It’s Time to Embrace Concealed Unemployment

It might seem curious to find an article on a job site that does not directly deal with career building or job searches, but then we would not be running a job board if we liked people being jobless. The social and human angles concerning the plights of the jobless are of concern to us. We are already running a job board for you to search and find jobs, and it’s one of the best. That’s the biggest help that can be provided to the jobless – help them to find a job. But the unending recession also makes it necessary to consider the existential problems of the long-term jobless, problems which rarely made to the forefront in the past 70 years until this recession completed three years.

When you remain jobless for extended periods, long-term career goals and the questions of self-actualization seem like jokes, and the pressing concerns are all existential in nature. How to survive and make ends meet; how to fend off loans and dues; how to still keep shouldering responsibilities, and how to stay in control are the first questions that the jobless ask themselves every morning. All processes and parts of processes dealing with acquiring a job, like job-search, resume preparation, interview procedures etc., retain relevance, but questions that address how to survive and excel while in a job become irrelevant. When the situation drags on, the all-consuming fear and uncertainty about survival, immobilizes the mind and often affects the personalities of the jobless negatively, reducing their chances of securing a job.

First thing you need to do after losing a job is to steel your mind and prepare yourself for multiple meaningless rejections. You will be facing incredible resistance when looking for a new job and the ones you will possibly be getting will be the ones with poor wages and few other benefits. Rejecting jobs can be risky, and it is first good to take up whatever comes your way, and then start looking for better jobs from there. While at least getting started in something will boost your confidence and situation perceivably, an ancillary incentive is that now your job searches will also become qualified for tax deductions if you search jobs within your present occupation. Such deductions would include costs for preparing and sending resumes as well as travel costs.

Secondly, remember that even though it might seem the other way, employers are still concerned over retaining existent employees while their ability to increase the paycheck has declined. Employers cannot be blamed for wondering over long gaps in resumes and the tendency of risk aversion will make them question why other potential employers too, passed up a candidate, for him or her to remain jobless for extended periods. So, again the solution is to grab any job that comes your way and get you self off the roster of the jobless as fast as possible.

Understand concealed unemployment as a fact of life now in America. What is concealed unemployment? Economists define it as a situation where a person is engaged in a job, which by itself is not sufficient to fulfill his or her demands or responsibilities. In the third world, it is extremely common for people to be in concealed unemployment, and family responsibilities can be met only with every member contributing his or her share. In the U.S. jobs that are actually concealed unemployment and not sufficient to fulfill ones needs are rejected outright by the candidates. But it is time to have a fresh look at things, and concealed unemployment is better than actually being jobless for long time.