Last year at this time I was in Pennsylvania, a situation I wrote about in this blog. I was there for a job which ran from late April through October. Shortly before I left there I was able to arrange another job back in Massachusetts which ran from November through the middle of April this year, when I was laid off.
So right around the same time I was offered the job in PA last year, lo and behold another job posting this year for a virtually identical job to the one I was doing last year came across the wires. The same recruiter contacted me about it and I said yeah let's do it! The job I had in Pennsylvania was a good one and I found places to stay with friendly and interesting people in the quaint little historic towns of Millersville and then Marietta, which came to feel like a second home.
So I called my former manager and told him I was eager to come down again. Things looked good. Then it became apparent things were not so good. The job was being promoted by other recruiters at half the rate I got last year. Last year before I left GSK outsourced their entire security team, laying off everyone in that department, and one of my friends there who was a business analyst I learned earlier this year had been laid off as well. So GSK is evidently pinching pennies along with the rest of them.
Another former employer, Teradyne, evidently now is outsourcing the entire documentation department they have had in place for many years. So that will put several more writers back in circulation as competition for every job heats up more and more each day.
Meanwhile unemployment benefits are running out for many people who are desperately trying to find jobs. And Congress is one vote short of approving benefit extensions because it will add to the federal debt. They can't approve something that we don't have the money for. Sounds reasonable. So if I don't have the money to pay my mortgage, I shouldn't pay it. There goes my house. If in order to pay the mortgage I have to forgo paying the exorbitant electric bill, I shouldn't pay that. There goes my ability to live in my house. If in order to live somewhere I can't pay for medical insurance which is required here in Massachusetts, I shouldn't pay for that. There goes my ability to see my doctor after I am forced into a restricted network plan.
You know something, Congress? If you don't have the money to help me, I don't have the money to help you. If I don't have an income, why should you have one?
2 comments:
Hey your one (?) reader checking in! That's one more than me--since mom died.
I prefer to share my embarrassments in email rather than in a blog comment. The old CIA domain is gone, as I recall? What's your current address?
Younger daughter is spending winter break on the shores of Lake Atitlan. She's in San Pedro La Laguna, learning Spanish.
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