How is recession affecting you?

[ar81]

I was wondering how were you affected by this crisis...

I have lived many crisis before. This time it did not affect me o much, but I see people around being affected like I was in the past.

[funchy]

After being the perfect worker, never taking a single sick day in 5 years of dedicated work, I was laid off in Jan as part of a downsizing.

Around here, nobody is even interviewing. I have a bachelor's degree in computer science, and I think right now the only place that's hiring around here is Walmart.

I was told I was "ineligible" for Unemployment Insurance claims because I was taking classes. According to the Unemployment office, I need to be available to work "any shift, any day".... even know the jobs I was looking at didn't conflict with the school schedule. They wanted me to drop out taking F's and take the first minimum wage McJob I could get. I found it odd they'd penalize people who are seeking retraining to become more employable, but that's the government for you.

Here's something interesting: officially I am not a part of the ~10% unemployment rate for my state. If you count others others ineligible for Unemployment Ins for other good reasons, plus the teen & retiree workers who cant get part time work, the discouraged workers, and others... my guess is that the real unemployment rate is more like double what they say it is, so that's like ~20%. (It's true the unemployment numbers they usually give are based mainly on Unemployment Insurance recipients, not on the real # of people who are not working) When we compare this "deep recession" with markers of the Great Depression, maybe we're closer than we think to the Depression?

Some of my friends are doing ok. My best friend is looking at his year-end projections and expects an involuntary drop of $10,000 in pay this year because he's commission based (working for a major soda corporation). Another had his house foreclosed on when it sat on a market with a massive loan [negative equity] for too long, even know he and his wife are both working... they are leasing now. On my street out of 6 properties 2 are for sale (have been for ages, no offers). I wish I could put my own home on the market, but no way would it sell unless I practically gave it away. Even the housing developers in my town are selling off some of the platted/planned "developments" that never broke ground, rather than waiting to build.

The company who owns the huge regional shopping mall for my area is in Bankruptcy. The mall itself won't close, but it's a sign of deeper economic problems.

The nonprofit I'm the director of has seen donations drop to about half of what they were in 2007. Supporters are still here but they keep saying "I really wish I could donate this year but..." spouses lost their job, losing their home, taking pay cuts, whatever. Grant money vanished since much of the small-to-mid sized grants are from Foundations which in turn kept their money in things linked to the stock market. As a result the number of the program helps has also dropped in half, leaving a gap in services in the community.

The nonprofit also lost its credit line when that bank decided to stop lending to all small businesses of that category. Running a small business (profit or nonprofit) is hard enough without suddenly losing the cushion of knowing you have a credit line. The org decided not to bother trying to open another one right now. It's being run on a cash basis, making it impossible to give the lifeline emergency help, so again the community suffers. (if anyone is wondering: I work on a volunteer basis, so I don't have to worry about a paycut or layoff there)



I made the best of things. I went from parttime school to fulltime, aiming to get a degree in a field that actually is hiring. I'm going into healthcare. However, it's disconcerting to hear from my friends that their healthcare/hospital facilities may have hiring freezes on. When I graduate in 2011, hopefully things will be improving.

Perhaps things are different elsewhere? This is just what I'm seeing here in my little corner of the world.

[Double]

I have grown wiser. Studing the phenomon has made me understand not only what causes these reccesions but what is responsible for the multitudes of human, and the environments sufferings. And it feels great.

[velvet1]

Originally Posted by funchy

I made the best of things. I went from parttime school to fulltime, aiming to get a degree in a field that actually is hiring. I'm going into healthcare. However, it's disconcerting to hear from my friends that their healthcare/hospital facilities may have hiring freezes on. When I graduate in 2011, hopefully things will be improving.

Perhaps things are different elsewhere? This is just what I'm seeing here in my little corner of the world.

This is what I'm going to do, go into the medical field as an interpreter. I'm kind of hoping for universal health care, it could create more jobs in the medical field.

[David Turnbull]

Being only 19 it didn't really affect me at all, although I sold my shares in Nintendo at the right time, and have been pretty good at saving. For a while the recession even sort of helped since the Aussie dollar dropped for a bit, and I get paid in USD. But of course I'm glad that everything seems to be recovering now.

[aelle]

I wasn't materially affected - I graduated, I found a job I like (sure it took me some time, but it was my first post graduate job so I have no ground for comparison), I work and make money, I have insurance, I pay rent, I go out and have fun. But the overall climate is wearing me thin. I try hard to keep my spirits high and not get dragged down by the ambient negativity.

[ar81]

Some news I have found on it.

Route to Recovery » Blog Archive » An unemployed banker on the Appalachian Trail | Blogs |

Route to Recovery » Blog Archive » Jobless, homeless, all this small band has is each other | Blogs |

[SomeRandomGuy]

The only direct impact I have felt is that my company cut salaries by 4% company wide. I think that hurt some people pretty badly, but has only slowed down our savings rate a bit.

I'm seeing a lot of people around me try to start saving, and cut back on unnecessary expenses. Assuming that they learn from this experience, and do not fall back into their old habits I think that the long term impact could be positive. Obviously some people are hurting badly from the recession, but I'm not seeing a whole lot of that where I am.

[ar81]

Recession shows shortcomings in U.S. economic data | Small Business | Reuters

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. government is having a tough time guesstimating how many small businesses failed in this recession, casting doubt on the reliability of vital data on employment and economic growth.

It looks data is not reliable.

[Daffy Duck]

Interesting to hear of how things are going in your local area, Funchy. In Florida we have plenty of work here for good computer scientists! At least in my local area...

The recession hasn't affected me at all. One of my friends recently had to take a 20% pay cut, but he didn't lose his job like some others in his company.

[ar81]

It seems like banks that cause crisis are now a natural disaster.
Now you have financial Katrina making towns to be ghost towns.
Route to Recovery » Blog Archive » “Tour de Depression” of Buffalo’s slow-moving Katrina | Blogs |
May I suggest to name the next hurricane as Lehmann Brothers or AIG?

FDIC fund falls into the red, Bair urges lending | Reuters
This is what happens when you do not solve the problem of incentives to take risks and to fail.

[vMike]

Business is a bit slow, but mostly because I'm lazy. I do have a few friends who had jobs as programmers etc and were fired though.

[ar81]

U.S. unemployed face higher healthcare premiums | U.S. | Reuters

[Lightgirl]

I have found a great job soon after the recession started And a very well-payed one.

Most people around me like to say: "Recession is just in the heads".