I just looked at unemployment rates through september of this year. Michigan tops the list at 15.3% with a few at 13 and 12. Here's something though.........I think that if people were to actually "LOOK" for a job, they might actually find one. Many people talk about "oh I cant get a job." Here's what I say when people say that to me. I say, "where have you been looking for a job at?" most people tell me they've applied at so n so then I say to them, "how long have you been looking for a job now?" they might tell me a year or maybe they'll tell me 6 months or whatever. But the majority of those people when I ask them how many places they've applied at they tell me maybe 3 or 4.
Now don't you think if they really WANTED a job they'd apply at more than 3 or 4 places in a span of 6 months or a year? RED FLAG!!!! Makes me think this person wants to live on unemployment or off the government or whatever you want to say. Lots of people I know are getting jobs and getting offers. I'm not saying company's haven't cut down, I'm saying if you're ACTIVELY "LOOKING" and "APPLYING," you "WILL" find a job. That's another thing, people wont take that job because they don't wanna flip burgers? Then don't have a job at all how about that?
If people actually APPLY for jobs day in, day out, they WILL find one. Don't like the job you're offered and don't wanna work there? Then DONT COMPLAIN ABOUT NOT HAVING ONE. If people were actually looking, they wouldnt be on unemployment, I'm not saying everyone will get a job, but if you look at the 15% unemployment in Michigan, 12, 13% in other states, if people were looking, these percentages would be less. One of the reasons it's so high is because people who are on unemployment and keep receiving it and not looking for a job keep those percentages so high. Fine, you're collecting for unemployment, but don't turn yourself into a sob story, stop whining and start looking and actually applying for jobs. ESPECIALLY now for the holiday season, lets see if the unemployment rate stays the same or goes, HIGHER? They are hiring for the holidays, but I'm not so sure (I know some will) but I'm not so sure many will apply for those jobs because they've been living on unemployment for a while now, and foodstamps, state aided medical, and they're starting to like it. Many of those are the ones keeping the unemployment rate so high. There, got that off my chest......................................................Goodnite, got to wake up early for work. Oh, and how can you afford your car on unemployment or that $500 blackberry? Just wondering
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| My opinion on unemployment (maybe im wrong) JMO |
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Blaiserboy
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Oct 21 @ 11:28PM
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If you become unemployed at this time. then perhaps you are entitled to that view...
We have to take time to understand that not all people are able to accept, for various reasons, the first job they are offered.
We also have to understand that not all people are able to work at the labor jobs that are available due to whatever physical limitations they may have....
Sometimes people do not exactly meet our individual expectations. and that does not mean that they are lazy or bad.... it means that they are different from us and are to be respected for whatever.
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bardnsage
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Oct 21 @ 11:47PM
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I understand both of the positions represented above. The answer, is not to blast the worker,,, or the freeloader. The answer is to ask our government why they have not actually tried to stimulate business in a sustained and meaningful way,,, instead of just stimulating their pocket books, and voter polls.
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chevymn
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Oct 22 @ 1:04AM
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I agree with you for the most part. Allthough. Around here with four major plants closing down, realistic pay is hard to find. 400 a week to draw unemploymen vs 250 a week to drop fries in grease. My ex girlfreind has been looking for atleast 6 months and can only find jobs that barely break minimum wage which is what she is making now. She almost doesn't make enough to pay her car payment. Some really are looking, most are just livin it up.
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sybnann
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Oct 22 @ 2:11AM
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Yes, I agree with all sides of this coin and have seen it all. My suggestion to "anyone' looking for work today, is:
Stay open to new possiblilities
If you recieve an offer to teach you a new trade, do it
If you have a hobby or hobbies, see if you could possibly make a living doing what you enjoy, and...
ALWAYS grab the yellow pages in your area and start calling A-Z.... ask if they have any openings or are taking apps.
That way, someone may have walked out of a position there recently and the opening has not been advertised yet, and here you are on the phone! If they are NOT accepting APPS, just keep trying.
Lastly, check BACK with places you have called and applied with, and places you have had interviews with.
I have found more than one job with the yellow pages AND I had a friend that all but camped on a businesses doorstep, until they hired her!! It can and often DOES work!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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phantom53
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Oct 22 @ 3:49AM
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Expand your horizons! Change your view! Move overseas. There are more jobs available than you could imagine. Anyone that is
1. Native English speaking
2. Has BA/BS or higher
That is the only qualifications. Teach English overseas. You do not have to be a certified teacher. Most classes you teach will be oral English only. That means no test to grades, no homework to grade. Minimal lesson planning
You will live better, freer, and more relaxed that you have ever been!
If you have a MA/MS/MBA you can earn about 5 times what the local teachers make. A BS/BA will get you about three times the local salary. All this and a home to live in thrown in as part of the package.
Explore the world while you wait for the economy to improve in the U.S.
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oct_cat
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Oct 22 @ 7:48AM
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This comment has more to do with the unemployment "numbers". Working for a seasonal employer, our field guys get laid off every winter for a few months & my hours in the office are reduced, so we all collect unemployment during that time. So keep in mind if unemployment rates go up, often it is due to temporary lay-offs, not just wholly unemployed people.
As for the system itself, it needs some checks & balances. Many people are only required to submit a few 'job searches' while on unemployment, but the submissions are not actually verified (most likely because there's not enough staff to handle all the tasks at the unemployment offices).
Personally I think unemployment, which was originally started to be a temporary help to people who lost jobs, should have a specific cut-off date after 12 months, no extensions. The large numbers of people on unemployment are putting the smaller businesses who pay unemployment tax, along with all the other employment taxes, out of business . . . which then is causing more unemployment recipients.
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RightWingRepublican
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Oct 22 @ 8:39AM
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.I think that if people were to actually "LOOK" for a job, they might actually find one. Many people talk about "oh I cant get a job." Here's what I say when people say that to me. I say, "where have you been looking for a job at? Ive lost 4 jobs since 2002. Ive never had any trouble finding another one.
What i discovered is that if people would call and woooo the employer they applied with, they will get the job. Call them every few days reminding them how much you want the job.
Every job i called after i sent my Resume, i got the job.
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ttomtarr
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Oct 22 @ 9:25AM
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Bear in mind that the jobless figures reflect only those who collect unemployment compensation, and not those whose benefits have expired, or cannot work for some other reason.
Also, while any individual could find work, there are just not enough jobs for the whole body of unemployed people to get employment. Just as any working class kid can go to school, work hard, and become a millionaire, the whole working class cannot move into the upper class, or even the middle class. The opportunities just are not there..
There is also the illusions fostered in previous administrations. Flipping burgers is classified as manufacturing. There are lots of minimum pay jobs. While you may be able to eat and live indoors (barely) with that kind of money, your health, teeth, and whole world deteriorate for lack of care you cannot afford. Any major problem, (appendicitis, bad transmission, etc.), wipes you out.
And for the unemployed middle class, when your monthly expenses run over $2500 amonth (after taxes), using your time at a minimum wage job is a one way ticket to bankruptcy. Many try to find a position that will meet their financial responsibilities, rather than take the job that is a slow but sure decline into insolvency.
Your photo shows you with a ball under your your arm. Swap that for a baby, with a few more on the floor, and your perspective might be different. Throw in a handicap, low IQ, lack of education, bad physical appearance, lack of parenting, or any other of the many diasadvantages many people suffer, and your hard line on the unemployed might soften a little.
You, like I, appear big and healthy. We need to ask what we are doing to help those who were dealt a weaker hand in life's game. Have a good one.
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dharmaseeker
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Oct 22 @ 11:33AM
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'82, you are dead wrong. Not only that, you hold the same opinion that many other people, especially younger people, hold that causes self righteous and condescending attitudes.
First of all, I would take any, and I mean ANY job I would be eligible to do. In this town, at this time, there are not I am even qualified to apply for. If I did there are hundreds of younger, more able, and more acceptable candidates. As a 52 year old man with certain disabilities and no "official" work record for the past six years I am for all intents and purposes entirely unemployable in this area. There MIGHT be a low paying job in a larger city but I cannot pull up and move wife and family to Houston so I can make seven bucks an hour. Of course I don't draw unemployment, that ran out a long, long time ago.
Second, in many parts of the country companies have laid off tens or even hundreds of thousands of workers who are older and closer to retirement for the single purpose of cutting off that retirement. Hundreds of thousands more have been laid off jobs they held for decades when the factory or business closed. In our town of 30k, give or take, four major industries and several lessor ones have closed up shop in the past year or so. The only major employer left has laid off over 500. There are thousands of unemployed people here, the majority men my age or older who have very little chance of finding work before their benefits run out.
These unemployed were not fast food cooks but skilled and well paid workers doing precise jobs that no longer exist. They do not qualify for much of anything else because they've done that job for decades and not trained. They are too old to go to college, they'd be retirement age before they graduated. What's going to happen is these folks are going to loose everything they have and then disappear in to the "poor" category and wind up scratching by on a few hundred bucks a month social security in a few years.
Third, my wife is payroll manager for an internationally known staffing company. Their business has fallen more than half in the last year alone. Two years ago the office grossed a million bucks. This year the boss is worried about having to close altogether. People are lined up out the door all day long filling out applications. Job orders to place them in are few and far between.
If all those people passing through my wife's office were to line up at every job opening or even show up to apply for any job they might qualify for at every company the only thing they'd accomplish would be to create chaos, waste their gas and time, and make the work of personnel officers and managers a nightmare. Having been a manager myself, as well as a welfare caseworker and an unemployed worker from different fields I know what it is like.
Few things irritate me more than have some young person look down their nose at others who may not be so young, so healthy, or so gifted and judge them because they can't work miracles. Wait until you are in your forties or fifties, having difficulty getting around, and find yourself competing with young kids. The shoe will be on the other foot. The American dream my generation held on to has become a nightmare of loss and sorrow and poverty to a huge number of people my age.
I would not judge if I were you. Some day your age is going to creep up and bite you on the ass for it.
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Wing_Zero_75
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Oct 22 @ 11:37AM
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We need to ask what we are doing to help those who were dealt a weaker hand in life's game Those who are dealt a weaker hand tend to roll over and play dead. Instead of rolling over, they need to stand up. I have been dealt a shit hand. I live in constant pain of some sort. I dont think my body likes me. Anyways, Ive always stood up and when there was no work in the area, I went elsewhere. If anyone thinks I liked working at burger king, you are sadly mistaken. To call my boss an arrogant pecker head, would be to call the titanic a small boat. It was a job and it paid my bills. I guess those who bitch the loudest need to learn what pride and self reliance are.
Just my thoughts.
Larry
And to those who "need" help because they were dealt a "weak" hand, I'll send a copy of Anton LaVeys Satanic Bible.
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Wing_Zero_75
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Oct 22 @ 11:49AM
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'82, you are dead wrong. Not only that, you hold the same opinion that many other people, especially younger people, hold that causes self righteous and condescending attitudes.
Its survival of the fitest. There are so many people who would rather starve than work at a fast food place or somewhere that actual work is involved. Someone has to clean toilets, someone has to pump gas, someone has to ask if you want fries with that. Oh wait, jobs like that are below them and their friends. To give excuses doesnt do anyone but obama any good. RWR has some health problems, as stated in a blog by her. You dont see her bitching and whining about life not being fair. She picks herself up and goes forward. If there is no work where you are, look elsewhere or move.
How many more excuses do we have to hear before someone gets off their ass and does something? Maybe we need to coddle them a little more under the obama regime. Maybe that would let them be completely useless all their life.
Luneib, look at her and her situation. DId she just roll over and give excuse after excuse? F*CK no, When things were not working out she did something else. We need to start looking at these people for inspiration.
This is not a back handed compliment to anyone, but why should what is normal now be the extreme? How many others here lost their job, but search and try endlessly to find a new one because surrender IS NOT AN OPTION.
Sometimes things work against you, but damnit, thats not a reason to give up, it is a reason to try harder.
Larry
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dharmaseeker
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Oct 22 @ 1:22PM
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Not to be rude or anything, but what you say is bullshit, wingman. *I* have worked at McDonalds, behind convenience counters, and driven trucks that were a danger to the highway and myself. I''ve cleaned more toilets than you've had time to sit on in a lifetime. I've switched careers nearly a dozen times when the job I had been doing was no longer a possibility. I'd gladly go back to any of those jobs if there wasn't several dozen people in line ahead of me younger, healthier and more able to do them than I who will actually get called for an interview.
Survival of the fittest is another way of saying you'll get what you want and screw everybody else if they can't measure up to your young and healthy abilities. I may be old and unable to do what you do but I am not too old to recognize jerkwadd attitudes or to speak up against them.
Sometimes things work against you, but damnit, thats not a reason to give up, it is a reason to try harder.
I agree with this statement but not with the attitude that goes with it. The old and stupid belief that all one has to do is work hard enough and one can do what they want or get what they want is a crock. It's also an insult to the older people who will never work again because they've been screwed by their companies and by younger workers who have no respect for the lifetime they devoted to their profession.
This country is going to hell in a handbasket. One of the reasons is that young folks look down their noses at older people and have no respect or consideration for them. A man goes to work when he's seventeen and works thirty years at a job, faithful and hard working, only to find himself kicked out the door at forty-seven because he is not young, his pay is higher (because he earned it) and he's only a decade or so away from costing the company retirement.
In this world the fact is that hard work is not rewarded, it is punished. Honesty is not desired, it is condemned. Faithful service is not rewarded, it is betrayed. Do you not see the irony of what you've written? "Survival of the fittest" and "Sometimes things work against you, but damnit, thats not a reason to give up, it is a reason to try harder" are completely contradictory. If it's survival of the fittest then folks my age will never survive no matter how hard we try because we've been betrayed by time. There's no way we can compete.
What young people should be doing instead of scrambling over older people to take their jobs away is marching in the streets for fair wages and fair treatment of all workers. But then that smacks of socialism, doesn't it? God help us all (if there was a god) if anybody actually stands up for someone else and acidently sounds like a socialist!
I am a socialist because I do believe there should be laws protecting workers who have given their lives to companies. I'm not one of them, either, I was a roustabout all my life. There are millions, however, who have been screwed by companies including thousands in this town alone. One company closed a division here a year ago, moved the long-term employees they wanted to keep and dumped the rest. Those they kept had their seniority and retirement stripped away. Then last Jan/Feb the company claimed its profits were down (11 million for a month rather than 13 million!) they dumped every single one of those over a hundred people, leaving them with no retirement.
Before I had kids I said let this country screw itself, I'll be out of it soon enough. Now that I have kids I teach them to respect others and care for everyone and maybe, just maybe, they'll have the ability to do what I never was able to do. What is most likely is that I'm setting them up to be martyrs to people who believe in "survival of the fittest."
I tell you what. If there was anywhere at all I could find a job even for minimum wage I'd take it, put all the money in the bank, and when I had enough I'd take my family and walk away from this place where such crap attitudes are all the rage and to a nice, remote island where they can make their own way in peace.
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thenewguy295
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Oct 22 @ 2:58PM
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After 30 years of working and paying into the system and never taking anything out I haven't earned, I'm out of a job and re-training for a new profession. Even if I wasn't getting unemployment benefits I'd still go to school.
The way I look at it someone else has benefited from my labor all these years and now it's my turn to get something back. Once I'm retrained and working I have greater potential earning power than I had which means I'll be paying more taxes and once again paying more into the system plus I'll have a larger pool of potential employers to choose from.
I was in a dying industry with only two real employers in the state one of which let me go and the other would be a 50 mile plus commute to work and not much better than minimum wage. Now I'll be able to choose from dozens of companies in Michigan alone and hundreds nationwide.
BUT I almost didn't get my benefits, the state decided that as a full-time student I wasn't able to be available to work even though there is no work available in my field. I basically had to agree to quit school and go back to my old profession in the event a job becomes available to get my unemployment. Fortunately that isn't going to happen so I can train and get the benes that I have paid for and earned.
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Hooks
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Oct 22 @ 6:31PM
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First let me say, there are some people that will take advantage of anything they can, but it doesn't mean everyone does! Now, it's called Unemployment Insurance, with insurance being the operative word, and it also means that the person was working, and through no fault of their own, have lost their job.
So if you don't believe that unemployment insurance compensation is right, insurance that it is funded almost totally by either federal or state taxes paid by employers (this tax is designated to unemployment), then the next time your house is damaged by fire, storms, etc just tell the insurance company, hey I know the insurance is paid, but I'll just cover it myself. Next time you have an auto accident, just tell the insurance company, I know I paid a lot of money on the premiums, but you guys don't worry, I got this. Next time you go to the doctor, or hospital, forget the insurance, just write them a check! Cough, cough err get the picture?
As I read through the comments, it made me wonder if some even knew that most of the unemployment insurance compensation is paid for insurance, not a government charity handout! Insurance that your former employers, and inadvertantly, you have paid for! 
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legacy1
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Oct 23 @ 9:04AM
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http://www.whittierdailynews.com/business/ci_13584373
"This is the highest ratio of job seekers to available positions we've seen since the government began tracking these figures in about the year 2000. As of July of this year, there were approximately 2.4 million full-time jobs open, but there were about 14.5 million people looking for jobs."
No wonder job seekers are under pressure!
Any questions? 
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