Feb 08
24
Hunting for a Job
“There is no such thing as not having a job; unemployment is a full-time job that doesn’t pay.”
I’m unemployed at the moment, so I plan on not only giving insight on locating employment, but also chronicling my efforts in doing so as I apply my own insights on it.
One can sit around complaining about how much unemployment sucks, or one can consider it as a job and treat it as such. What I’ve learned in life, an undesirable job is basically an opportunity for you to “trade up”. It’s just like a piece of crap car — when you don’t want it anymore, you trade up for a better car. However, you’d have to pay an additional amount of money in addition to trading in your car. But when you consider how if you hadn’t traded in your car, you’d have had to pay a much higher amount of money to get the new car. Of course, one could argue that I can sell the car for a much better price than the dealer would offer, but as much as many of us might wish we could sell our jobs to the highest bidder, that unfortunately isn’t an option. For most of us anyway. So we’ll use the trade-in analogy.
Most think of the career ladder as starting with a menial job. I’d have to beg to differ. I think the career ladder begins with unemployment. This is written for those who managed to finish high school, but haven’t obtained a college degree yet. If you haven’t finished high school, feel free to still follow through with this article, but I most strongly advise you to either finish, or get a GED.
Unemployment is a full-time job. Of course, many would hate being unemployed. There are people who aren’t employed, but have a decent income from various sources, such as blogging, writing, making crafts and selling them — even if those kind of people aren’t employed by someone else, they’re basically self-employed, thus have jobs — the only difference is that they’re their own bosses. While that’s a dream job (which I’m ultimately aspiring for), the main point of this article isn’t about becoming self-employed, but rather finding a job.
“There are always resources one can tap into; one has to just find them.”
The first objective here is to identify the resources one has. This will vary for everyone, but if one wants to find a job as soon as possible, this step is absolutely essential, as it’ll enable one to tap fully into all available resources. Resources will be of enormous benefit when one searches for jobs. There are always resources one can tap into; one has to just find them.
The first resource to identify would be money. Identify how much money you have in total. For some, they might have enough to tide over for a few months. For most, they’ll have no money whatsoever. Either way, we’ll assume you have none (like I do!). Is there any source of income you can obtain that will enable you to support yourself on only the most absolute essentials that won’t put you in debt?
“Band-aid solutions should never be considered as a permanent solution…”
There’s also other sources of funding you can tap into. Before I go into details, I’d like to strongly advise you that this is simply a band-aid, a way to support yourself temporarily while you seek employment. Band-aid solutions should never be considered as a permanent solution, otherwise you’re just wasting your life. That being said, there’s resources established by the government to aid those who’re in between jobs. Examples are social security supplements, unemployment insurance, and welfare (food stamps, TANF (temporary assistance for needy families), etc). Unemployment insurance usually will only be collectable if you’ve been employed by the same employer for more than three months before losing the job, and the reason for the job loss must be due to being fired (wrongfully fired, but wrongfully is subjective so isn’t really a factor) or laid off.
There’s also other non-monetary resources we can make use of. For that, research will be needed in order to identify them. What do we think of when one mentions “researching and getting information”? Let’s think back to high school. Where did they repeatedly send us for researching information for those endless essays they had us do? That’s right, the library. There you go, you just identified your first resource; the library. There’s also a less obvious resource: City hall. Alright, now we know to go to City Hall. Maybe for you, it’s called the Town Hall. Or by some obscure name. But most of the time, it’s the City Hall. You could also try the Mayor’s office, or your local congressman’s office. You voted (or maybe you didn’t, but they want your future vote anyway) him/her into office, they owe it to you to give you assistance in finding a job. Other places to try is the Social Security Administration, Unemployment Office, Welfare Office, Office (or Department) of Vocational Rehabilation Services, and the EDD (Employment Development Department, or whatever your state’s equivalent may be). Just check Google for it. If you lack internet access, use the library as they usually have it.
Today is Sunday, and for some reason, the government LOVES to shut down on Sundays. So I’ll wait until tomorrow before approaching all of the places I mentioned above to inquire about resources I can make use of to locate employment.
For now, I’m going to apply for as many jobs as I can online. I’ve already applied for Walmart and Lowes. I will be applying for Home Depot, Barnes and Noble, Sorenson Communications, Comcast, AT&T, Verizon, Clearwire, Circuit City, Best Buy, Kohl’s, Target, Radio Shack, and Office Depot.
If you’re also a job seeker, hope those links were of some use for you! If you were successful or already have been moving up the career ladder and have some tips/insight, I’d love to hear from you, so please feel free to post a comment! 
