Surviving the New Economy Part 1: Reinvention

Welcome to the new world order where you never know when your secure job may just end unexpectedly.  The truth of the matter is that over the last two and a half years, the United States that we’ve all gotten used to being secure in has taken a very drastic and dangerous turn. No one is safe anymore when it comes to employment and the news that we see on our televisions certainly reflects this fact.

'No one is safe'

Have you been watching the news continually unfolding surround the Occupy Wall Street protest group that has been garnering news headlines for many weeks and has even as of late gotten a group of Muslims to come on board in support of their efforts?

The world has turned upside down and many Americans are just trying to hang on for their dear lives. Here are a few things that we struggling Americans have to understand about the world that we find ourselves living in at this juncture in our history….

• The unemployment rate was little changed (9.0%)
• Employment in the private sector rose, with modest job growth continuing in professional and businesses services, leisure and hospitality, health care, and mining.
• Federal Reserve Bank of Boston President Eric Rosengren said the central bank should act to bring down “stubbornly, and unacceptably, high” joblessness that’s been stuck near 9 percent or above since April 2009.

I want everyone reading the above bullet points to pay close attention to that last one, where we get to realize that the unemployment rate has stood at 9 percent since 2009. In 09, I was not a part of that figure, but since the end of 2010 until now…I have been.

I want to point out a few things about myself and that means I’m going to be totally candid as I use myself as the example for the rest of this article…

My name is Lew Newmark, and below are some important facts about me…

• I’m 54 years old at the moment
• I’ve been a factory worker for most of my employed life with a small stint as a purchasing agent in the factory that I worked in for almost 17 years.
• I have two separate health issues. I have Cardio Obstructive Pulmonary Disease or COPD for short. I also suffered with a vascular condition called Churg Strauss Syndrome.
• I’ve found that I’m really not employable at this stage of my life, having had a few different positions this year, and the last one that I recently held only lasted three days before I was ceremoniously let go.

Surviving a Down Economy

So as I said, in the beginning of this year I found myself unemployed due to circumstances and throughout the entirety of this year I’ve had to pretty much re-invent myself in order to find a new way to find gainful employment.

What I had to do was take something that I had been doing for quite a while…which basically was blogging and turn that into an actual writing career. Okay, so I know what you’re thinking because I’ve heard it from other people when I mention what I’ve accomplished this year…

• I’m not talented enough to be a writer.
• I don’t want to have to read something in order to learn something new (Yes, I’ve actually had people say that to me!)
• I don’t have enough money to start taking a course.
• I’m too old to learn something new.

Okay, so maybe a few of those “objections” (another term I learned this year) are valid… but I have to tell you, well actually all of you out there if you happen to be reading this article that “you need to get over it!”

The world that we used to take refuge in, that we thought would not become as terrible as the world that our parents had experienced during the “Great Depression” has arrived quite unannounced and at the moment we’re stuck with it. So we all have to start to take a closer look at how we’ve earned a living vs. how we may have to earn one now. In the second part of my series I'll be talking about the role of volunteerism in the new economy.  Check back in the next few days!