Posted on 12/28/2002 11:13:08 AM PST by ex-Texan
Edited on 04/13/2004 1:40:14 AM PDT by Jim Robinson. [history]
The district manager would conducted the interview was very nice ... and very candid. He said that his company, and as he knew, other like companies were looking for "career minded candidates" (his words) and are especially NOT hiring laid off high tech workers. I asked why, when people like myself are very well qualified to the job. He said that I must know that the company is fully aware that when the economy turns around all the high tech workers will leave their company and return to high tech. He also said the his company could not afford the time or money to train those "temporary" employees. He also said that we, the laid off high tech workers should use the unemployment money to better their education and "wait out the storm ... after all you earned it" (his words again)
That is the way it is John ... Krispy Creme is NOT going to hire people like myself who are vastly over-qualified. I know because I tried. Radio Shack was not my only effort at entering employment outside of my field. Sure one could lie on a resume, BUT when the hiring manager is seated across from you in a face to face interview, you are not going to be able to hide your education and that manager is going to know in a hot minute that you are OUT OF PLACE and you WILL NOT get the job.
Still on my first cup of coffee
Though I agree with you, their ignorance is NOT going to pay the bills.
Unemployment used to be two years. It was lowered to six months during the "boom" years as it wasn't really needed. It IS needed now. There are over 90,000 laid off high tech workers in Silicon Valley out of a high tech workforce of approx 300,000. Do the math, that is approx 33%. These high tech workers are NOT bums and WOULD take just about any job. Contrary to a few delusional misinformed or just plain stupid people on this thread, there are NOT 90,000 low level jobs for these people to take. The government really does NOT want the technical base of this country, you know ... the people who design the nifty high tech stuff that keeps us a super power and enables us to defeat our enemies though they out number us ... the government does NOT want to lose those people to Burger King. So George W gives out an additional 3 months ($4,000) of unemployment so these people can at least feed their families while they try to find a job. Most of these laid off high tech workers pay and have paid high taxes through the years. That $4,000 pittance is not even 10% of what I paid in taxes last year. That little $330 a week is not going to pay the mortgage nor is it meant to. That means that people who have been out of work for 6-12 month have probably already lost their life savings trying to keep their houses which are now probably in foreclosure. The rate of mortgage default in Silicon Valley as reported by the media is ... 42%.
If you noticed ... not only did the job market tank BUT the stock market also crashed during this time. A lot of these people saved their money ... as they as supposed to ... in various markets including long term 401K's ... and lost EVERYTHING (like me). The banks pay ... what 1.5%? Oh ya that's a good investment for the future.
The bottomline of this rant is ...
1. Unemployed high tech workers are NOT bums looking for a hand out. Their jobs have been stolen from them by H1B's who have NO business in our country taking our jobs just so some greedy company can make an easy buck.
2. H1B's can work for minimum wage because they DO NOT have to live in THIS society when they leave. It is NOT a level playing field for the American worker.
3. Lower wage paying companies are NOT going to hire highly (over) qualified people. AND if a high tech worker aws lucky enough to land a low paying job, he would NO LONGER be available to interview for high tech jobs if they became available cause he is now flipping burgers in Podunk (where the jobs are).
4. The next industry hit by this could EASILY be yours ... so get off your arrogant assinine high horse (not talking to you personally John)
5. Most of these high tech workers have spent a lifetime building their lives and are NOT likely to give them up before the situation becomes critical ... we HAVE been though downturns before, BUT in high tech this is NOT a repression ... as the media recently reported, it is a high tech DEPRESSION. No one could have anticipated the level that this has reached.
On a good note ... after 9 months of hell 88 recruiters and dozens of resume submittals ... I got a job in an electronics company doing something distantly related to my disipline. I was into my first extension, without which I would have gone hungry.
Also forgot point #6.
6. Most laid off high tech workers WOULD work for the lower wage, I took a 25% pay cut. BUT the H1B hiring companies don't want them anyway cause they know that they can do ANYTHING to a H1B without fear of repercussion cause if the H1B complains the company pulls their sponsership and the H1B gets shipped home (where they belong anyway).
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They's be nuts to hire you for that job. You know it. I know it. Any honest person with half a brain knows it.
As far as this Krispy Kreme bull crap, if I were a hiring manager I'd look for a high school graduate who was not particularly college material. I want somebody decently bright with a pleasant disposition who is going to believe he has hit life's jackpot delivering donuts. It will be worth investing in training him because he'll stay there forever and be happy. I'm going to firgure a 140 IQ engineer makes a damned good engineer but will be too unchallenged and bored fooling with donuts. I'll want somebody with about 110-115 IQ with limited education. The hiring interviewer will have been told to do that in the industrial or personnel psychology courses he took.
Depending upon your ability, you may even be overqualified for many technical and engineering jobs requiring marginal engineers at marginal salaries. In this market with hundreds os resumes comng in for each newspaper ad, employers can afford to be choosey. With five degrees, if you are good, you are going to have a problem. Much of the work at high levels is not being done here, or is being shipped out of the country.
Half the people on this thread have been lucky, are life-inexperienced, are wound up on cliches, or are posting to beat their own drum and brag about how clever they are.
Millions of Tax Payers get a Break!
Don't have to pay people for not working. Job seekers will have added incentive to take a job, any job.
Actually Mensa has me recorded at 161.
As far as being good ... I'm a recognized expert in my field ... and it still took 9 months to get a job and not in what I am expert at.
Like I said ...
My Real Estate business cratered last year. Being self employed I didn't have the option of unemployment, and there were no jobs here either. I got a job waiting tables. See, sometimes we have to buck up and take a lesser job than we would really like. When most people whine, "there are no jobs", that's code for, there are jobs, I just think I'm too good to take them.
Business is back now, and I never had to depend on ANY government welfare in the meantime. (still have the waiting job 1 or 2 days per week)
twin sisters from 'M'ethyl Island
"Forget about the politicians, the American people have become shameless and sound like a bunch of spoiled two year olds. "
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