I hadn't seen a thread on this anywhere, mods please merge this if there is one. I was recently laid off from work, due to a number of reasons stemming from a lack of sales to do with the economy combined with the fact that the small company I worked for had suffered from a bit of a lack of direction. I was wondering if any other board members had suffered a similar plight, and how you were doing? Have any of you had any luck finding new work yet? I, so far, have not, but it's only been two weeks.
A few days before Halloween the video store I worked at closed with 48 hours warning and we were all laid off. I've been looking for a job ever since.
Back in '01 I was laid off from the paper I worked for at the time. We were set to go to press, and the owner/Editor-In-Chief assured us that he had plenty of cash to keep operating for at least 6 months and that he had some deals in the pipeline that would keep things afloat. Saturday morning, the day before the paper was to hit the stands, he called everyone and said "It's all go, we've got money, blah, blah" and then about 1AM in the morning the phone rings and he says "We're out of business, I'm pulping this issue for the loss, the office is locked till Monday lunch, you can clean out your desks then". Go down Monday, and the freaking secretary from the company that shared the building had to let me into the office, owner completely MIA. Followed right on the hells is a guy that bought up the ad-contracts and wanted to do a "serious paper". We got two issues in, couldn't get a story printed, wasn't getting paid for photos, he wasn't returning calls for advertisers. The two issues printed were all local sports reports-- with really shitty writing and photos that look like a spastic monkey took them...well except for the photos of the highschool cheerleaders, those were in focus and stable. He's never in the office-- which is in the back of his beeper/paintball/ATV store. Call him at home, get into an argument on the phone-- threats of lawyers, etc, we agree to settle for 1/2 of what I'm owed. Go to pick up the check, he brings his father to the meeting (Just in case) and he says he's shit canning paper. Why? Cause it's not fun.
I used to work at an animal shelter. I got paid $7.00 an hour to come in from 5:00-7:00am and clean out all the dog...uhm...business. They fired me one day before I was going to quit. Ah...life.
I was forced to resign last August (not economy-related), but I've since gone back to school and I just landed my first job since, as a tutor here.
I was laid off in September because of the economy in September, and landed a new job in mid-November.
I haven't been laid off yet, but I expect to be. I work for IBM and came in as part of an acquisition only 2 years ago, and IBM doesn't count time with the acquired company for seniority purposes (or severance pay purposes, from what I hear). They laid off about 20,000 last week and more previously in two smaller layoffs - I think about 35,000 total so far. So I've 'made some cuts'. But I'm pretty sure I'll be part of the next batch. Especially since my division is losing money now.
I was laid off with 30 of my coworkers in early November when the skyscraper we had been designing for the last 3 years stopped just before they went to construction. Despite assurances, the owners were not able to secure the $400m for their 40-story mixed use tower. It was tough. It was the kind of building one gets into Architecture to do. You really invest yourself emotionally in a project that big. Fortunately, my first employer, whom I had left 12 years ago (on good terms) jumped on me when they found out I was available. It's a little tough to go back to a small firm from a really big one, but I'm grateful to be working. I'm the only one from the team to obtain a new full-time job. Things are very tough in the building field in the northeast right now. I still miss my tower (sniff)
Sort of where we're at with the wife's job: Day to day, any moment the axe could fall. It sucks, cause you can't plan or brace. Yeah, you can sock money back and cross your fingers and toes and hope you get by one more week to make the bills, and that it all holds out long enough for you to build a good solid nest egg. We're both jumping everytime the phone rings and her boss's number is on the caller-ID
my wife was recently laid off. i'm a contractor and while i havent been laid off , i havent had any work for over a month! damm economy........
You know that's what pisses me off: Some folks dont' get it. I was talking to someone the other day about how hard it is for me to drum up contracts right now (freelance writing and website construction) and they said "Well, you can always swing a hammer". Well (1) My health is too far gone for that, I'd end up either having a heart-attack, or killing someone when I had a heart-attack on the job. (2) Dumbass, contractors are feeling it just as bad, if not worse, as the rest of us. Just up the road, about a mile, a contractor and his crew are in a legal fight cause the owner of the house they were building said "Fuck it, I don't want it anymore" and stopped payment on the checks and refuses to pay anymore money for the work already done, and isn't answering his phone.
Yeah, I've been cutting back on my spending, trying to set aside enough in accessible savings to weather a 6 to 8 month job search. I REALLY don't want to have to cash in any investments since all of them are currently in the shitter on paper. But right now I have enough cash to make it about 5-6 months, if you count unemployment and my upcoming tax refund. After that, I'll have to go into the investment accounts, which would not be ideal. But then, right now, hardly anyone can expect 'ideal', can they?
Working at an automation company that is branching out into general contract work, we're doing alight at the moment... cash is coming in and bills are getting paid but as the owner said it takes just one or two phone calls to change all that. I got this job by pure chance just talking to someone at the hardware store. As part of the owner's turn around plan he fired several long-standing well established workers, a foreman and the purchasing guy. The Foreman apparently had an arrangement with the temp service he was getting some kind of payout for running a revolving door... the owner turned a blind eye to it in good times but now he can't afford the fees. Same with the purchasing guy, he was getting kickbacks from several suppliers, suppliers that were charging us vastly inflated prices. $40 for 10 trash-bags... Things of that nature. Part of my new responsibilities, since I'm "good with the internet" is to handle some of the purchasing arrangements. Hooray? Wife on the other hand is on Extended Leave with Soulless Insurance Contract Kompany and has a written letter from the President of the company himself stating that her job is secure no matter what... barring a buyout of the company. Given that S.I.C.K. seems to be financially secure at the moment we shall see where that goes. Freaked out though still, I read the papers, check the ads and have feelers out. Manufacturing in this area seems to have hit a dead stop across all sectors, and that's not a good thing for someone in my field. Once the wife is up and moving about again she'll be in a better position, her degree and her experience allows her to cover any one of several possible job positions so if push comes to shove she has better odds of getting a new job than I do.
It's a chain but there's only 13 in the country. They previously closed one or two before we got axed.
My boss has actually been pumping more money into our business to keep it afloat. He's lowering prices and investing more money in our product to attract more customers. He believes it will help us be even stronger once the recession is over. That said, he's trying to weed out the crappy employees, but he's doing it by encouraging his current employees with incentives. All in all, we're doing pretty well. And I am, luckily, someone they cannot afford to lose. They won't fire me, and if I were to quit, they'd be totally fucked.