Livelihood | Unexpected Leisure

March 7, 2011

What if Education Isn’t the Answer?

Today's New York Times OpEd section features a typically thoughtful piece by Paul Krugman that challenges a truism that I have held for many years, in spite of evidence all around me that it might not reflect reality. Read more [...]

March 1, 2011

If You Just Lost Your Job

Psychologists will tell you that starting a new job is a highly stressful event, even if it's something you wanted. Change can be like that. So it's not hard to imagine how stressful it is if you just lost your job. Read more [...]

February 25, 2011

How Many Americans are Really Unemployed?

This is yet another reason why the Cheddar Rebellion in Wisconsin and elsewhere is so important. These jobs have gone away as the direct result of corporate excess enabled by the destruction of unions and deregulation. If we want to have jobs and restore the middle class, that's where the fight will be, and it has to be won. Read more [...]

February 23, 2011

Lessons From Wisconsin and Elsewhere

But the whole argument over unions and the accusation that unionized public employees make more money than their private sector counterparts (they don't), or that unions created the economic collapse we see happening around us (they didn't) masks what I think it a basic philosophical difference or, perhaps more accurately, a mythical difference. Read more [...]

February 22, 2011

The Diversified Skills Portfolio

Skills are capital, but the market does not always recognize them as such. Indeed, the ability of the market to make use of skills found among us seems to be getting worse, not better. Even when people go back to school to learn some new subject or skill or trade, too many of them find that the market can't find them a job as promised or, the job they do find is too little to support them. Read more [...]

February 20, 2011

The Age of the Generalist?

Some conversations with a few friends recently has prompted me to give this some thought with respect to the unemployment crisis. Our modern society has more and narrower specializations than at any time in history. That argues that because of our highly specialized job descriptions, losing that job to overseas outsourcing or other cause means that more people have to adapt because the few jobs that are left don't make the best use of one's specialty. It's downright uncivilized. Read more [...]

February 19, 2011

“Funny Numbers” on Inflation: It’s Higher Than You Think

Now the question is, if excess money in the system causes inflation, how bad is it? The answer is that it's worse than you're being told. Starting in the early 80's the Government began fiddling with the numbers used to define inflation. This practice continued through several presidential administrations. Read more [...]

February 16, 2011

Preparing for Unemployment: Are You Next?

You need to keep in mind the possibility that you could face the unemployment abyss in the not-too-distant future. The first thing you should do is try to assess your chances of a layoff. Low morale at company will say a lot. If management isn't trying to address poor morale, that says even more. Read more [...]

February 16, 2011

Is Long-Term Recovery Likely?

Washington, DC to Wall Street seem to assume is ramping up and going strong. For obvious reasons I remain dubious. I still have a lot of friends and associates who are either jobless or nearly so. It's also clear that in our new globalized world there are plenty of things that can tip the economics of the globe off kilter and cause trouble. Read more [...]

February 15, 2011

Spotting Job Scams

You've seen the ads; they're all over the web and if you do anything that hints of looking for work (like posting a resume or applying for a job online) you'll see them pile up in your email in-box. For heaven's sake, life is hard enough when you're scrambling for something, anything that can help pay the bills. Read more [...]