We were incredibly lucky — we had our campus job searches at the end of fall term/beginning of spring term, and we signed on two new faculty just before the coronavirus hit the fan. If we hadn’t, we probably would have postponed the searches until next year and left a lot of good people hanging, wondering what next. I can’t imagine the stress of trying to search for a job right now in the middle of this chaos.
Abe at Oceanoxia doesn’t have to imagine it — he and his wife are both smack in the middle employment uncertainty. He does good work. If you’re in a more fortunate position, check him out and do what you can to help.
Tell me about it. I work in a credit/debit card fraud alert call center and since this insanity began there has been a lot less spending which means less potential fraud activity to look into and contact card owners. Most of the time, it’s bumper-to-bumper calls for long stretches of the day. For last few days, 10-15 minutes can go by between calls.
I’m 45-years-old, and since I have no union to protect me, any “seniority” (I’ve been with my company for 8 years) is moot. If they lay me off, I have no reason to believe that when business picks up again, they’ll just replace with someone who’s younger and desperate enough to work for less. (Not that they are paying my well right now.) If that happens, I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to get another job.
Tell me about it, I’m defending next week.
Tell me about it, I’m also looking for work, and to make matters worse my car was written off on Wednesday. Someone pulled out in front of me well within my stopping distance. I took evasive action and saved their lives at my expense, scuffing their driver-side rear corner and running into a concrete post. My whole body aches like I’ve been doing some kind of torso workout while being kicked on the ground. Which also meant I had to be checked over in A&E, which is the last place I wanted to be or bother in these times.
Once that mess has settled down I’ll probably look to get work as a delivery driver for the supermarkets, which seems to be a growing field right now. If they’ll have me, that is.
Unfortunately, like so many others, my family is in a similar predicament
Yep, currently looking for a job (I say currently… since my burnout over three years ago it’s been a pretty constant thing), and this whole business is going to make it harder, if not impossible. Luckily, the government institution responsible for welfare in this country has already let it slide that they do not intend to be lenient on people not doing whatever they can to find work, so… yeah, that.
Thanks for sharing this, PZ.
Things are tough all over right now, and I know I’m better off than many. I’m spending today pulling together as many resources as I can find for folks who need help, and I’ll link to that here later on.
Here’s what I have so far.
It’s mostly focused on the US with a little bit of UK, so I guarantee I missed some important resources for people living elsewhere. I’ll work to improve that in the coming days and weeks, including reaching out to contacts in other parts of the world to see what they have to share.