ECON - Sweetie and OG go to a lay-off reunion

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I went with Sweetie to an ex-employees' reunion last night. Apart from two spouses, the remainder of the crowd of about 30-35 people were layoffees. One of the married guys explained: "She wanted to come but we couldn't afford a babysitter." He's still laid off, has a Ph.D. in Computational Linguistics. Sweetie says he's absolutely brilliant. Very personable guy. Has a three-year old and a baby, born just a few days before he was laid off.

Over half of the people--probably three-fourths--are still unemployed. This is an exceptional group. Besides being very clever with computer stuff, they're good-humored and obviously fond of each other. I had noticed the unusually good rapport at the Christmas party but this was a much different occasion. They were all so glad to see each other; you could see they had missed the day-to-day camaraderie. They're scared and it shows with a drawn face in a brief unguarded moment. Ninety percent are under 35 years of age, maybe another fifty percent under 30. They've never known hard times.

I felt a bit guilty.

-- Anonymous, August 18, 2001

Answers

>He's still laid off, has a Ph.D. in Computational Linguistics

I'll bet you a Powerball ticket that he is refusing to relocate because the pool of comp-ling specialists isn't that large, but they do tend to get hired for 3-5 year projects. Pangloss (attempt at making a universal translator, sort of like the one seen in Star Trek) at CMU (Pittsburgh) was a good example, but as far as I know, everybody got other jobs, or they got more funding to go at it on a smaller scale.

The former love of my life is currently in comp- ling in Israel. I'm sure if his unit's been re-activated that he is driving them all nuts: his army buddies weren't overly literate or analytical to begin with, and now they'll have to contend with a guy who parses sentences for entertainment, in three languages!

-- Anonymous, August 18, 2001


He may have started to think of working away from home by now. It's only just starting to sink in for all these folks that another job is going to be difficult to find. I suspect he has a mortgage and the housing market is not what it was. If he can't sell the house, he and his family can't relocate so easily. I know we wouldn't have stood a chance in hell of selling the house, even if I was in good enough physical shape to go through that particular harrowing experience. (Not to mention mental shape!) I don't think this guy will go to Israel--his mother is American but his father is from Syria!

-- Anonymous, August 18, 2001

Hey, I refused to go to Israel! And I'm sure not going over there now. There are comp-ling jobs around in the US, and lots of families have rented their homes in similar situations. It's not the best option, but it can be done: I've managed properties for friends when they've had to move. Sometimes one just has to cut his losses and move on. Life really is a crap shoot sometimes.

-- Anonymous, August 18, 2001

I have somewhat fond memories of a reunion following a bankruptcy dissolution back in the early 80s. I was one of two people left working for the bankruptcy trustee, still in the ghostly caverns overrun with junk mail that couldn't (yet) be tossed. Everyone else was getting on with their lives.

At the time I was obsessed with an Arlo Guthrie song. Did you know that IOCOCCA stands for "I am Chairman of Chrysler Corporation of America"? At any rate, the lyrics go something like...

http://www.arlo.net/lyrics/chrysler.shtml

B.

-- Anonymous, August 20, 2001


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