Archive for January, 2007

– Michelle Campa

“You are over 50 so we won’t even ask you about your job searching. It is very hard to find a job in this area if you are older.” That is what the unemployment agent told me when I lost my job in 2002 and signed up for benefits. He said there is age discrimination “out there” but you cannot prove it. I collected benefits until they ran out the following year and was never asked about my job searches.

I spent the entire year that I was collecting benefits searching for a job. I was always a dependable and dedicated employee with team spirit. I figured I was valuable and an asset to a company. After all, as a corporate salesperson, I had always made excellent sales and was the best salesperson in my territory and number three nationwide. It was not long before I found out that I was not of value at all.

Job searches ended with doors slamming behind me. I heard every excuse in the book. After some time, I had to set my sights lower. I was told to get computer knowledge in this program and that program. So I went to night school and got the education. A few hundred dollars later I went back to the same companies and the new excuse was that I had no experience. Talk about a rock and a hard place. So I set my sights even lower. You cannot get much lower than retail sales. Suddenly there were lots of jobs available to me…but at $6.00 an hour. That was far less then my previous income.

One of my retail jobs, at $6.00 an hour, lasted a whole nine months. Wow! I was actually one of the employees who lasted a long time. But after the abusive customers and the fifth manager turnover, I finally quit.

About four years ago I sat quietly and started to think about my future. It became very clear that I had to start my own business. I had no idea what to do. I had always loved painting and over the years sold my paintings at arts and craft shows and also over 100 paintings to greeting card companies who published them. I remembered a Bible quote: (paraphrased) “What do you have in the house?” So I started to think about that. I walked around the house looking for clues. Then I looked at my art and the idea hit me. I took some of my paintings and made prints of them. I matted them and framed some of them. I set up at my local farmers market with two card tables. I started to sell. As I made more prints and made more money I set up more tables and invested in a canopy for the rainy days. Each year I grew.

With the weekly exposure people began to give me commissions. Last year I decided to expand to other communities’ farmers markets. Not only was I doing well in other towns, I also got orders for art in public buildings. As I met more people I had requests to teach painting. So I started to do that as well, which keeps me going in the winter months when the farmers markets are not in operation. My freelance art for publishers grew as well. It was hard to find time to actually paint new art, but I did.

In 2006 I realized that I was doing well in my small community but that it was time to think larger. So at the end of 2006 I had a web site created. My plan now is to market my art all over the United States. Since tourists from all over the U.S. were buying my work, when they were on vacation in my town, I figured other people in other areas would like it too. I am right. Never underestimate what you can do on your own.

– Andy Daitsman

I hold a Ph.D. (1995) in Latin American history from the University of Wisconsin. After ten years of one-year replacement jobs, including schools like Dartmouth, Holy Cross, and California-Berkeley, and a short stint overseas, I switched into high school teaching four years ago. Two years ago I took a position teaching ninth grade history at a small district in suburban Boston. Unfortunately, the principal and superintendant who hired me both retired during my first year. The new principal and superintendant, concerned that my Ph.D. and years of experience put me at the top of the salary scale, took advantage of my lack of tenure to not renew my contract.

I recently took a position teaching Spanish language at a suburban high school in Boston. It’s outside my discipline, and the pay is $20,000 less than I would have earned had my previous contract been renewed, but it is work and I can afford to pay my bills. If I get renewed for the fall, I’ll be back on tenure track as a high school teacher, but at the moment even that is not assured.

 – Brian Tanguay

I’m fortunate to be a unionized public-sector worker, and I’m proud to be an active union member, but I am worried about this country and what thirty years of Conservative, dog-eat-dog ideology has done to the middle class. The rhetoric is wrong: we need each other and we need a collective vision if we are to survive.

– Myles Halsband 

After listening to Barbara Ehrenreich on WBUR in Boston today (October 3, 2006), I went directly to the United Professionals website to sign up. I am interested in building a chapter in the Boston area to work on advocacy issues and to provide a support network. Please contact me at myles.halsband@monumentdata.com.

– Jay M. 

Just after reading a blurb on her books, I definitely fit the profile. I have an MBA from Top-10 Carnegie-Mellon, 17 years of professional experience (yep - one of those “loaded” resumes), but I’m just a Business Analyst at 44. Despite huge work accomplishments, impossible projects made possible, years of unpaid overtime, downsizings, salary cuts, unwanted relocations, etc. we’re barely getting by trying to make it as a family of 3 on a single-income. I’ve given up on ever retiring, let alone to someplace nice & warm. I’m hanging on to my last small hope, which is that I can manage to stay under the hit-list radar for another 10 years so my son can at least get through a reasonably decent public school. (Sidebar: Private School? At $15K a year, where the hell would I find that kind of cash? We can’t afford to go to

By Nikki Zeichner, Wage to Live

And yet, despite the interconnectedness of the millions living here, we generally don’t talk about the way that some people in the City earn unreal amounts of money and others work full time for unlivable wages.   Perhaps not having to talk about wage disparity is one of the freedoms of living in the city.  However, it’s also a tremendous problem.

In New York City, because the cost of living is high, a living wage for a single person is a little over $18 per hour (based on a formula by Universal Living Wage, which allows rent to only count for 30% of one’s earnings, and based on the Department of Housing and Urban Development’s account of the rental rate of a studio in NYC as $926).  Needless to say, many people in the City are earning less than this amount – and a disproportionate percentage of those earning less than a living wage work in the service industry.  Many believe that low wages in the service industry are inevitable and that businesses cannot afford to pay higher wages.  But profits are growing where wages have not kept pace.  The restaurant industry, for example, experienced 5.6% growth in 2006 and is expected to grow by 7.2% by 2017.  Such growth indicates that higher wages are feasible.

Those of us who have worked in the service industry, those of us who work full time and still struggle to make ends meet – and even those who earn decent wages but are aware of the struggle that so many people experience – personally understand the need for wages to become more livable.  But how can we, as a community, prove that higher wages will not only benefit workers, and the community, but could be beneficial for the industry?

A 2005 study performed by Cone, a Boston-based strategic marketing firm, found that 86% of consumers are willing to alter their consumption in order to support businesses that further a social cause.  The success of recent conscientious consumption campaigns, such as Fair Trade, also show that people want to support responsible businesses and that consumers can have a tremendous impact on wages by choosing with whom to conduct business.  Since New York is a place full of both underpaid workers and conscientious buyers, it’s the perfect place to start.

For this reason, a few young, creative lawyers are teaming up with grassroots advocates, religious leaders, social entrepreneurs, and restaurateurs to launch a project called Wage to Live – a conscientious consumption campaign designed to raise the wages of workers within the service industry beginning with restaurants in NYC.   Wage to Live will promote responsible business owners who strive to pay their workers living wages and will prove that living wages are a component of smart and successful business.  Because restaurants are selected on a whim, and staffed by some of the lowest paid workers in NYC, we expect this consumption campaign to bring about much needed change in the industry and the entire New York City community.

Check out Wage to Live online and become part of our community by joining our mailing list.    

– Susan Berlowitz

Just before Thanksgiving, I was let go from a good, steady freelance job that I felt lucky to have. I have worked in the music industry for a quite a few years, and it has been imploding in upon itself since the middle 1990s, with one corporation after another consolidating, resulting in countless layoffs, espeically in New York City and in Los Angeles. The Clear Channelization of this country, in 1996, did not help our industry, either. My client, an indendent music publisher in NYC, lost her biggest client, and it has been all downhill from that day to this.

Like so many other individuals in this country, I am looking for any job that I can get. Last night, I came home to find a three-day notice to evict on my door. That’s a little bit too much reality for me. I just spent two weeks standing out on street corners in NYC, working for Grassroots Campaigns (a political consulting company hired by the DNC), raising money for Howard Dean’s “50-State Plan.” The seven days I spent with them was an education! People who stopped to talk to me opened up, while choking back tears, and told me their stories. I kept a daily detailed log.

On my second day of work, I was told, by my FM, or field manager, that I sucked. In the past, I have worked middle management and upper management jobs, and if I had told an employee of mine that they sucked, on their second day, or on any day, at the very least, I would have been reprimanded, I’m certain, by someone. I can’t believe this is the world that we are expected to accept– with a smile, accompanied by big pay cuts. Oh, yes, I forgot, the Grassroots Campaigns training we received definitely qualified all of us for the “perky” brigade. It was straight out of Barbara Ehrenreich’s book. They were also into “passion.” My daily log includes — 1) to whom I spoke, 2) the locations to which I was assigned, 3) conversations in the office, 4) my immediate daily FM (field manager), 5) morning conversations in the office and more. Orignally, I was drawn to the Grassroots Campaigns ad by the words, “Hiring Immediately.” In addition, I believe in Howard Dean’s plan.

When a person needs a job, the words “Hiring Immediately” are like music to the ears. From the beginning, though, my days were probably numbered. I don’t have time to beat around the bush! Every morning meeting began with a question — 1) What movie star (alive or dead) would you want to play your life? Answer: Susan Sarandon. I could feel the shudder go around the room. 2) If you could recommend only one book of literture, what book would that be? Answer: The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver — another shudder — although most people in the room had never heard of the book. I caught on quickly that independent women didn’t score very high on their lists. After three days, when I shared with one of the FMs that I didn’t ever plan to vote for Chuck Schumer or Hillary Clinton, regardless of what they were running for, the air became quite chilly. I told Pete, the FM, “I am a true progressive, a liberal, and I am proud to say I am.” The young whippersnapper, 25-something, couldn’t handle it.

The best part of the job was standing out on those street corners, hollering out my grab line, “Do you have a moment for the Democrats?” — and talking to the people who stopped. Some of the unemployed people actually emptied their pockets out to me — $7, $4, $2, etc. Others were closer to losing their apartments, like me, and couldn’t give. I also talked to quite a few Europeans and Canadians, who just shook their heads at the state of the union — The United States. I wish I would have known about United Professionals when I was out on the streets. Some of the unemployed would have been excited to learn that someone, somewhere, is advocating for them.

Laid off from semiconductor industry, even though told 4 months earlier that the company would be out of business if not for what my group had done. Now management consulting using a systems thinking perspective that provides primarily long-term improvement. Finding it difficult in a business world oriented toward the short-term. Now applying systems thinking to understand our social and economic problems.

Please visit my website at http://www.exponentialimprovement.com/

– Hillary MeisterI spent 3 years working contract jobs getting laid off in between and having a very difficult time finding work at a decent pay. I’m a single, professional female in the tech market in her late 40s and have had to deal with gender and age discrimination and other issues. Also, as a cancer survivor I have to have medical insurance and without a permanent job, there’s only COBRA, the biggest ripoff on the face of the planet. My concerns, therefore, are two-fold - job security and availability and affordable health insurance that isn’t tied to the company you work for.

– Eric Campbell 
      I read Bait & Switch when it was first published. I am an IT
professional (or at least I used to be), and many of Barbara’s experiences in Bait &
Switch sounded familiar. I’ve been there.
     The job fairs, where smiling college interns collected my resume while
being unable to answer the simplest of questions about the company or the jobs
they allegedly needed to fill.
     The so-called “recruiters” and “headhunters” who have no real placement or
HR experience. They seem delighted just to meet with me, to put me into the
all-important DATABASE.
     The networking groups, which remind me of the I Love Lucy episode featuring
the Friends of the Friendless. People bring cookies and other sweets, perhaps to
mitigate the overall bitterness they feel.
     I have been told to find spiritual guidance, because HE will help me make
my car payments, if I accept HIM into my heart. OK, I exaggerate a little here.
     Endless hours spent trolling the online job boards. Monster has 2,347,891
jobs today!
     Thousands (yes, thousands!) of resumes and cover letters. I’ve licked
enough stamps to cover the Eiffel Tower. I’ve created enough digital refuse to
fill Madison Square Garden. Still no job.
     In the past 5 1/2 years, I have been stuck in a downward spiral. I quit
looking exclusively for a computer job long ago. I have applied for jobs that
pay less than a livable wage, only to be turned away as “over-qualified.”
     I have had potential employers not hire me because they were worried about
the number of jobs I have had over the past few years. The fact that I have been
repeatedly laid-off, my jobs out-sourced, matters little to them. They
sympathize, but I still appear to be damaged goods to them.
     I have failed to get interviews for jobs that I am qualified to perform.
The reasons for this are many: been out of IT for too long; too many employers
in too short a period of time; and the very vague yet commonly used explanation
of how I am “just not the perfect fit.”
     I have worked off the books as a painter and landscaper. I have gone broke
twice, and I’m on my way there for a third time. I have lost my apartment, been
forced to move in with my elderly parents. I’m 39; they’re in their 60’s. They
(and I) live in a retirement community. Oh, joy!
     I have worked for temp-agencies and I took a so-called “survival job,”
which featured a profane, 73-year-old boss, and a vastly misrepresented job. I
lasted a whole year there.
     Health insurance is a distant memory. So are most of the dreams I had for
myself. Some of my best years have been wasted. I’ll never get them back.
     I have fundamentally changed as a person. I no longer laugh or make jokes
as much. When I do joke around, I notice my humor is tinged with bitterness. I
miss the person I used to be.
     My personal life is of course intertwined with the professional side. How
can I initiate and nurture a relationship when I can’t even support myself? At a
time when my contemporaries are married, having kids, and moving up in their
careers, I just sit on the sidelines and watch. Forever the fan, I long to be on
the field.
     The goal-oriented man I used to be has been replaced by a depressed soul
whose greatest accomplishment today may be fighting off the urge to take a
midday nap.
     I have learned some things about myself that I can use as positives. I
realize I’m a bit stronger than I gave myself credit for, more resilient.
     I seemed to have recaptured a compassionate streak I had in my youth. By
that, I mean that I have empathy for people who are suffering. Do I volunteer?
No, but neither do I simply dismiss the downtrodden as those who simply “don’t
try hard enough.”
     I’ve searched for enjoyment not through the accumulation of “stuff” but
through the accumulation of experience. To that end, I have taken up hiking, and
I reconnected with my passion for reading.
     I have also written several short stories, and I am working on my third
novel. All of my work remains unpublished at this time, but I don’t sweat it. I
have bigger problems. Job-hunting in this day and age requires a thick skin, so
when my queries to literary agents and various publications are returned with a
“no thanks,” I don’t let it get to me. I write for myself.