Without in any way minimising the economic and psychological blow that people experience when they lose their jobs, the unemployed in affluent countries still have a safety net, in the form of social security payments, and usually free healthcare and free education for their children. They also have sanitation and safe drinking water.
Hope is the motivation that empowers the unemployed, enabling them to get out of bed every single morning with unbounded enthusiasm as they look for work.
My mindset is of the person who is still unsure whether they have enough money in their ATM to go to another bar. I lived that way when I was unemployed, when I was a snowboard instructor, and when I was at NYU. A lot of my personality is stuck in those five years, and I don't know if that's ever gonna change.
I'm one of the great unemployed looking for the next job. I'm waiting for the right offer. Like anyone, I want something that turns me on inside.
Childhood was terrifying for me. A kid has no control. You're three feet tall, flat broke, unemployed, and illiterate. Terror snaps you awake. You pay keen attention. People can just pick you up and move you and put you down.
When you're unemployed for six months or a year, it is hard to qualify for a lease, so even the option of relocating to find a job is often off the table.
Most Americans probably aren't aware that there was a time in this country when tanks and cavalry were massed on Pennsylvania Avenue to chase away the unemployed.
Despite our high rate of unemployment, 300,000 jobs go unfilled largely because many of the unemployed lack the skills needed today as a result of technological progress.
What this country needs is more unemployed politicians.
We want to change the way we help unemployed people find jobs. We want to be faster and more goal oriented.