while i was sitting in traffic yesterday i started to think how about how much this financial disaster has changed the lives of my friends and family over the last two years. it’s one thing to get caught of the larger debate (and the spectacle of it all), but maybe the best way we can decide whether we are going in the right direction is a personal assessment of our own community. so on this memorial day weekend i’m taking a personal inventory of my community (colleagues, friends, family and neighbors) to remember how bad things have become during our “Great Recession”
In Remembrance of the Great Recession of 2008-2010
of my family member who has lost his catering business
of my family member whose job has been moved to the east coast and but whose termination keeps getting delayed 6 months at a time
of my family member who lost his job in retail and now works as a temporary manual contract (scab) labor to pay the bills
of those of us whose property value is under water
of my neighbor who is over 50 and lost his private sector job a year ago and hasn’t been able to find any work
of my neighbor who was planning to retire and whose pension has lost so much value he has to work at least 5 more years
of my new neighbors who lost their house and are now renting next door
of the neighbors who have have lost their homes (and are sitting empty) along my daily walk through the neighborhood (1 out of every 6 the last i counted)
of my friend who lost his job and is now working whatever part time work he can to put food on the table
of many of my part time colleagues at CSUF who have lost work or have had their hours dramatically cut
of my secondary school colleagues who have been pink slipped and/or displaced for this fall
of those of us at CSUF and secondary schools who still have jobs in education but have taken a 10% pay cut and at least 3 weeks of furlough
of those friends of friends who have cashed in their retirement plans to make ends meet
of those who have moved into a smaller house and/or moving in with parents for housing
i also have realized that we also have to take some personal responsibility here and maybe we created much of these problems because our inability to live within our means and are now collectively paying the piper.
from what i see many of us are helping each other out, but where has our government been? this is biggest crisis to happen in my life and it seems that we are expected to get through this storm on our own.
where are the WPA type jobs programs? where did the stimulus money go? has the promise of an education for all disappeared for good? (at least in california)
my fear is that a few years from now we are going to look back and realize that the middle class dream of being able to work a decent job for decent pay died in the summer of 2010 and was traded for that old libertarian mantra “it’s every man for himself”
May 29, 2010 | Categories:blog | Tags: bankruptcy, csuf, education, furlough, Government, Memorial Day, Middle class, mortgage, neighbors, Pay cut, Pension, politics, Property, recession, retirement, United States | Leave A Comment »
