Is your job holding up?

[Wicked Lester]

This goofball presented a veiled threat also when he stated "Would you like us to reach you at either of these two numbers or the one I am calling you from now(and threw out my/wife's work numbers.) That's when I blew my cool and said I have had this loan for 10 years---and never been late one time.  I am only 20 days late and you are threatening me?  Then I told him to go ahead and call my work if he thought that would get him some money---because all it would get me is fired---then he'd be sure to get paid.  All of this because they won't let me defer a month because of an ailing economy.


What makes me sick is up until this point I had perfect credit and had never been late on anything---ever.  Since they know everything there is to know about you by looking at your credit report, you would think that might make them go, Hmmmmnnnnn.

Anton
I could tell you what to REALLY say to them but would get banned if I did.  The few times I actually pick up the phone when I KNOW full well who it is I make Regan from the Exorcist blush in what I tell them. I DESPISE these people and if someone is willing to take this job then either they are waaay desperate or they know full well they could feel the wrath of someone like me. " No remosre No regret ..."Wink wink get the idea? The little  Bill collector pests have very little neg effect on your credit score and realistically unless you are going to buy something big soon it don't mean diddlywah. BTDT for many years. Scare tactics and annoying everyday calls that in a few secs can be deleted. As Mr. Natural once said " It don't mean S(*at*)(*at*)T bro.

[Scatter]

I got my first ever call from a bill collector in nearly 20 years of marriage today.  I called them and told them I would be taking a loan out of my 401k because I knew I was going to be late this month.  I also told them in email form.

The caller was from India.  No mistaking it.  When I told him I had already called and emailed prior to this to forewarn the bank I would be late...he replied:" What is the reson for you inability to pay ontime.?"  So...I let him have it.

I explained my job and my wife's are both tied to the automotive industry.  I asked did he watch the news?  Was he aware that Chrysler was shipping our steel back to us and saying "no thanks", when they were committed to purchase it?  I asked him was he unaware that GM just filed bankruptcy today and the US was in an economic crisis. Then I said, give it a break, man. I don't have anybody else's money coming to bail me out like you guys did.

Then I suggested the reason he didn't know any of this was because he was probably sitting in the middle east somewhere doing an outsourced American's job. And I promptly hung up the phone.

That made ME feel better, and I didn't even make the call!!

[Barlow]

Fester wrote:

Barlow:
Speaking of real estate-- Maybe this is a good investment opportunity.

LOL! I love that! Thanks. I gotta bring that to the office! 

[Uncula]

  I guess I'm "lucky" to be on a Social Security disability and on Medicare.  I retired with a "disability" retirement from GM.  Now, after over 75 years with the UAW, the federal government did what GM has always tried to do and take away their workers health benefits.  One thing is assured is that the first day collective bargaining starts, the number one item on the agenda with the UAW is the reinstatement of their health care.
  It has alway upset me when people bad mouth the unions because they are what gave this country a middle class.  The owners didn't give us benefits from the goodness of their own hearts.  We had to fight and sometimes die for the right to decent treatment.  I recently researched the difference of todays money compared with what I made in 1973.  In other words what I can buy now against what I could buy then, or the rise in the cost of living.
  I hired in at GM at $7.26 per hour (not including benefits).  When I retired, I made $32.00 per hour (again, not including benefits).  But if you figured the real cost of living (buying, selling, etc.) that $7.26 per hour figures out in todays money as $35.00 per hour. And back in 1973 our benefits were of a greater quality than now.  So when I retired, I was actually loosing money!  For the most part, we gave away our raises in favour of a slightly unrealistic "cost-of-living" allowance
  Those of our people who make all of $8.00 to $10.00 per hour are actually making only pennies on the dollar compared to 1973 dollars.  With minimum wage set at below $6.00 per hour, life can not only be bad but impossible.  Please don't mistake this as a partisan, political statement because both parties are responsible.
  So...how is my job holding up?  I'm okay but how others are getting along is beside me.

Uncula

[Fester]

I remember my first prototype job in high school back in 1972.  Minimum wage in Utah was $1.65/hr.  I was a busboy at the last of the grand hotels in Salt Lake and was paid $1.30/hr. The law allowed it because they figured busboys made $.35/hr in tips.  Later I moved up to a job at the phone company at $90/week or $2.25/hr.
Back then, the minimum wage was supposedly for kids first jobs or entry level positions. But somewhere along the line, it became the minimum amount employers could get away with paying people.  
At the plasma center where I work, most of the donors were in their 20s and 30s and almost all were working at around the minimum wage. After the Kaiser Aluminum plant (a major employer here in Spokane) shut down, suddenly scores of folks in their 40s and 50s were competing with the teens and 20-somethings for jobs at the local Arby's.   Now they are supplementing their meager incomes donating plasma.
The sad part is the demoralized attitudes many have when they come into the center for the first time.  Our company has a policy of promoting the position that donating plasm saves lives.  And for many that is a a saving grace.  The idea that they are doing something good for someone seems to be a moral liferaft to many donors. We always try to treat the donors with as much dignity and respect as possible.  It is one of the more pleasant aspects of my job: helping people see beyond their immediate need for cash.  The bigger picture is: EVERYONE benefits from plasma donors.  Tetanus and Rabies vaccines as well as gamma globulin and some varieties of insulin are plasma derived. Burn victims and haemophiliacs and those with damaged immune systems all survive because of plasma based therapies.  Somehow these donors aren't part of the story when the numbers of unemployed and underemployed are given on the nightly economic news.

Sorry about the soapbox  speech.  But this is how some people are coping with the current economy in my corner of the world.
Dave

[ChattyLMS]

Hi Fester!
It's a shame that people have to supplement their income by donating plasma.  But I liked the way up put it, that it halps the community and the donors.  That's much better than supplementing your income by selling drugs.  Thank goodnes you guys are there.  Are you affiliated with the Red Cross?

[Fester]

Not Red Cross.  Those guys usually collect whole blood for free, supply whole blood, concentrated red cells and some plasma to local hospitals for transfusions. They are the front line for immediate need in emergencies.

I work for one of several corporations that pay the donors, collects the plasma, and converts it to pharmaceuticals.  We are part of a worldwide manufacturing system.  I am not sure of the ethics of advertising one's work place in these forums.
If you would like to know more specific info I'll be happy to reply by PM.

Dave

[Wolf Man]

When the chips are down, make dip. 

I am reluctant to write.  I was a business owner and shut my business down due to the ailing economy and I follow the news very close.  I watch for all business that are closing their doors and have even been impacted by a few that I favored that closed down.  I miss them. 

One of the backlashes to closing businesses is our loss of choice.  While everyone is struggling to stay afloat, keep paying bills and have a roof over your heads our choices are dissapearing.  If we ever recover what will we get to go buy.  All our favorite places will be gone and unlikely to come back. 

As for my wife and I, well, we are doing very well.  This is one of the reasons I have been reluctant to post.  I decided that if any of you would like to hear a success story then I would offer one. 

I shut my business down to take the firefighting job in Iraq.  With a bad economy I was willing to put myself in harms way for two reasons, first to protect our soldiers who have no choice in being there and the second for the money I would make to give my wife a better life.  I was paid four times the amount I would make at home doing the same job.  After completing my year in Iraq I took a similar position in Kuwait.  Same money, less getting shot at and blown up (we had three firefighters killed and all from my duty station), more time off and much better living conditions. 

With these jobs I was able to buy a new home in a nice affluent neighborhood.  My former house is under contract and I stand to make over three times what I paid for the house while inflating my bank account considerably. 

My wife has a very secure job as a boat Captain for Army Corps of Engineers.  She is the most valuable Captain they have since she can operate all of their vessels in both sections.  She is an Army veteran and works very hard taking all the overtime they offer.  I do the same here and in fact working overtime as I write. 

Although our life is financially doing better than ever, all bills paid off and no debt there is a severe price we are paying.  I have not been home nor been able to spend time with my wife for more than two weeks in the past year and a half.  We have lived apart for too long and it has been a strain on both of us.  I have a wonderful new home that I have only seen for a short time and won't get to see it again for a long time to come.  We have no children but my pets are getting older and my time to spend with them getting shorter.  My wife has also had to deal with every aspect of our life, moving from the old house to the new, dealing with fixing up the old house to sell and now selling it.  She has been a real trooper but I know it gets to her sometimes.  She tells me how a simple phone call makes her feel better since I always have a plan and am able to guide her if only a little bit.  We miss each other terribly and sometimes it seems this seperation will never end.  In this rotten economy though this is what we must do to not just get by but come out of this smelling like a rose, or wolfbane.

I can't stress enough how much I miss my wife, my home, all aspects of my life including holidays and most importantly to my wife and I, Halloween.   

My heart always goes out to those who are struggling and I follow business and their financial woes daily.  I made the personal decision to go where the money is and as I said in the beginning, when the chips are down, make dip. 

I will offer this to you all.  There is every kind of job here and also in Iraq and Afganistan.  There were jobs I could take that would pay 12,000 a month and even one where I could make 300,000 for nine months work.  I can't really go over the details of those jobs and how I qualify for them but any of you who are willing to travel and turn your lives around I will help you with all the information you will need to apply for some of these jobs.  If you have the strength to make the sacrifice and endure a long seperation and harsh conditions at times then contact me.  They need people in every field you can imagine, from janitors to mechanics to teachers and everything in between.  I am here to help in any way I can.  We all have to stick together and show some true loyalty to each other as Americans. 

[Scatter]

When the chips are down, make dip. 

I am reluctant to write.  I was a business owner and shut my business down due to the ailing economy and I follow the news very close.  I watch for all business that are closing their doors and have even been impacted by a few that I favored that closed down.  I miss them. 

One of the backlashes to closing businesses is our loss of choice.  While everyone is struggling to stay afloat, keep paying bills and have a roof over your heads our choices are dissapearing.  If we ever recover what will we get to go buy.  All our favorite places will be gone and unlikely to come back. 

As for my wife and I, well, we are doing very well.  This is one of the reasons I have been reluctant to post.  I decided that if any of you would like to hear a success story then I would offer one. 

I shut my business down to take the firefighting job in Iraq.  With a bad economy I was willing to put myself in harms way for two reasons, first to protect our soldiers who have no choice in being there and the second for the money I would make to give my wife a better life.  I was paid four times the amount I would make at home doing the same job.  After completing my year in Iraq I took a similar position in Kuwait.  Same money, less getting shot at and blown up (we had three firefighters killed and all from my duty station), more time off and much better living conditions. 

With these jobs I was able to buy a new home in a nice affluent neighborhood.  My former house is under contract and I stand to make over three times what I paid for the house while inflating my bank account considerably. 

My wife has a very secure job as a boat Captain for Army Corps of Engineers.  She is the most valuable Captain they have since she can operate all of their vessels in both sections.  She is an Army veteran and works very hard taking all the overtime they offer.  I do the same here and in fact working overtime as I write. 

Although our life is financially doing better than ever, all bills paid off and no debt there is a severe price we are paying.  I have not been home nor been able to spend time with my wife for more than two weeks in the past year and a half.  We have lived apart for too long and it has been a strain on both of us.  I have a wonderful new home that I have only seen for a short time and won't get to see it again for a long time to come.  We have no children but my pets are getting older and my time to spend with them getting shorter.  My wife has also had to deal with every aspect of our life, moving from the old house to the new, dealing with fixing up the old house to sell and now selling it.  She has been a real trooper but I know it gets to her sometimes.  She tells me how a simple phone call makes her feel better since I always have a plan and am able to guide her if only a little bit.  We miss each other terribly and sometimes it seems this seperation will never end.  In this rotten economy though this is what we must do to not just get by but come out of this smelling like a rose, or wolfbane.

I can't stress enough how much I miss my wife, my home, all aspects of my life including holidays and most importantly to my wife and I, Halloween.   

My heart always goes out to those who are struggling and I follow business and their financial woes daily.  I made the personal decision to go where the money is and as I said in the beginning, when the chips are down, make dip. 

I will offer this to you all.  There is every kind of job here and also in Iraq and Afganistan.  There were jobs I could take that would pay 12,000 a month and even one where I could make 300,000 for nine months work.  I can't really go over the details of those jobs and how I qualify for them but any of you who are willing to travel and turn your lives around I will help you with all the information you will need to apply for some of these jobs.  If you have the strength to make the sacrifice and endure a long seperation and harsh conditions at times then contact me.  They need people in every field you can imagine, from janitors to mechanics to teachers and everything in between.  I am here to help in any way I can.  We all have to stick together and show some true loyalty to each other as Americans. 

Wolfie, if I were a single man I would do it in a second. In fact, I'm a marine mechanic (or WAS one) and had a contract to go to Saudi Arabia and refit some billionaire in the royal family's yacht backin the day......but then the Gulf War broke out first.

Now, I just couldn't be away from my wife and kids. My wife would probably be happy to see less of me  , but my kids need their daddy.

[carnivore]

L.A.'s unemployment rate is almost 12%.  If things don't pick up, we're looking at a pitchfork and torch uprising.

It's ironic in a way, because even though we're suffering from this recession, I haven't cut back on monster spending, in fact I've increased spending because it's frankly the one thing I have left to enjoy. 

Looking at my collection makes me happy. 

I am pulling for you guys, especially the vendors in here.  Let me know when you guys set up shop at a near-by convention and I'll try to help you out and buy some stuff.

[Inkfink]

Wolfman, no slight at you, but something isn't right when all this money is being spent rebuilding other countries other than our own.

[Scatter]

Wolfman, no slight at you, but something isn't right when all this money is being spent rebuilding other countries other than our own.

When confiscatory and punitive tax structures that inhibit business investment here are changed, we can rebuild here too. Not a political statement, because both major parties are equally to blame, rhetoric and spin aside.

[Wolf Man]

Trust me when I say that even though the money is awesome, I have been against the war in Iraq from the day someone got on TV and lied to get us into it.  It is even worse now that I have been in Iraq and see the rediculous spending and even here in Kuwait.  If the US masses only knew what I know there would indeed be an uprising and perhaps a good old fashioned lynching of politicians.  This has become an absurd world and our leaders are indeed to blame, all of them.  We think we have smart people running the show but it just aint true folks. 

So I don't take a slight at all.  I am with all of you all the way.  I came here to take a fools money so to speak.  Unfortunately I can't provide the conscience for the country, if the powers to be are willing to pay then I am willing to take it.  They not only owe it to me but to all of you as well.  Not trying to make a political speach here or anything, we all feel the same in most aspects.  Frustration.

[Scatter]

Trust me when I say that even though the money is awesome, I have been against the war in Iraq from the day someone got on TV and lied to get us into it.  It is even worse now that I have been in Iraq and see the rediculous spending and even here in Kuwait.  If the US masses only knew what I know there would indeed be an uprising and perhaps a good old fashioned lynching of politicians.  This has become an absurd world and our leaders are indeed to blame, all of them.  We think we have smart people running the show but it just aint true folks. 

So I don't take a slight at all.  I am with all of you all the way.  I came here to take a fools money so to speak.  Unfortunately I can't provide the conscience for the country, if the powers to be are willing to pay then I am willing to take it.  They not only owe it to me but to all of you as well.  Not trying to make a political speach here or anything, we all feel the same in most aspects.  Frustration.

And the church said "AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAMEN"

[Inkfink]

I bow in agreement.