As one of the 13.5 million unemployed I was interested to see this column by Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Krugman, confirming many of the trends I and my fellow have-nots have experienced at first hand. Did I say one of the unemployed? Whoops! I meant, as one of the many millions of 99ers whose benefits have expired and who are therefore no longer counted in the unemployment statistics. One of those whose omission has helped artificially drop the unemployment rate to 8.8%. One of those who, with zero dependable income, now depend on the kindness of friends and strangers to avoid homelessness day in, day out, facing the grim prospect of sleeping out in cars or of camping on cold concrete and begging on the streets.
Paul Krugman testifying before Congress
Newly published research reveals that many HR professionals make a standard practice of excluding the unemployed from consideration for open positions. The average length of time unemployed is at an all-time high since the Great Depression. Age discrimination is rife, both against young job-seekers new to the labor force and against veteran workers suffering the natural ravages of age and decades of overwork. Veterans certainly deserve better treatment when they are looking for jobs, and maybe if they visit website: https://recruitmilitary.com/employers they can possibly receive the job support they need in civilian life.
So you will forgive us for taking a rather jaundiced view of the “American Dream” and the vaunted Wisdom of the Free Market force-fed to U.S. citizens by the corporate media and political Establishment over the last three decades. As the Feds and state legislatures embark on a carnival of cuts to the services which might otherwise have assisted the Great Unwashed — all in the name of Austerity and Deficit Reduction — and neatly transfer the funds thus “saved” into the pockets of the plutocrats through obscene tax cuts, the hypocrisy of the system stands revealed for all to see.
Read Krugman’s original article from the New York Times, supporting all the assertions made above:
— Larry Neilson