Nothing in the article is of any surprise. One feels deeply sorry for all
those over 50 -- and even over 40 -- who are out of work. It's highly
likely that most of them will never have a full-time job again. But even if
the advanced governments do the decent thing and offer some halfway
reasonable welfare then governments will have something far more serious to
worry about. This will be the accumulation of jobless young people,
particularly young males and of increasingly educated and competent males
also -- those who expected to move smoothly into well-paid jobs after
university. At any age up to about 30, while their frontal lobes are still
developing, they are very impressionable and many can be captured easily by
extremist beliefs. Think IRA, think Saudi Arabian 9/11ers, think of
terrorists and revolutionaries throughout history. But, of course,
governments won't be thinking about this just yet. They'll be assuming . .
. hoping . . . hoping . . . that the aftermath of the credit crunch won't
last for more than a year or two until some financial wheeze or other will
rescues them.
Keith
At 12:40 21/09/2010 -0400, you wrote:
September 19, 2010 NY Times
For the Unemployed Over 50, Fears of Never Working Again
By
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/r/motoko_rich/index.html?inline=nyt-per>MOTOKO
RICH
VASHON ISLAND, Wash. Patricia Reid is not in her 70s, an age when many
Americans continue to work. She is not even in her 60s. She is just 57.
But four years after losing her job she cannot, in her darkest moments,
escape a nagging thought: she may never work again.
College educated, with a degree in business administration, she is
experienced, having worked for two decades as an internal auditor and
analyst at
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/business/companies/boeing_company/index.html?inline=nyt-org>Boeing
before losing that job.
But that does not seem to matter, not for her and not for a growing number
of people in their 50s and 60s who desperately want or need to work to pay
for retirement and who are starting to worry that they may be discarded
from the work force forever.
Since the economic collapse, there are not enough jobs being created for
the population as a whole, much less for those in the twilight of their
careers.
Of the 14.9 million unemployed, more than 2.2 million are 55 or older.
Nearly half of them have been unemployed six months or longer, according
to the Labor Department. The unemployment rate in the group 7.3 percent is
at a record, more than double what it was at the beginning of the latest
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/subjects/r/recession_and_depression/index.html?inline=nyt-classifier>recession.
After other recent downturns, older people who lost jobs fretted about how
long it would take to return to the work force and worried that they might
never recover their former incomes. But today, because it will take years
to absorb the giant pool of unemployed at the economys recent pace, many
of these older people may simply age out of the labor force before their
luck changes.
For Ms. Reid, it has been four years of hunting without a single job
offer. She buzzes energetically as she describes the countless
applications she has lobbed through the Internet, as well as the online
courses she is taking to burnish her software skills.
Still, when she is pressed, her can-do spirit falters.
There are these fears in the background, and they are suppressed,said Ms.
Reid, who is now selling some of her jewelry and clothes online and is
late on some credit card payments. I have had nightmares about becoming a
bag lady,she said. It could happen to anyone. So many people are so close
to it, and they dont even realize it.
Being unemployed at any age can be crushing. But older workers suspect
their résumés often get shoved aside in favor of those from younger
workers. Others discover that their job-seeking skills as well as some
technical skills sought by employers are rusty after years of working for
the same company.
Many had in fact anticipated working past conventional retirement ages to
gird themselves financially for longer life spans, expensive health care
and reduced pension guarantees.
The most recent recession has increased the need to extend working life.
Home values, often a familys most important asset, have been battered.
Stock portfolios are only now starting to recover. According to a Gallup
poll in April, more than a third of people not yet retired plan to work
beyond age 65, compared with just 12 percent in 1995.
Older workers who lose their jobs could pose a policy problem if they lose
their ability to be self-sufficient. Thats what we should be worrying
about,said Carl E. Van Horn, professor of public policy and director of
the John J. Heldrich Center for Workforce Development at
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/r/rutgers_the_state_university/index.html?inline=nyt-org>Rutgers
University, what it means to this class of the new unemployables, people
who have been cast adrift at a very vulnerable part of their career and
their life.
Forced early retirement imposes an intense financial strain, particularly
for those at lower incomes. The recession and its aftermath have already
pushed down some older workers. In figures released last week by the
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/c/census_bureau/index.html?inline=nyt-org>Census
Bureau, the poverty rate among those 55 to 64 increased to 9.4 percent in
2009, from 8.6 percent in 2007.
But even middle-class people who might skate by on savings or a spouses
income are jarred by an abrupt end to working life and to a secure retirement.
Thats what I spent my whole life in pursuit of, was security,Ms. Reid
said. Until the last few years, I felt very secure in my job.
As an auditor, Ms. Reid loved figuring out the kinks in a manufacturing or
parts delivery process. But after more than 20 years of commuting across
Puget Sound to Boeing, Ms. Reid was exhausted when she was let go from her
$80,000-a-year job.
Stunned and depressed, she sent out résumés, but figured she had a little
time to recover. So she took vacations to Turkey and Thailand with her
husband, who is a home repairman. She sought chiropractic treatments for a
neck injury and helped nurse a priest dying of cancer.
Most of her days now are spent in front of a laptop, holed up in a
lighthouse garret atop the house that her husband, Denny Mielock, built in
the 1990s on a breathtaking piece of property overlooking the sound.
As she browses the job listings that clog her e-mail in-box, she refuses
to give in to her fears. If I let myself think like that all the time,she
said, I could not even bear getting out of bed in the morning.
With her husbands home repair business pummeled by the housing downturn,
the bills are mounting. Although the couple do not have a mortgage on
their 3,000-square-foot house, they pay close to $7,000 a year in property
taxes. The roof is leaking. Their utility bills can be $300 a month in the
winter, even though they often keep the thermostat turned down to 50 degrees.
They could try to sell their home, but given the depressed housing market,
they are reluctant.
We are circling the drain here, and I am bailing like hell,said Ms. Reid,
emitting an incongruous cackle, as if laughter is the only response to her
plight. But the boat is still sinking.
It is not just the finances that have destabilized her life.
Her husband worries that she isolates herself and that she does not
socialize enough. Weve both been hard workers our whole lives,said Mr.
Mielock, 59. Ms. Reid sometimes rose just after 3 a.m. to make the
hourlong commute to Boeings data center in Bellevue and attended night
school to earn a masters in management information systems.
A job is more than a job, you know,Mr. Mielock said. Its where you fit in
society.
Here in the greater Seattle area, a fifth of those claiming extended
unemployment benefits are 55 and older.
To help seniors polish their job-seeking skills, WorkSource, a local
consortium of government and nonprofit groups, recently began offering
seminars. On a recent morning, 14 people gathered in a windowless
conference room at a local community college to get tips on how to
age-proof their résumés and deflect questions about being overqualified.
Motivational posters hung on one wall, bearing slogans like Failure is the
path of least persistence.
Using PowerPoint slides, Liz Howland, the chipper but no-nonsense session
leader, projected some common myths about older job-seekers on a screen:
Older workers are less capable of evaluating information, making decisions
and problem-solvingor Older workers are rigid and inflexible and have
trouble adapting to change.
Ms. Howland, 61, ticked off the reasons those statements were inaccurate.
But a clear undercurrent of anxiety ran through the room. Is it really
true that if you have the energy and the passion that they will overlook
the age factor?asked a 61-year-old man who had been laid off from a
furniture maker last October.
Gallows humor reigned. As Ms. Howland who suggested that applicants remove
any dates older than 15 years from their résumé advised the group on how
to finesse interview questions like When did you have the job that helped
you develop that skill?one out-of-work journalist deadpanned: How about
during the 20th century?
During a break, Anne Richard, who declined to give her age, confessed she
was afraid she would not be able to work again after losing her contract
as a house director at a
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/u/university_of_washington/index.html?inline=nyt-org>University
of Washington sorority in June. Although she had 20 years of experience as
an office clerk in Chattanooga, Tenn., she feared her technology skills
had fallen behind.
I dont feel like I can compete with kids who have been on computers all
their lives,said Ms. Richard, who was sleeping on the couch of a couple
she had met at church and contemplating imminent homelessness.
Older people who lose their jobs take longer to find work. In August, the
average time unemployed for those 55 and older was slightly more than 39
weeks, according to the Labor Department, the longest of any age group.
That is much worse than in August 1983, also after a deep recession, when
someone unemployed in that age group spent an average of 27.5 weeks
finding work.
At this years pace of an average of 82,000 new jobs a month, it will take
at least eight more years to create the 8 million positions lost during
the recession. And that does not even allow for population growth.
Advocates for the elderly worry that younger people are more likely to
fill the new jobs as well.
I do think the longer someone is out of work, the more employers are going
to question why it is that someone hasnt been able to find work,said Sara
Rix, senior strategic policy adviser at
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/a/aarp/index.html?inline=nyt-org>AARP,
the lobbying group for seniors. Their skills have atrophied for one thing,
and technology changes so rapidly that even if nothing happened to the
skills that you have, they may become increasingly less relevant to the
jobs that are becoming available.
In four years of job hunting, Ms. Reid has discovered that she is no
longer technologically proficient. In one of a handful of interviews she
has secured, for an auditing position at the Port of Seattle, she learned
that the job required skills in PeopleSoft, financial software she had
never used. She assumes that deficiency cost her the job.
Ms. Reid is still five years away from being eligible for
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/subjects/s/social_security_us/index.html?inline=nyt-classifier>Social
Security. But even then, she would be drawing early, which reduces monthly
payments. Taking Social Security at 62 means a retiree would receive a 25
percent lower monthly payout than if she worked until 66.
Ms. Reid is in some ways luckier than others. Boeing paid her a six-month
severance, and she has health care benefits that cover her and her husband
for $40 a month.
And she admits some regrets: she had a $180,000 balance in her
<http://topics.nytimes.com/your-money/retirement/401ks-and-similar-plans/index.html?inline=nyt-classifier>401(k)
account, and paid $80,000 in penalties and taxes when she cashed it out
early. She did not rein in her expenses right away. And now, her
$500-a-week unemployment benefits have been exhausted.
She has since cut back, forgoing
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/business/companies/nordstrom_inc/index.html?inline=nyt-org>Nordstrom
shopping sprees and theater subscriptions, but also cutting out red meat
at home and putting off home repairs.
In order to qualify for accounting posts, she is taking an online training
course in QuickBooks, a popular accounting software used by small
businesses. She recently signed up for a tax course at an
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/business/companies/h_and_r_block_inc/index.html?inline=nyt-org>H&R
Block tax preparation office in Seattle.
And she is plugging ahead with her current plan: to send out 600
applications to accounting firms in the area, offering her services for
the next tax season. Eventually, she wants to open her own business.
With odd jobs and her husbands albeit shriveled earnings, she could
stagger along. For now, she stitches together an income by gardening for
neighbors, helping fellow church members with their computers, and
participating in Internet surveys for as little as $5 apiece.
You dont necessarily have to go through the door,Ms. Reid said. You can go
around it and go under it. I can be very creative. I think that I will
eventually manage to pull this together.
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Keith Hudson, Saltford, England
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