USA welfare system

[Felix]

I graduated High School when I was 16, completed a course in basic engineering in collage when I was 17 and from then on, I was working.

When I was 16 I was sleeping under bridges, learning to build fires, learning to bum rides, taking whatever drugs were offered me, and getting mugged a lot. I was so naive. I went from yuppieville to the projects to wandering and totally clueless as to how to take care of myself. What do you do when you have just a backpack and a highway, and no one to call? Where do you go next? I couldn't even sleep on it and figure it out in the morning. The morning was harder than the sleep.

Earlier I think I meant to be chiller. I meant to apologize, to agree that I haven't earned what I have. I take handouts. If I didn't, we'd be lost. I've been that route. I haven't always been on the grid. My daughter deserves better than I can give her without help, though.

It's hard to think about. I don't know how to be objective about this.

[Cindy]

Lets also put this into perspective.

I have just advertised a job for a basic medical scientist. I have had 77 applicants. The qualification needed is a basic science degree. It is a start off junior job. It is permanent.

Of the 77 I have 15 people with PhD's. Some of the PhD's are 15 years post their degree. They have excellent publication records. One has a PhD and a medical degree. The people with B.Sc are mainly 1st class Hons. I have people who have worked 20+ years as senior technicians applying.

The job market has collapsed.

How to choose people to interview has become a challenge. Sadly the people who are junior enough for the job haven't a shoe in. I'll be taking a PhD with heaps of experience.

[Felix]

Lets also put this into perspective.

I have just advertised a job for a basic medical scientist. I have had 77 applicants. The qualification needed is a basic science degree. It is a start off junior job. It is permanent.

Of the 77 I have 15 people with PhD's. Some of the PhD's are 15 years post their degree. They have excellent publication records. One has a PhD and a medical degree. The people with B.Sc are mainly 1st class Hons. I have people who have worked 20+ years as senior technicians applying.

The job market has collapsed.

How to choose people to interview has become a challenge. Sadly the people who are junior enough for the job haven't a shoe in. I'll be taking a PhD with heaps of experience.

That's really crazy. The work I'm best at (DNA amplification, PCR, other lab gruntwork) was attainable at one point just for knowing how to do it. Where I live now, you have to at least have a B.S. to get hired, and even then you've got a lot of competition.

Those comments don't really back up my "that's really crazy" comment. I didn't realize Australia had fallen so solidly into the recession as well. I'm approaching problems as if it had never happened. My troubles predate the economic collapse.

[Cindy]

 I have a publication record of about 300 peer reviewed papers. So I should. I have people applying for this job with 100 peer reviewed publications. There is no way that people should be thrown away like this. These people have cost a fortune to teach.  I was quoted several years ago that in Australia we  commit $1mill per year to train a PhD student. Where the money goes goddess knows I never see it.

It is tragic how we are treating people.

No it is disgusting.

Cindy

[Felix]

I have a publication record of about 300 peer reviewed papers. So I should. I have people applying for this job with 100 peer reviewed publications. There is no way that people should be thrown away like this. These people have cost a fortune to teach.  I was quoted several years ago that in Australia we  commit $1mill per year to train a PhD student. Where the money goes goddess knows I never see it.

It is tragic how we are treating people.

No it is disgusting.

Cindy

Huh. I might've heard of you, and you might've heard of my bosses. I'm not sure if that's really cool, or if I should back away and go to some other thread and talk about strapons or whatever.

[tekla]

I'll be taking a PhD with heaps of experience.

And if you didn't the very best person, then I'm pretty sure that your boss would see to it that you were out looking for work too, as such a decision would not be in the best interests of your employer. 

I'm sure it's very discouraging to the kids who come in for the load-in/load-out who really want my job, in part for the money, but mostly because working with live music is far more 'theatrical' than setting up conventions for dentists, accountants and fat guys in comic book costumes.  And when they find out that I have a PhD, and my co-worker has a Masters in Mechanical Engineering from MIT, and that between us we have over 70 years of live concert production experience in venues across the US and Europe as well as both of us having served our 'time on the bus' with international touring acts^*, well they start to realize that it's a long way to the top if you want to rock and roll - or do major symphonies, or Broadway shows, or major movies, or major TV shows.  But the earlier you realize that, then the earlier you can start working your ass off and getting the training, education and experience.

* -  I did Devo last week at The Fillmore, and looking at the five of us who were there doing the show call I counted over 175 years of total experience, 8 college degrees from real top schools, alumni from the Grateful Dead, Journey, Santana, Translator, the Bangles, Dave Mathews, Little Feet and Metallica (and tons of lesser bands) touring crews.  People want to work that job, and why not - the Fillmore is arguably one of the top rock and roll venues of all time, if not day in and day out, year in and year out, decade after decade THE top venue.  So of course they want to work there.  But what they don't realize is that one of the key reasons that The Fillmore is that good has to do with not hiring people like them in the first place.   They hire me (and always have hired people like me and the other boys and girls on the crew) and not people with no experience, no training, and frequently no work ethic.

[Felix]

My dad makes a crapload of money with just a bachelor's. He sells semiconductors, or designs military weapons, or works with lasers, or hell if I know, we don't talk much, but he does okay. He got his education and his foot in the door early, and he also has few principles.

I still plan on getting a PhD, and hopefully also an MD, and doing medical research. I won't make a ton of money, and since I'll be starting old, I'll be happy to just pay off my loans and make a little academic progress before I die.

Until then I just want to not be homeless again, and to not fall apart under my current living conditions. If my daughter gets better I can go back to school.

[Joelene9]

  I did not get a degree, but I made enough to save and to get on my company's 80% stock option, despite getting the lowest pay for that industry.  That stock split twice in my latter years with that company.  Some of that went to pay off the mortgage, the other portion in investments.  I am still living off of those investments more than 10 years since I got laid off.  My fellow Boomers did not do that, instead they spent it on the latest expensive fad stuff and overpriced housing with astronomical mortgage rates.  Some of these people were in management. 
  My mom was a manager in the Bell System with a unit of a dozen people in the 1980's.  She told me that a several of her male employees were making bets on whose credit card was maxed-out the most!  These were in the $10K - $25K range!  Dadgum, did one of those fellers get into management later.  These were the first to go into foreclosure on their homes when that "Baby Bell" was bought off and then sold down the river (fraud, that ex-CEO is serving prison time).  A lot of layoffs there and lousy phone service!  My mom did not live to see the disaster occur after working there 30 years with 4 kids to raise.  She would of lost her pension anyway. 
  Joelene