Get a Job!

Yeah you!

If I were you I'd be knocking on every door.  You need to make some money!

This is a discussion (more of an argument)  I actually had with a relative.  Mind you, I'm not some Instagram obsessed teenager laying around the house binging on Netflix.  For god's sake!  I'm in my 40's.

I can't afford to binge on anything.  That's what's so irritating.

It's one thing to be 20-something and have trouble finding work.  Nobody judges you.  Your frustration has more to do with unbridled ambition than a perceived character flaw.

If you've followed this blog for any amount of time you know my story.  I've worked....hard.  I've ticked off all the boxes; College, career, sacrifice, frugality.  I followed the rules, kept my options open and always kept an ear to the ground.

All seemingly for nothing.  

I had a fairly stable living for many years that allowed me to not only better myself but my family.  Now that same family is harder to deal with than a bill collector.

I understand their disillusionment.  For a long time I was looked at as the guy who always seemed to be able to keep it together.  I took adversity with aplomb (well mostly, I do tend the bitch a lot) 

These days I can barely afford to feed myself.  To them it must seem like I've given up.

Thing is, I haven't but I'm far more disillusioned and frustrated than they are.  

There was a time when there was always a fallback position.  If you couldn't find work in your own field you could at least find something to keep you going til you did.

It doesn't take much investigation to find confirmation of what I always suspected was true.  That being that regardless of the unemployment numbers and Wall Street rallies there are still way too many barriers to making a living.

Minimum wage hasn't kept up with the cost of living for a generation but worse than that the competition for jobs that offer it is staggering.   Look at the candidates for these jobs and you find everything from the high school kid to PhD's. 

Those who've never suffered the indignity of rejection for a low wage job don't understand.  They believe there are still jobs whose only requirement is a warm body.  

They're wrong.

These days even flipping burgers requires training on your own dime just to obtain a food handler's card.  With that in hand you're well on your way to 25 hours a week crafting Angry Whoppers for the princely sum of $8.05/hr.   Oh yeah, with benefits too, if you can afford the payroll deduction....

It gets worse....

Now we're hearing an uproar over raising the minimum wage to something in line with what it actually costs to live somewhere other than your car.  

"It'll cause higher unemployment!" 
"We can't afford to pay more!"  
" It'll break the back of small business!"

Which ticks me off even more.  While all these "job creators" game the system to overwork and underpay their current employees, they place hurdles in the way of new hires to ensure nothing changes.

There's no way around it and if you don't understand what I'm about to say I'm sorry but you're either bloody stupid or worse a selfish bastard.

Hiring someone full time for a wage they can't live on in a first-world country is institutionalized slavery.

Offering only part time hours and scheduling employees so that it's impossible for them to get another part time job is even worse.  As an employer you're effectively forcing your workforce into poverty for no other reason than greed.

Don't give me that crap about high labor costs either.  If you can't afford the means to sell your product you don't have a damned clue about how to properly run a business. 

Employees are your partners not your slaves.  Paying them shouldn't be looked at as "an inconvenience."

It's no different than the argument from the Southern states that led to the Civil War.  Let's get one thing perfectly clear here.  Lincoln was no great abolitionist, he was a nationalist. He was far more open to compromise: even those that would include continuing slavery if it would have kept the country together.  The Civil war was about human rights only as much as the space program was about inventing freeze dried coffee.

That's historical fact.

Meaning any business, especially BIG business that argues against a livable wage is taking the same position as the Civil War South.  For them it was about cheap labor to improve their bottom line.

Sound familiar?

In America, it's not about some misguided fantasy of climbing the ladder of success.   it's about production at the lowest possible cost.  That means near poverty wages to keep an unskilled workforce forever unskilled and powerless.   Now add in the yoke of the "Credit Economy" that exists only to perpetuate itself.  A faceless beast fed by the poor.  By the way, that includes you if you're only one paycheck from financial disaster. 

It's hard to pull yourself up by the bootstraps if the boots have a 29% interest rate.

We, all of us of unfortunate birth are increasingly subject to the indecencies of an inadequate paycheck that won't even cover the basic necessities.  

It's nothing less than indentured servitude.

Which comes to people like me.  I'm not unskilled but I'm not especially talented either.  So I'm right there with you.

I hear a lot of, "You're a top candidate" when applying for jobs in my field only to not get the job.  A bit too much of hearing that lately meaning I've taken to applying for "seasonal" positions with local retail stores.

Even then the whole premise is twisted..

Questions like, " Why do you want to work here?"  Duh!  I need money and you're supposedly hiring.  Of course you can't say that.  You have to come up with some bullshit about a life change and trying new things and ground floors for new starts, blah, blah, blah.

You're actually better off if you never did anything with your life.  Otherwise that 6 figure resume becomes another hurdle to overcome fighting for a job you don't really want for a wage you can't really afford.

BTW, it's damned hard to dumb down a professional resume for $8.05/hr.  Nobody's going to believe you've been sitting on your ass for 30 years of your life.  The background check ( that they all run ) will show your lie anyway.  So no, acting stupid isn't an answer...

Who the hell actually prepares a resume for a minimum wage retail job anyway?  What are you going to say?  Stocked shelves, greeted customers, kissed ass?  All that crap fits on the application.  Resume's are for the jobs you work after you get the hell out of retail.

Anyway, more to the point: that there's any expectation that working retail is a great career move is lunacy.  I know, it's what I did when I was in high school 1000 years ago and I knew I didn't want to do it when I was my age now. 

Give me a break.  Once everyone's returned their Christmas gifts and yanked down the baubles and twinkly lights you're out the door buddy.  

If'someone like me is on your doorstep looking for work, I'm fucking serious about being there.  I've taken a deep breath, swallowed my pride and committed to the relationship.

By the way, never, ever tell me I need to swallow my pride.

I've been so beaten up that I don't have any left.  I've seriously entertained a job delivering and cleaning port-a- potties.  The only thing that stopped me was the lack of a commercial driver's license and being in my 40's.  Meaning I'm not sure I can lift 100 pounds 30 times a day every day on a job with no health benefits.  ( That's what the ad actually said BTW )

I'm mad as hell that I'm being denied a living ( as corrupt as the word is in this country) and even angrier when someone assumes I'm not doing enough to improve my situation.

I'm also sick of being judged by people who don't deserve the jobs they have.  Worse, when they cast aspersions on someone like me who's been in the field longer than they've been out of high school.  

That sounds arrogant but remember, I know from whence I speak.  Most of the people I've interviewed with (with rare exception) got their positions through the buddy system. I only say that because part of my interview preparation involves looking them up on LinkedIn.  I've found IT directors whose last job was a sales director and others with no IT or management training at all.  

I really don't care how they got their jobs just so long as it doesn't have an effect on me getting hired.  Unfortunately, it does...

It's an old boys network and I DO MEAN old BOYS.  I've yet to meet a female IT director.  I doubt I'd have as much bullshit if I did.  The nice thing about having a female manager is that chances are she's gone through a lot of crap to get where she is.  That tends to minimize the games because she just doesn't have the time for it.  

It's natural for the male of the species to feel threatened when someone better than him has come along even if he gets to boss you around.   In my experience women don't engage in that kind of pissing contest.

If you think this is just a bunch of whining and excuses then put yourself in my shoes for a minute.

You're in you 40's, lost all your income and can't replace it.  Nobody takes you seriously when you apply for low-wage jobs and your relatives don't want to talk to you unless you're sending them a check.

Pull myself up by my bootstraps?  My boots have holes in the soles buddy.

It doesn't stop me but what slows me down is your misinformed judgement.  I'm putting it out there, no agenda but to survive.  

Until you know what I'm going through (and I'm pretty sure most don't) keep your admonitions to yourselves and thank your creator that you don't have to be here.

I won't quit but I know a lot of people that dismiss me would have long ago.

That makes me better than them and if nothing else, that's worth living for.  There needs to be a change and perhaps I need to feel the effects to understand how badly it needs to happen.

Livable wage now!  

The Glass Floor

Up until recently the term "glass ceiling" was common when discussing women in the workplace.  It was a societal problem, a symptom of a stereotype that held that females of the species were far better suited to the kitchen than the boardroom.

The stereotype still exists but it's far more subtle now.  In the second decade of the 21st century we find more women holding the reigns of business but the numbers show they're still a minority.

Now it's less about glass ceilings and more about what you get paid once you successfully break through it.  Numbers don't lie and on average women still only make 70% of what men do in the same role.  It's just the evolution of the stereotype.  It's systemic discrimination and it's wrong but it happens.

But there's another kind of discrimination.  One that's hard to define and has no champion to defend against it.  It's discrimination born from our own ingrained subjectivity.

You can read any of the articles on how to have the perfect interview to get the job but do you comprehend the hidden message?  You're expected to be at your best but the person across the table from you is usually at their worst. 

Just walking through the door could kill your chances based on nothing more than a personal bias.  Who hasn't suspected they've lost a job because of somebody's closet racism, sexism or ageism. 

But try to prove it.

You can chalk it up to human nature but let's face it, as human beings we're awful to each other.  The truth is, most people go through life with their own little prejudicial firewall.  

The lizard part of our brains tells us that everybody is out to take our stuff and only when you prove that you're not can you make any progress. 

This is why interview advice ends up sounding like a mashup between a polished sales pitch and a Dominatrix's slave. 

Yuck!

This is where the Glass Floor comes in. 

It's bad enough trying to get a job you're qualified for but what if the only thing available is something less than that. 

What if instead of going for the regional sales manager you're forced to apply for grocery stocker. 

Hey, things happen and we all need some kind of income.  

Thing is, you've got an even bigger uphill battle when you're aiming lower than that sales manager gig. 

Nobody really believes your heart's desire is to be facing bottles of salad dressing the rest of your life.  Thing is, your interview for that prime minimum wage gig starts from the premise that it is.  

Meaning you'll have a hard time convincing "Buck the Boss" who rose to his lofty heights after a string of pizza delivery gigs after barely graduating high school that you're seriously interested.

It's the glass floor where those that have supposedly "made it" have no fallback position.  Yeah, you could leave that CFO position off your resume but if you're a bit older nobody is going to believe that you're that into jockeying pallets of Hidden Valley Ranch. 

Get real, stocking shelves is a crap job and everyone who's ever done it knows it.  It's not meant to be a career path but when you're sitting across the table from "Buck"  you might as well be going for a tenured Professorship at Harvard.

It's a big reason why the old saying still rings true.  There's a lot of people with Masters degrees living on the streets.

That anyone would expect a dead end job to be a lifetime career path is ridiculous.  The reality is, they don't.  It's just another "plausible" means of legally discriminating against an otherwise viable and willing candidate.

It is, the glass floor.

My advice, I don't know, I haven't found an answer yet.  Maybe I should try entrepreneurship!  I know I still have that work at home email somewhere around here...

Gays, God and Wedding cakes

I'm getting really tired of it...

Tired of fiction being held up as reality.  Tired of the assertion that the Almighty gives a crap about whose flag is flying overhead and most of all tired of bigotry hiding behind a facade of religion.  

Remember that Colorado baker last year who refused to make a wedding cake for a gay couple?  In the end the state's supreme court brought reason to the ridiculous by ruling that his actions were not an expression of free speech or religious freedom but rather an act of outright discrimination.

In short, he may not have to stick a rainbow flag in front of his shop and march in the parade but if he wants to conduct commerce he's got to sell to everybody.

This is where cold secular reason must prevail against theology if we wish to continue as a civilized society.  

Thoughtful consideration must weigh all points of view without the undue influence of any one belief system.  This is the very core of the separation of church and state. 

Whether you realize it or not, most of what we call civilization vanishes without secular commerce.  It provides the foundation for all those rights and privileges we've come to expect extending even to the expression of religious beliefs. 

Progressive idealists may chafe at the thought of commerce being so central to everyone getting along but until the world trades only on ideas instead of goods it's the best we can do. 

Face it, no matter what your political leanings, without commerce nothing happens.  It goes further than the stone canyons of Wall Street extending to halls of congress.  

I can tell you from experience just how much DOESN'T happen without commerce...

That means the primary function of government is really to protect the mechanisms of commerce above all else.  Don't let the speeches on C-Span fool you.  Everyone in those hallowed chambers is seeking to tilt the scales in their favor. 

So if you decide that your religious ideals should somehow impede the natural flow expect the state to get involved. Without exception, regulation of commerce falls under the secular and exclusive purview of the state.

How you choose to exercise your faith, however, does not so long as you stay off its turf.  Contrary to what you may have heard, the state has no interest in the value of your eternal soul. 

It's a reciprocal relationship by the way.   The state stays out of your religion and you keep your religion out of the state's business.

There's even support in the Bible if that's your ultimate authority.  In it we find examples where commerce and religion make no bedfellows  such as the well known tale of Jesus kicking the moneychangers off of the temple's steps.

“Take these things away; do not make my Father's house a house of trade.” 

That pretty much sums it up right there I think... 

The money in your pocket may say, "In God we trust" but rather than some admonition of piety for the nation, a little research finds that phrase came about during the civil war as little more than propaganda device for the Union.  Just as a championship football team may proclaim that "god was on their side" apparently the same went for the Union cause. 

Really now, who wouldn't want god on their side if there was at all the possibility?

The Founding Fathers knew all too well the dangers of concentrating too much power in any one entity, especially god, conspicuously avoiding anything that would even suggest the mix of church and state. 

That the country was founded as the very antithesis of monarchical or theocratic rule bears that out.  Pious or not European monarchy frequently claimed divine lineage to justify the affluence and the atrocities of a station provided by nothing more than a fortunate birth. 

Thomas Jefferson and John Adams, just to name a few, would have none of it...

" The government of the United States is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion.”

 John Adams

"Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between Man & his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legitimate powers of government reach actions only, & not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should “make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,” thus building a wall of separation between Church & State"

Thomas Jefferson

The founding fathers and apparently even god seem to understand the need to separate religion and state (commerce) but somehow people who want to justify discrimination and intolerance don't.

Let's get real here.  God doesn't have 32000 convenient ATM's or free checking so why involve him in the business of your...business?

What these zealots fail to see is that elevating religious belief to public policy invites the same jeopardy as printing, "In the President we Trust" on a greenback.

Take the more recent case of the court clerk in Kentucky, Kim Davis, who as of this writing still refuses to issue marriage licenses if she has to issue them to same-sex couples.  She bases her position on religious grounds even after the Supreme Court has already decided that it lacks any legal foundation.

" One couple, David Ermold and David Moore, tried to engage the county clerk, Kim Davis, in a debate before the cameras, but as she had before, she turned them away, saying repeatedly that she would not issue licenses to any couples, gay or straight.

“Under whose authority?” Mr. Ermold asked.

“Under God’s authority,” Ms. Davis replied." *

It's unlikely that God gives much thought to the Rowan County, Kentucky court house.  By extension, I'm fairly certain that should Davis relent it's doubtful the place will be descended upon by plagues of Locust or vengeful lightning bolts.

What God may notice, however, is the denial of 50 years of civil rights law.  If its not clear to you just substitute the word "black" for "same-sex."

No one is challenging Kim Davis' right to her beliefs even if obsolete or prejudiced.  However, when those beliefs interfere with her job as a clerk in a public court house there is only one solution.  She needs to go...

For one simple reason.  She obviously doesn't understand the context of the job she's doing.  A Marriage License is nothing more than a statement of intention to co-mingle assets and the power of attorney.  That's it.  That's all.  No proclamations from the divine or admonitions from scripture.  About as exciting as renewing your license plates.  If ol' Kim wants to execute her interpretation of scripture she's free to do so.  Where it matters...church.

Faith in your chosen deity should have no bearing on your public policy views.   Save perhaps for those tenets that eschew discrimination, intolerance and ignorance.  

Even an Atheist can get behind that!

To do any less does a disservice to your faith and an injustice to your fellow man.

Taking the Human out of Human Resources

There's a lot of fear in the job market these days and most of it stems from a disturbing tendency of employers to treat candidates like some kind of trade-in at Honest Bob's car lot.  I'll give you some analogies (of course) to make my point a little more clear...

• I sell Trucks, they're trying to trade a motorcycle! - Does this person even fit the job?
• How many miles, Condition? - Are they too old or are they going to drive up my health insurance costs?
• What kind of options does it have? - Do they have all the skills and experience I need or do I have to train them?
• Show me the CarFax! - Anything in their past I can use to lowball the offer or exclude them entirely?
• Market value? - I want to get this guy/gal for as close to free as possible.

In the private sector it's no surprise.  In theory, removing intangibles and non-sequitur from the process should create a more level playing field.  It's also more efficient which plays well with the bean counters.

But it can go too far...

It's one thing to use objective criteria  to thin the herd but that's where its usefulness really ends.  We all understand that no employer wants to interview 100 burger flippers for a structural engineering job.  However, a potential candidate shouldn't be excluded by a process that's left to HR departments that have no idea of how to vet a potential hire.

We're coming back to the real point here. 

Today's work environment is frequently populated by underpaid and mostly disinterested workers.  There's no denying it in spite of the all the stock photos of happy faces populating the company HR page. 

We live in an age of stagnant wages, dwindling benefits and a slow erosion of worker rights.  Let's not forget the almost total lack of job security.  Even CEO's can't guarantee their tenure but then they've got a lot softer landing than the rest of us.

So don't expect a lot of that "personal touch."  You're just another resource to be evaluated, a commodity.

Which is a problem.

When you reduce talent to their lowest common denominator you end up missing a lot of important information to help you make a decision.

For example: A top notch engineer could be cut from consideration because of a bad credit record, a visible tattoo or if they happen to smoke.  HR pundits ( yes they exist) will offer up excuses like:

• A bad credit history reflects on a lack of responsibility. 
• Tattoo's cause issues with workplace culture
• Smokers drive up insurance costs and take too many breaks. 

None of them have anything to do with the quality of the candidate but more often than not they're used as screening factors.  The justifications are hollow but there's no point in challenging them.

It's the result of a process cut to the bone and borne out of a systematic devaluing of the Human in Human resources.  
The only advice given to the job seeker? 

Bend over...

Yeah, no big long flowery mental masturbation there.  That's the bottom line. 

Because you as the candidate have no value outside of the factors of a commodity you must focus on the irrelevant.

Look sharp, clean up your social profile, quit smoking, pay all your bills on time even if you're broke and without exception, never have been sick.

That's an awful lot of time spent on things that have nothing to do with your ability to actually DO the job.

Here's a posting for a VERY entry level job.  It's a good representation of what I've been talking about.

Flier Delivery (NOT door-to-door) Team Needed (East Valley, AZ)

FLIER DELIVERY TEAM NEEDED TO DELIVER TO EAST VALLEY SCHOOL DISTRICT SCHOOLS

What: Team (of 2) needed to drive to elementary & middle schools to deliver fliers for after school programs. (One driver & one delivery person per team)

What we are looking for in a delivery person: *GREAT personality a MUST! *Be able to effectively communicate with school secretaries *Must be able to present a clean cut look with business casual attire.

*No visible tattoos or body piercings
*Non-Smoker *Clean Background Check

What we are looking for in a driver: *RELIABLE transportation (with room for boxes) a MUST! *Proof of Insurance *Know the East Valley well! (especially school districts) *Clean Background Check *Clean Driving Record.

*Able to lift about 60 lbs.

Deliveries start right away! Hours will be Monday-Friday, approx 8am-4pm (when schools are open) We give preference to drivers with GPS or navigation systems.

This is NOT a sales position, but sales experience & driver). Driver & Delivery Person need to have a positive personality &
"personality" a ++. We offer $11/hour (per person) + mileage (for the professional attitude. 

Our Teams represent ***************of America to the schools, clubs, churches & districts that support our programs.

Some familiarity with *************** is WELCOMED

Ok , this is about as low on the totem pole as you can get but the takeaway is this: The same selection criteria is becoming commonplace regardless of industry or position.

Entry level jobs usually suck, that's a given but at some point along your career path you would expect to be given more consideration than some kid handing out colorful pieces of paper.

Sadly, you'd be wrong.

The reality of today's interview process is cold and impersonal.  You'll frequently hear catch phrases like, "Culture fit" and "Self Motivated" which translates to "anything we can legally discriminate against" and "doesn't ask a lot of questions."

It's only going to get worse before it gets better.  For now set the bar low and you might just survive it.

Just be sure that you can accept how employers see your value.  These days the demands of work will monopolize more of your time than family or friends and the higher up the food chain you go the worse it gets.

Remember, the price of potatoes is based on their current market value which can fluctuate with demand.

So, are you worth more than a potato?  You might be surprised.

Net Neutrality loses its appeal and so do you...

Originally published on Kupeesh!

Who owns the Internet?

Apparently it isn't you at least so far as the latest rulings on Net Neutrality go...

With phrases flying around like "commercially reasonable" and "competitively threatening" one has to wonder if the free and open Internet is soon to be relegated to the status of those quirky public access channels you used to see on cable.

Biker Billy (legendary public access star) may have cooked with fire but he never had the opportunity to set the airwaves ablaze like Discovery channel's American Chopper.  He just didn't have the access to a bigger audience.

Which is exactly the scenario the Internet is facing.

The latest development in the battle for an unhindered Internet experience finds F.C.C. chairman (and former telecom industry lobbyist) Tom Wheeler at the center of the storm.  Coming after his bid to codify Net Neutrality under the F.C.C. umbrella was rebuffed by a Federal appeals court in January, Wheeler's latest olive branch appears to be anything but.

In the latest set of proposed rules, broadband providers like Comcast and Verizon would have the right to prioritize Internet traffic from those who pay for the privilege over those who don't.

Now, If you're someone who gets their news from the New York times,  your movies from Netflix and only plays games on your XBOX then you probably don't care.

But you should, here's why...

At its core, the primary argument against these new rules swirls around the concept of "commercially reasonable."  A term invented by the F.C.C. but so poorly defined that the agency will spend the next few months trying to come up with a definition.  The popular consensus is that it lies somewhere between a toll bridge and extortion.

Not only does the possibility (if not outright probability) exist for smaller content providers to be crowded out by deeper pockets but consumers could be in for sticker shock as content providers try to recover priority access fees.

Netflix and Hulu are going to get a lot more expensive...

On its face Wheeler appears to be trying to please everybody but his history as an ardent supporter of telecom industry deregulation makes such overtures suspect.

In January, the F.C.C. was told by the Federal court in no uncertain terms that the Internet was not currently considered a critical utility like water or electricity and therefore couldn't be regulated in the same manner.

Which was probably music to the old telecom lobbyist's ears.  Wheeler's statements this week have amounted to little more than lip service to Net Neutrality.

In what appears to be an about face since the court's ruling (despite Wheeler's denials,) the F.C.C. now embraces regulation "along the lines of the court's decision."  Meaning that every challenge is met with that phrase.  So-called Fast lanes, as the F.C.C. refers to them, cite the ability of premium content providers like NetFlix or Amazon to prioritize their traffic.

For a fee...

To be clear, nobody is saying you have to pay if you want users to be able to access your content but there's nothing in the F.C.C.'s proposals that require anything more of an ISP than a promise to play nice and submit a few reports.

It might as well be the F.C.C.'s version of Chamberlin's 1938 Munich agreement.

With an edict handed down from the Federal courts, Wheeler is now free to move the F.C.C from a regulatory agency responsible for protecting the public interest to a service window for telecom industry lobbyists looking to cash in.