How old are you?
51
What job did you last hold?
I was an editor at a newspaper in Kentucky
How did you find out you were losing your job?
I was asked to come in early for an important managers’ meeting, after working until about midnight the night before. At the managers’ meeting, the editor announced that she was resigning to take a position at a university. Then she gathered the staff in the newsroom and announced her departure. We knew that layoffs were coming too; my newspaper had been asked to prepare a plan to eliminate 15 percent of the staff. Immediately after her announcement, I was asked to go to Human Resources.
Did you have to leave immediately or did they give you a few weeks to get used to the idea?
I got the impression in HR that I was expected to work out the remaining two weeks before my job was officially eliminated. I worked the night I was laid off and it was miserable. (Dozens of my co-workers were laid off the same day; some left immediately, a few worked the full two weeks.)
On the second day, my former supervisor called me in to his office and said he wanted to make clear that I didn’t have to work if I didn’t want to – the company could put me on administrative leave. I decided to finish the shift and say goodbyes as people left that night.
Tell us a little about what you did when you worked.
I was a reporter and an editor on both the metro and copy desks. (For those not familiar with how newsrooms are structured: Assigning editors work with teams of reporters, planning, editing and updating stories online and for the paper. Copy editors read the stories after the assigning editors are done, to give them a “fresh set of eyes” and make sure errors haven’t been introduced or missed by the assigning editors. At this stage, pages are designed and headlines and photo captions are written. I worked mostly in news but from time I edited sports or features copy. I was in charge of the newsroom on Sundays and some weeknights.
What was your favorite part of the job?
Editing, especially when I was able to turn a bad story into a good one.
What was the worst part?
For the last two or three years, the constant need to lower my expectations about what the paper was able to do as its staffing diminshed.
Did you like going to work every day?
Yes.
Did you feel like you were making a difference?
Yes. Almost always.
How do you spend your days now? On the internet? Job searching? Drinking coffee?
I volunteer at an anti-poverty agency that works primarily with women and children. I’m spending more time there, more time at the gym, more time doing housework, more time asleep. I’m writing a novel that had been rattling around in my head for years. But I’m surprised at how time-consuming unemployment has proved to be. Although I’m trying to avoid relocating, my job search is pretty broad-based, and there are many places to look online.
The days I dislike are the ones I spend almost entirely on the computer – working on my resume, looking at classifieds, networking. I recently found a temporary job, which I haven’t started yet, so I have eased up on that temporarily. I have done a little traveling. But mostly I’m at home at the computer.
Have your spending habits changed since you've been laid off?
Not appreciably. I have severance pay and unemployment benefits.
Do you have big financial worries -- kids in college, etc.?
Not immediately, but my son has been accepted to a private college. He is deferring college for a year – his idea, not mine – so I won’t be feeling the financial pain for a while. But that also means my daughter will start college before he finishes.
Do you have a spouse who works?
Yes
How many jobs have you applied for since you've been laid off?
Seven
Are they in the same part of the country or a different part?
All are local.
What kind of job are you looking for next? Will it be in the same field or a different one? Why?
It will almost certainly be in a different field. I don’t think newspapers will be a mass medium for much longer – not because they aren’t needed, but because they aren’t appreciated. Too many people are much more interested in Jon and Kate’s troubled marriage than in how their government is performing. They’re much too complacent about their eroding civil rights – Guantanamo Bay, the Patriot Act, cameras in every business and on every streetcorner. The ironic part, to me, is that the people most pleased by the demise of newspapers are the ones who are most mistrustful of government. Who’ll be keeping an eye on politicians when newspapers are feeble or gone?
Talk about anything else you'd like to talk about.
I found my temporary job at the unemployment office, which is funny because it would be hard to find a more dysfunctional place. I went down to get some questions answered about my unemployment benefits, but there were about 40 people ahead of me and it appeared that only two staff people were there. After about 20 minutes, when only one person’s name had been called, I gave up. But I found my job on a list at the center’s job resources office.
I’m saddened by the demise of loyalty in the American workplace. I do not think it makes businesses more competitive if employees are considered disposable and workers view jobs as temporary. In many cases there are no humans involved in the job search until the interview stage, and most of the places to which I’ve applied haven’t even acknowledged receiving the application. Down the road, I think companies will pay a price for that lack of sensitivity.
