Quote from hughb:
I'm a low level employee loading trucks for deliveries to grocery stores. We don't even work 40 hours a week anymore.
Frankly though, this isn't the worst I've seen, because I live in San Diego. In the early 90's, after the Soviet Union breakup and the fall of the Berllin wall, San Diego turned into a ghost town. There was no work anywhere, it didn't just kill the aero/defense industry here. I ended up working at telemarketing places back then. Goddam what a miserable time that was.
Our higher up muckety-mucks are trying to downplay how bad it really is, for whatever reason. They told us that last year's volume was 98% of the previous year's. I don't know why they would stand there and lie to us like that when we can see with our own eyes how much work has dropped off. Maybe they figure that hourly employees aren't smart enough to notice that their paychecks are much less that 98% of the previous year's.
A couple of guys at work have recently married and had children. they are very scared right now. One even pulled me aside and confided in me all the problems he is facing right now. His wife doesn't understand why the cable tv is being shut off and why she has to cook every day now.
My trading isn't going to damb well either. I've never been very good working the short side of the market. I damb sure better learn how though.
EDIT to add - my kitty is very sick right now. I took her to a pet ER and they wanted over $1000 a day to keep her there. A couple of years ago i would have readily agreed to something like that to help my kitty, but now I flat out can't afford that. She's spending the night in a local vet's office tonight, I have to get her out of there tommorrow AM.