28 million Americans had to make due this Holiday season, and its not the first time, in fact for many Americans it was the 4th Christmas Holiday in a row we had to do with less or even without. If only the margin on election day had been 28 million votes, but it wasn't
U6 Unemployment finished the year 2012 at 14.4%. The Civilian Workforce was at 155.5million, so this recent Holiday season saw 22,392,000 ( nearly 22.4 million) people who would take a full time year round job if offered.
The U6 Unemployment metric doesnt count everyone, At the deepest part of the recession U6 was 17.2%, about 26.48 million. Various estimates toped out at 30 to 32 million. In President Obama's first term he created 4.25 million jobs. But after the Recovery Act the House GOP voted against every jobs bill.
This great nation has about 28 million people looking for jobs, for the last 4 years. Will we allow extremists to steal another 4 years of our future?
When Occupy Wall St. got started I had been looking for work for about 10 months. I organized a food drive in my town of Montclair NJ. The response was great, many of the food donations came from near 1%ers. Some people volunteered to drive in to deliver the food. Many times hot platters, that were still hot after driving for 30-40 minutes. I delivered about 500 meals over 5 weeks, culminating on Thanksgiving day 2011. I ate Thanksgiving dinner at Zucotti Park and helped to hand out something like 3500 meals that day.
During this period I met Jesse LaGreca, Tool and OllieGarkey. After conversations with those 3 and many other Occupiers, I ended up with a take away point. They've stolen our future. We've played by the rules, went to school, went to college and had our homes taken away, our jobs taken away.
I'll be 55 years old at the end of the month, my unemployment ran out last summer and had to ask my Mom and Stepdad if I could move in with them in Connecticut, they said yes of course. So I've been sleeping on a couch since June. In the summer I helped out at the family Nursery, I designed and built a drip irrigation system for 1500 Chrysanthemums. then just before Thanksgiving I found work at a small Ski area in Woodbury Ct. $8.25 an hour, I usually work about 20-25 hours. I've recently applied to work at 2 other much larger ski areas, if I can get another 3-4 days that would be great.
I'm not married, I have no girlfriend, I need to get some dental work done, the entirety off all my belongs fit into my 1996 Dodge Minivan in 2 trips from NJ to Ct.
I'm more fit than many men 10-15 years my junior, I'm enormously fortunate my legs still work. I've battled Depression and won, I know what a depressive trigger is and have learned to recognize when one occurs, and what to do about it. I've shared these tips with my Mom, she recently got a new hip, and it was hard on her at age 77. I've trained my Mom to say "Damned straight Skippy" when I tell her what she should be looking forward to. I make her smile.
I'm mentally and emotionally stronger than at any time previously in my life. I'm smarter, more knowledgeable than at any other time in my life. And never before in my life had I had 4 years stolen from me, with the prospect of another 4 years being stolen from me by the Oligarchy and their paid for minions, the GOP.
If they haven't broken me by now, they won't ever. This is the way I stand my ground.