The Terrifying Reality of Long-Term Unemployment

[Richard Hakluyt]

I liked Ray Davies' account of how he came up with the idea for the song :

"In the book The Kinks: The Official Biography, Davies said that he was inspired to write this song after the band manager Robert Wace had spent the night dancing with a transvestite. Davies said,
"    In his apartment, Robert had been dancing with this black woman, and he said, 'I'm really onto a thing here.' And it was okay until we left at six in the morning and then I said, 'Have you seen the stubble?' He said 'Yeah,' but he was too pissed [intoxicated] to care, I think." "



from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lola_%28song%29

[Ideologue]

Actually Raz, just put "Institution X, 2004-2008."  Lots of people in hiring positions can't actually read, because they got their jobs when a HSD and a good handshake was all it took, and there's a possibility they'll just think you worked there.

You guys did remind me that I need to start putting my volunteer stuff on my resume.  Because 50+ hour weeks and mornings at an animal shelter means work ethic, and per Strix' wisdom, work ethic is all it takes, even if you have a felony record and Latin Kings tattoos.

If they ask any more questions I'll just tell them that a criminal attorney said to put on there.  They'll probably think I meant the other kind of criminal attorney.

Better call Saul.

That's a palpable hit, man.  Good show.

[Phillip V]

The terrifying reality is that there are too many people for too few jobs that need doing.

There can be as many jobs as there is demand. If I earn $100k/yr for example, I can "easily" set aside $30k/yr to pay someone to massage my shoulders each day.

But I don't want to right now.

[Syt]

Lol.  I can't believe that song gets radio play.

HIT ME WITH YOUR LASER BEAMS.

What, "WHEN YOU WANNA COME" doesn't mean you're coming over for tea and crumpets?

I've always also felt that Aerosmith's "Dude Looks Like a Lady" was a weird song to be a hit.  It's the only credited rock anthem about fucking a T-girl, at least of which I am aware.

Frank Zappa's "Bobby Brown" receieved some serious air time in Germany way into the 90s. Mostly, because many people probably didn't understand the lyrics.

I got a good chuckle a few months ago, when I was shopping at the supermarket and their "radio station" played "Super Freak".

[Brazen]

The terrifying reality is that there are too many people for too few jobs that need doing.

There can be as many jobs as there is demand. If I earn $100k/yr for example, I can "easily" set aside $30k/yr to pay someone to massage my shoulders each day.

But I don't want to right now.

Communism should do the trick. I fondly recall a school visit to communist Russia where one person would take your order, another would pick it up, another put in in a bag, another take your money and a final one hand it over to you.

[The Larch]

It is a tremendous waste and, I believe, characteristic of capitalism and the profit motive........it is cheaper to poach off other employers for people with an unblemished record than take a chance on someone. It probably makes sense at the company level but obviously not at the level of the national economy.

But what to do about it  ?

Tax breaks for companies that take people off the dole queue spring to mind, though the devil is in the detail.

We have that over here, and unscrupulous companies will just start to factor those tax breaks as default stuff, requiring any new employees to sign up as job seekers before getting the new job with them, even if they're not.

A friend of mine worked for a couple of years in a place that had that stuff completely mastered in, their HR guy was an absolute expert at poaching any tax break you could possibly conceive, and almost everyone in the company provided them with some sort of discount. As a result, most employees in the company were women under 30 with little to no previous experience, and the odd handicapped person here and there.

[dps]

The place I used to work, if we did happen to hire someone we could get a tax credit for hiring, they didn't bother to file for it, because the paperwork was more of a hassle than the tax break was worth.

Of course, the tax break wasn't going directly to the guys in HR who would actually have had to do the paperwork, so that may have been a factor in thier view that it wasn't worth it.