I had a job. The company didn’t realize that they actually had to sell product to stay in business. Almost all of the workforce was let go or furloughed. I’ve been unemployed for over a month now.
I’ve filled out dozens upon dozens of job apps, starting even before I lost my job. I have my resume public on job listings sites for employers and hiring agencies to find, and I’ve sent my resume to employers and hiring agencies directly. I look through the listings on job boards for each day, mostly limiting my search to a wage that would allow me to make ends meet at home. I’ve solicited and implemented advice from resume design experts. I’ve had one in-person interview, a few preliminary phone interviews, and a couple of message conversations between recruiters and myself. The one in-person interview I had would not have paid enough for my monthly expenses and I was overqualified for the position; they decided against hiring me. I had another interview scheduled and confirmed via a hiring agency’s AI text bot and a human agent’s text; I drove to the scheduled interview place and time and they had no idea that I was supposed to be interviewed. All other communication has either been flat-out rejection or just left me hanging.
I have a Bachelor’s of Science degree from a top 25 ranked university in the US. I have no criminal record. I do have multiple disabilities but they are generally mitigable enough to not affect my work. I have references of my (now) former boss and a (now) former coworker who both praise my impact and aptitude in the factory and office workplace. I’m evidently overqualified for positions that don’t require higher experiences and I’m underqualified for nearly everything else; I can’t get experience in most niche or broad fields because nearly every position requires these experiences to have already been met. I try to follow all the invisible rules of applying and social etiquette. I am too physically ugly to sell my body. It feels like there’s always been a magical aura about me that makes people dislike me no matter how much I try to do the ethically or socially right thing. How am I supposed to get an income to survive?
I’m an idiot, I’m blue collar, I’ve had about 20 jobs I’ve kept for at most, 3 years, and I could quit my job and have a new one tomorrow, for more money.
and that isn’t fair to you. People like you dedicate your life to knowing your topic. People like me live my life knowing how to do as many different possible things as I can, and a monetary balance needs to be in place here somewhere so academics with more rare skills are still upheld so their abilities are still useful when needed.
A safetynet, for smarties to be paid to be smart, to keep them around even if unnecessary right then.
Hey fellow laborer. Loved your comment but I just want to say there are many different kinds of intelligence. Don’t call yourself an idiot. Working with tools effectively is a kind of intelligence for sure. I’ve seen a person who seemed incapable of operating a screwdriver, but he was a network engineer. I wish I’d known I was good at it much earlier in life.
Something got up my spine when I was 18 to where, I didn’t just dislike depending on Best Buy to work on my PC, I loathed it, and at the time, it wasn’t even because I was into computers. I saw the bill, saw the work, put two and two together and couldn’t believe I paid two teenagers to play Legos with my tower for the cost of a… then, PS3.
this is the work, huh?
Then one day at an auto shop…
teeth add 5 years of wear
“I can’t… do it? Eh?”
Every day since, I’ve been… doin’ it, in spite.
Righteous.
Good on you, my friend. This is inspirational.
I mean they also mentioned “knowing how to do as many different possible things as I can”, which to me sounds like a person who’s flexible and a fast learner. These are properties that can’t be taught, maybe not even learned with experience. And super valuable.
There might be elements that can’t be learned, but there are plenthy that can. A lot of it is just attitude. Perserverence and a willingness to acknowledge and learn from your mistakes and not get too frustrated when things break, I’d say that’s 90% of it.
I’ve unfortunately become disillusioned with ableism. There are things I’ll never learn that some other people find easy and there are things I find easy that some others will never learn.
I deleted a 500 if not 1000 word stream of consciousness here, but the gist of what I was trying to get across is that unless you’re interested or naturally talented in something, you’ll never be good at it. Time and time again you’ll see someone with a lot of experience in their field who has no idea what they’re doing. It just doesn’t come naturally and no amount of perseverance will change that. You can certainly become mediocre, just not great.
I spent an hour or two per week for 9 years on drawing, same for singing. I’m no good at either, despite the fact that I was consistently getting practice. Diagnose and repair a car, even a modern one that a lot of old school mechanics would be afraid of? No problem and it’s not even what I do for a living.
You might be right. Personally it doesn’t seem that way to me, but ultimately people end up wherever they end up, and it’s often hard to disentangle why.
One thing that does seem different in those skills that you mentioned, is that drawing and singing are creative/artistic, which means that there’s no “correct” outcome. If you fuck up fixing a car, it doesn’t work, and you have the immediate and direct feedback that you’ve done it wrong.
With drawing or singing, if you do it wrong, you only really have your self-image and personal aesthetics to answer to. You can get really good and still hate everything you do, and there’s no way someone can show you that you’re objectively wrong, because it’s a taste thing. OTOH you can do it technically “badly” forever, but like what you do, and if you stick with it enough, then maybe you just made a new style of art.