The Job Delimma

The Employment Quandry
As you might or might know I am desperately seeking employment.  After spending some time in the Hospital last year, I have spent the last eight months or so making my contacts every week.  As more and more time passed and the ever present need for a job increased, my standards of what qualifies as a good job, including pay, has decreased.

Couple in the fact that Colorado was among the 10 states that recently ended state extended unemployment benefits and it really has put me in a bind.  In response to this bind, I have lowered my standards further and am desperately seeking employment.  The reality though is that in Colorado there are not very many jobs and it is a very competitive market.

The hard truth I face though is that I have a mortgage, a car payment and a family to support so there is a very real financial number I must meet to ensure that we keep this standard of life.  I have eliminated everything I consider a luxury, such as cable t.v. and Netflix accounts.  I ensure that lights are never left on and we are not blowing money on things like Fast Food or anything else that is non-essential.  I then took and totaled the remaining bills and came up with a modest number that I need to make from either salary or hourly to survive.

And that number is very modest.  I am an IT Manager and my salaries have been very comfortable for our way living.  We are not rich by any stretch of the imagination but prior to the company I worked for being sold, we lived within our means.

Back in August 2010, the company I worked for was sold to a competitor.  The competitor kept all of us managers on board until we brought them up to speed then they decided to let the management staff go and back filled those positions with their own people.   This left a large group of us unemployed.  The economy was still reeling from the recession and then I ended up in the hospital.  Months passed with doctors visits, therapy, and residual care until I finally got the green light and a clean bill of health.

The dilemma I face as we fight for preservation deals with the job market and potential employers.  The interviews I have gone to focuses on the lapse between my last job and this potential job.  I have had prospects tell me straight out that they would not speak to me because of this gap.  And being an employer’s market where there are so many more candidates than jobs, I am sure they are not feeling the squeeze like I am.

At the conclusion of one interview, I was positive I was in.  It went fantastically.  He was all smiles and he even mentioned that he was looking forward to working with me.  Then he dropped the bomb.  “If it was up to me, I would hire you on the spot.  H.R. saw this lapse in your work history and it brought up a red flag and honestly they think we should pass on you.  I will try to talk to them to smooth it over but -”  But, don’t get your hopes up is how I understood it.

It is the single most aggravating situation for me as I really was in the hospital.  I really did go through months of therapy to get back into form.  Now I am ready to work- no, I NEED to work and something that I can not control is blocking my path.  I even brought the hospital discharge records in hopes it would make a difference, but as of today, it hasn’t.

The whole situation feels almost unconstitutional.  I have never experienced such blatant prejudice before and honestly it is shocking.  Meanwhile, the clock is slowly ticking down and I grow closer to ruin.  The law however is read that the unemployed are not a federally protected group, like homosexuals or people with disabilities so we are not eligible for protection from this sort of selective hiring.  The government has asked that employers not advertise this policy when placing want-ads, however I think it would really be nice if they did.  Time is crucial and I would rather not bother then try to sell ice to a penguin.

So where does that leave me?

You might be thinking there are programs out there to offer aid, and there are.  I just have a complete mental block with requesting aid when I am willing to work.  Hell, I WANT to work.  I have been doing it my whole life and I feel that this is part of why the system fails.  If employers are allowed to be prejudiced and we are pushed to welfare or any other government assisted program when we are capable and willing to work, then it is no wonder we spend so much money as a nation.  Aside from that, I am at a loss.  What would you do?

I don’t need help, I need a job.  If nothing changes I will eventually come to a point where I am forced to ask for help because self preservation will compromise my standards.  I have read some reports where they are considering regulating how people are hired, however I doubt it will be in time to help me.

Let me know your thoughts. - Re-post from http://theorysmith.com