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Originally Posted by Rodney
As for the "hot economy," many of the jobs being created are part-time or without benefits. Let me tell you about the temp job I have right now:
I'm working in a public university in the publications dept. They have _two_ temporary four hour openings: one in the morning, one in afternoon. Same work, same workstation even. Why have two instead of one? So they don't have to pay benes, which would be required otherwise.
And there's a lot of that going around: multiple half-time jobs instead of single full-time jobs, and I'm talking knowledge-worker jobs here.
Aside from that, it's starting to dawn on some folks that the booming economy could deflate fairly quickly. A big part of the economic growth of the last few years has been built on creative credit, low interest rates, home equity cash-outs, and a booming real estate, mortgage, and home construction industries. Pull out the low interest rates -- just that one change -- and it all starts to fall apart. Home equity cash vanishes. Hundreds of thousands of jobs vanish in construction and real estate and banking. Foreclosures rise, real estate prices fall. You want a scary figure: one in 50 adult Californians has a real estate license. A whole lot of them are going to be on the street soon, if they ever even got off the street.
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Exactly.. I've seen at least 45 different people, mostly women, whom i have worked with over the past 4 yrs drop jobs to get a real estate license and cash in on what i see to be a fast buck. It cannot hold, quite honestly, adn i believe the loss of the low interest rates will be the first hiccup and everything after that will plummet.
I also agree that it sickens me at how few full time jobs with benefits there are anymore. Literally dozens of my friends have been phased down to part time status where 2 people do the job that 1 used to do...and since they are part time, they get paid about 15-20% less AND get absolutely no benefits, or, at the most, a week's paid vacation after a year...(25 hrs at standard pay) To think that my father's generation worked an entire life at one company and can retire on the pension given by that company...it just makes me so frustrated now. I cannot forsee me or anyone else my age working at the same company for more than 5 yrs anymore. After that, it's like they are phased out, dropped, Shifted, or dropped to part time when they start to get antsy about benefits, vacations, retirement, etc. Hell, the manager at the restaurant i work at right now has been wtih the owner for almost 9 years and still barely gets health insurance, does not have any form of retirement plan or pension, and barely gets 2 wks vacation, while being on salary for 65-70 hrs/wk, at a cutrate salary..
and whatever happened to employer/employee loyalty? It's seriously becoming so much of an us against them mentality in the workplace as well. No matter how high up you are, you're always butting against anyoen above you...or below you..or beside you...disgusting.
scary stuff.
and i don't see it changing when the GOP is booted from the whitehouse..