Laura and Charley Gosse are tightening their belts in the article "Two Layoffs, One Family: When a Household Is Out of Work"
In July 2009, one in three unemployed persons have been out of work for 27 weeks or more, according to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. That’s nearly 7 months out of work.
Now imagine the two-income families who have lost both jobs to layoffs. It’s not a joyous thought, but it’s a reality all too familiar in almost all regions of the U.S.
How do these families manage? It depends on how well they have saved, the state of their health and their ability to reenter a very competitive job market, says a Richmond-Dispatch article “Pink-slip Couples Share Emotional, Financial Load.”
Lisa and John Scheid of Mechanicsville, Va., have been getting by on smart finances, cost-cutting and a special two-year radiology training program for John that allows him to collect unemployment benefits while in school. While this family has been managing its debt very well, Lisa has not been able to find work despite getting interviews.
Jim and Becky Johnson expect to lose their house. From the Richmond-Dispatch article:
“We’re looking for a miracle,” said Becky, 56.
The Henrico County couple are four months behind on their mortgage. Neither have health care. Job prospects don’t look good.
And Jim, 64, has health problems. The day before Qimonda announced massive layoffs in February, he had a stroke. When he returned to work, his job was gone.
Becky, who had been a contractor at Infineon Technologies, which later spun off operations into Qimonda, lost her job there in 2005. What few contracting jobs she could find locally since then have dried up.
Continuing their health insurance coverage would have cost $3,000 a month, so they declined. She is taking smaller doses of medicine and hoping for their health to not erode.
She’s looking for jobs in Missouri, Oregon, Idaho and elsewhere. A hoped-for job at Walgreens didn’t pan out.
Jim filed for retirement to collect social security, Becky has sold gold jewelry and other possessions, but it will probably not be enough to keep their house, the articlesays.
Not every picture is as grim as the Johnsons’. Jill and Bryan Lemon both lost their jobs but got new ones rather quickly but for a lot less money. Jill, who had worked in IT recruiting, is now a career counselor, and Bryan, who had worked in construction for Circuit City is an estimator/project manager for Glenn Glass Inc.
Both have advice for couples facing dual unemployment.
Jill says seeking outside help from a marriage counselor helped them make it through.
Bryan’s package when he left Circuit City included health benefits. They saw the counselor until that benefit ran out.
And Bryan is a fan of not limiting your job search. He says don’t be defined by what you did, but rather by your skills and all the different ways they can be used.
“It could be very easy to get into a one-track mind of what it is you’ve done and what you want to do next,” he said. “In this environment, that is not possible.”
Consider that in 2007, 512,000 two-income families were without incomes. In 2008, 151,000 additional families were in the same boat, according to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics — a 29 percent increase year over year. We’re over half way through 2009, and new data on families without incomes is not out yet.
In the article “Two Layoffs, One Family: When a Household Is Out of Work,” Donna Spellman, director of Self Sufficiency Services at Family Centers of Greenwich, Conn., suggests that getting some structure to job hunting between couples is the best advice for dual layoff families looking to balance caring for children and managing the stress.
“If one person is staying behind with the kids, focusing on keeping things moving along smoothly, that person is creating space for the other person to do their thing,” Spellman said. “And perhaps tomorrow or the next day, they switch. But it means that everybody’s truly doing their part. They’re not scrambling, and they’re not saying, ‘I thought you were going to stay home!’ It’s not about that.”
Spellman also advises that flexibility is key.”It will happen that somebody’s going to get a call that’s going to be very spur of the moment — ‘I’ve got an interview, and I’ve gotta go,’ ” Spellman said. “The partners have to be flexible as much as possible.”
More layoff, career, resume and networking advice:
- Every Job Search Is a Family Affair
- Should You Tell the Kids You Lost Your Job?
- The Consulting Trap
- Two Layoffs, One Family: When a Household Is Out of Work
Nice advice on how to deal with dual layoffs… Thanks that our economy is finally moving again… Let’s all hope that there will be more work for all of us again…