On Unemployment

I'm having trouble writing lately. Normally this happens for one of two reasons. Either I don't know exactly what I want to say or I have something I really don't want to say. The first causes long streams of non-sense, too many big words and wandering. The second stops me totally. So let me get this out and hopefully I'll be able to move on - write some more about zombies and capitalism.

I'm unemployed. I've been looking for a job for two and a half months and haven't been able to generate any interest at all. No interviews, no call backs, no "thanks but fuck off" emails. No nothing. Like I don't exist. Which is pretty much how I feel. In a society where value is determined monetarily, I am worth zero. No one will pay me anything to do anything. I make $0 per hour, which translates into $0 per year - that's math even I can do.

In a world where so many people are doing so many things, I'm doing nothing. 

In the wake of the 2007 financial collapse investigations into predatory lending demonstrated extraordinary malfeasance by banks, mortgage brokers, and lending institutions. People were given mortgages they should never have qualified for, with incomplete disclosure of the terms and, most damningly, contracts were altered without the borrowers knowledge or consent. Thousands lost their homes.

Investigations into the human toll of rampant financial up-fuckery have discovered a large percentage of people who lost their homes are suffering from clinical depression, feelings of guilt, and a vastly increased risk of suicide. Even though it has been proven over and over again that financial institutions placed these people in an untenable situation (without their understanding and sometimes without their consent) the victims are the ones who feel responsible. I can understand that.

Common sense says there are economic forces completely beyond my control effecting my situation. Architecture is part of the building industry - if people stop building, architects don't work. That's the big picture. The rate on a five year fixed mortgage has dropped to 3%. I don't know much about economics but I know that, combined with a conservative government more concerned with debt reduction than unemployment (despite the fact our debt to GDP is 1.5% compared to the US at 10%) is bad news for the building industry.

Despite all that I still feel useless. I vacillate between depression and anxiety. I feel guilty doing anything besides job hunting and that makes me depressed, when I take a break I feel anxious. Unemployment is bad news for mental health, unless you are rich as fuck and I'm not.

A recent article in the Toronto Star quotes a study by McMaster University and United Way Toronto, saying 50% of Toronto workers have precarious employment - "either full- or part-time with no benefits or no job security, or in temporary, contract or casual positions." 

This is the labour market I'm trying to get in to.

To top it all off, I just turned 40. "Just" might not be the right word but until I'm 50 I'm going to describe myself as having "just" turned 40. This is a point when most people stop to examine the first half of their lives, have a mid-life crisis, dump their spouse, take up with someone much younger and buy a shiny sports car.

I own three pieces of furniture and my accomplishments in the first half of my life are the three degrees I still can't get a job with.

Those of you who have struggled through this sea of self-pity and bad prose, thank you. Those of you who are, like me, unemployed, take some small comfort in the fact I make excellent company.