Rejected Round-Up, Vol. II

Here are the latest thumb-twittling "gee, isn't it a shame" stories that I've stumbled across during this era of "full employment."

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55, unemployed and faking normal: One woman’s story of barely scraping by

I shared this one in my previous "round-up" entry, but it's been reappearing regularly across social media over the past few months prompted by a recent online interview she gave to PBS News Hour Making Sen$e with Paul Solman. Because her situation is so far from unique -- note the multiple advanced degrees (no, not in Basket Weaving or Modern Dance) -- and so frightening AND infuriating, I think it's worth sharing again for those who missed it the first time. Seems to me that if someone like her can't make anything happen in this screwy new economy (other than write a book about it), what hope is there for any of us?

I must also call out the excellent observation in the comments section about how "trickle down" really works:

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San Francisco 2.0

This documentary by Alexandra Pelosi is currently being shown on HBO , but you can find other ways to view it via a Google search.

Most share-worthy for me was at the 35:30 mark, "How did you go from a securities broker to homeless?"

Well, there was a recession, no one was hiring. I went through my unemployment benefits, cashed out my 401K, then I started working temp jobs. I know other people that are in my position that are college educated, that have lost everything...I'm 61, I've got two college degrees, I've got about 30 years' experience, working in the corporate world, and nobody wants somebody like me...I don't live in your world anymore. Things are completely different. What you take for granted doesn't exist in my world anymore. I think we're rapidly becoming something like Venezuela where there's very small ultra rich class and everybody else is poor and the middle class is shrinking. I think the American Dream is a load of crap. There is no American dream. It's a nightmare for most people.

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J.C. POCALYPSE

We are about to confront something that it is clear American politics is not capable of confronting: the possibility that we now have an economy of staggering size and wealth that cannot produce enough full-time jobs for the number of people in this country. We can't all make a living getting paid to Uber one another around, and there are only so many menial service industry jobs – making coffee, flipping burgers, etc. – to keep a limited number of people afloat. Structural changes to the economy that our political system refuses to do anything but encourage are going to force us to confront this unprecedented reality sooner rather than later. For years the standard palabrum for economic transition has been to tell the newly unemployed to learn some other skill and transfer to another section of the economy. What happens when there isn't one?

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There's something rather unsettling about people who seem quite content to be homeless...

There's No Place Like Home
...its race to the bottom with all of those 'free' to be their own boss in the "gig economy." (That is what their calling this return to the Industrial Revolution, yes?)

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I've met plenty of folks who have done what they had to do to survive in this strange new world...

Disabled or just desperate? Rural Americans turn to disability as jobs dry up

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I’m unemployed and ashamed. The idea that people don’t want to work is a ridiculous myth.

Wow, 28 years old and she's been looking for six whopping months...boo fuckin' hoo, come back for sympathy when you've been out five years and are considered way past shelf life, kid...

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Meanwhile, the future remains bright 'n' shiny for rich fucks (doesn't look like there will be any "steerage class" tickets offered for that trip)...