Not extended benefits. Or whether or not there is unemployment available.
There are three "nasty secrets" about how most job applicants get through that final evaluation to be hired.
The first is to have a good relationship with your potential employer - either through a really great first impression where your previous work is such that your employer can relate to or through common networks (schools, acquaintances, organizations), if you don't already have a relationship with the person you want to employ you. I have seen so many qualified people not considered because when the differences between resumes are not significant, the future employer will always go with the resume they can relate to.
The second to already be gainfully employed at a good job - at the very lower end, having just been informed about a layoff and winding down your current employment.
If you don't have the luxury of secret number 1, and have been unemployed in your field of expertise for more than two months and have been using that time to look for work but haven't found anything, people begin to wonder if there's something wrong with you.
And if you have been working temp or part-time at a job that would be considered "lesser", they wonder even more.
As an example - a computer engineer who has been supplementing the tenth to fourteenth month of his or her unemployment working part-time as a Best Buy Geek Squad member is going to have problems explaining that this was just a hobby while he was out looking. And if s/he had been working at Micky D's or day labor, there would be even more questions.
Rule of thumb when unemployed. Whatever job you take is the level you will start your next employment cycle from.
That means, the hypothetical computer engineer who had been working for 8 years at a position making $85K a year gets laid off and took that $10 an hour job at Best Buy hawking computers or installing stereo systems, there is an 80% probability that the only job offers that s/he will be considered for are based on that current job at Best Buy, no matter the job experience, talents or skills that engineer has or what other positions there are to apply for. Even if s/he applied for the very same type of job that had been worked prior to the layoff. That Best Buy job, the last job on the resume, now defines the applicant.
From experience in a technical field, it looks far better if s/he had been using that time to get additional certification or training to keep the skills up to day, but a 40 year old with a family is not going to be able to pay the bills and go to school, because frankly, there are very few programs for older working adults that also pay for them to live while going to school, or give them free quality training and a supplement so they can concentrate on their training, not on keeping a roof over the head and other day-to-days.
The third is the ability to go to any job interview on the potential employer's schedule, and to be able to start the next day if accepted. You need to have an open schedule, and a the time to prepare for an interview or to begin new work with little notice.
Which means that searching for work is a full-time job in itself. If you are getting ready to start your shift at that crappy $9 an hour retail or restaurant service job you took because you didn't want to seem to be a lazy moocher, and you get an hour's notice for an interview for a $65K a year job you might be able to start in a month if picked, you're either:
a) losing the crappy job by screwing your current employer because you bugged out of your shift for a job interview that might not pan out, or
b) potentially screwing yourself out of a job that can get you back on your feet if you can't make that interview. School can be an excuse, because most employers are somewhat sympathetic to a person trying to make themselves better, but asking to reschedule an interview because of you were too proud to take unemployment and need your crap job at Best Buy or Arco?
Unemployment was implemented as a form of safety net by which someone could take the time to look for a meaningful job that matches their qualifications and experience to replace the one they lost and not fall into the trap of just taking any job just to have a job. As an old fart, I remember that low wage jobs are supposed to be for young people starting out, who could live with their parents or room-mates, not for 40 or 50 year olds who were laid off through little fault of their own.
Ultimately, the problem is not "unemployment" or lots of lazy people gaming the system, it is the lack of meaningful jobs that pay comparable wages to lost jobs. The primary factor to the unemployment numbers is the number of like jobs available compared to the number of qualified people looking for those jobs.
Haele
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