habits which are required for lots of gainful employment, such as "getting up before 9 AM consistently" and "working mostly non-stop for 8 hours a day". I see this in a lot of these articles where folks will, e.g., claim they applied for 15 jobs in 3 weeks. At some point the new nor…

(Relatedly: some days I wonder if the single most effective form of unemployment relief would be teaching people that sending out resumes is for suckers.) The welfare-reform efforts of the past 15-20 years in most western countries have tended to do exactly the opposite, oddly enough. Out of a worry that people were just receiving benefits without really looking for work, you must now demonstrate that you're actively…