The New Normal, Or It's Still the Economy, Stupid

In 1992 Bill Clinton's campaign manager James Carville famously exclaimed "It's about the economy, stupid!" And I believe that to be more relevant than ever. Each day there seems to be news that while something may be looking up, five other things are still looking downward in terms of economy and jobs.

Some time back I read an article about a 'new normal' for the economy and job market. The gist of the article was that things won't go back to the way they were. Which is understandable as things change. Take an article I read this morning about jobs being made obsolete by technology- technology is not the problem itself but the companies who integrate the technology without thinking about the people they're tossing out on their ears. It used to be there were jobs that paid well that only required a high-school diploma. This lifted many families into the middle-class and enabled them to send children to college who then in turn moved into the upper middle-class. But now those high-school diploma jobs are rapidly drying up and even a college degree sometimes isn't as valuable as it once was. Now I still feel a college degree has value and sometimes it can get you ahead in the job line but the cost of education is something that has to be addressed, too.

Living on the cheap used to be what you did when you starting out or getting back into the game after getting knocked down. Now it's normal for so many people even for those who have a steady job. Wages have not kept up with inflation and the vicious cycle that the powers-that-be can't seem to realize is that without money to spend there is no real way to stimulate economic growth. Companies come back and say they can't hire and increase wages without cutting into profits. Bullshit- these greedy bastards cut wages and people starting in 2008 and then put the fear of joblessness into the remaining souls they had on the payroll and squeezed more productivity for less money. But I will say that's starting to come back on some companies (Wal-Mart comes to mind- I read an article about how their sales are starting to hurt because they won't hire enough people to stock and service their stores).

But I wonder how people would change if they did have more money- would they more careful? Would they focus on managing debt and saving more money? Or would they revert to the free-wheeling spend-for-all ways pre-2008? Personally, as long and as hard as this recession has been I don't think people would revert to pre-2008 ways if wages did take an upturn. I would hope that people would listen to common sense and not give in to consumer madness. Now some nitwit-pundits will say if people are too cautious then it will perpetuate the cycle of a suck-ass economy. Why would that happen if people will spend money but not at insane levels? I don't see a need for insane corporate profits and get-rich-quick bullshit like it seemed to be pre-2008. For me, as I earn more I'm sticking to my goal of getting out of debt and building up a solid savings and investment plan. And I won't live beyond my means for any damn corporate entity or some dumb-ass pundit who doesn't know jack-shit about the real world.

The new normal right now of living on the cheap sucks. People should be able to have money to spend on what they want to instead of having to say 'no' to themselves and worst of all, their kids. And I'm not talking about gold-plated Mercedes spending desires here- I'm talking about being able to go the movies or eat out once a week type of spending here. I'm solidly middle-class and even if I got rich I don't think my mindset would change. Going without does bring things into perspective both good and bad and the good far outweighs the bad in the sense that you see what really matters: the people around you and how you live your life. If you can take care of yourself then you can help out those with even less.

Poverty sucks and it's not a choice. But living hand-to-mouth and on the cheap because you have no choice also sucks. So when it comes to the economy, stupid it's not just a catch phrase: it's a way of life that shouldn't be.

Drive By Monday

This is kind of a drive-by post as it's Monday and I have to go the salt mine where the phones will ring off the hook (Monday is the busiest day in a call center).

I got out of bed at 5:30 which is an improvement over my usual 6 or 6:30. I walked Darcy in the muggy dark with sprinklers all around and a resident stray cat slinking around. Amazingly Darcy did not bark at the cat. Of course I was moving her away from the cat and going 'leave it' all the while. Now if I can get her to look at a cat and not want to lunge at it or play with it that will be an accomplishment. At class on Saturday the trainer told me that when a dog approaches another dog (or cat or human) that they have one of two thoughts: 1) I want to meet you, and or 2) I want to eat you. The second seems to be Darcy's default sometimes and learning when she's thinking that is the next step in my training with her.

Yesterday at work I brought my big red zip binder and Alphasmart to work though I didn't work on any writing. I have some good notes in the binder but the tentative schedule I made for the writing went out the window last night. And now I realize why: I would love to work on my novel more but I think during the work week I'll work on the non-fiction projects with my days off reserved for said novel. It seems like my brain is okay with shorter times for non-fiction but not fiction.

I bought a new book for my Kindle this morning: The Long Way Home by Jessica Scott. It's the sequel to one my first Kindle purchases To Iraq and Back by Jessica Scott . To Iraq and Back is a collection of writing from the blog she kept while she was deployed to Iraq for a year. Ms. Scott is an Army officer, wife, and mother, and I read the blog when she was over there but it's great to read it all in one sitting. I've been looking forward to the sequel as coming home is nowhere near as easy as most people think. Also, her fiction books are most excellent also (she's an auto-buy for me now).

Well, back to the grind.

Today Was a Fat Tire Day

Fat Tire Beer, it's a brand out of Colorado. I read about it in the book 'Skin Deep' by Pamela Clare, specifically in the novella after 'Skin Deep' called 'Marc and Julian Make a Beer Run' (which you can buy in e-book form here)



 

 

First, I started off my day without being able to log on to my computer. There goes seven minutes of my day re-booting the darn machine. Then three voicemail messages I need to answer and accounts to update. Then the calls started.

 

I had three grumpy people gnaw on me because they didn't like what I was telling them. Basically, I sat and listened but being told that I'm basically a greedy idiot in so many words or less is not a way to endear yourself to me. Now of course they didn't know me from a whole in the wall and somebody must have peed in their cornflakes this morning but why call and take it out on some poor customer service rep? It's the nature of the business though so you just learn to take these days as they roll oi. In addition, I forgot to take an allergy pill before I work so I was miserable with a hugely-stuffy head, sore throat, dry cough, and sniffles and sneezes. Needless to say I came out of work with the intention of getting a beer.

 

Because today was an I-need-a-beer-but-can't-afford-a-six-pack day. I was in the HEB store on DeZavala here in San Antonio because my regular HEB is being remodeled and you can't find anything in it (they have nice employees wearing t-shirts with 'Help You?' on them). In this store and at the other one I went to Saturday they have beer by the bottle for sale. I bought this Fat Tire because I'd read about it in a book and thought 'what the heck'.

 

Well, what the heck have I been missing? This is a full-bodied yeasty-smooth ale (it's labeled Amber Ale on the bottle). I like really rich beers so this is perfect for me. And it's a nice end to what was an overall crappy day at work.

How It All Started - I Needed a Job

I got my first call center job simply because I needed a job. I really had no idea what I was getting into or that fourteen years later I'd still be working the phones.

It started in 1999 after a job working in a card store for a wacko-boss who was totally horrible to her kids in front of everyone. There was this place in the town where I lived called Brylane. Again, I had no idea what they did but they were hiring so I went and filled out an application, took a typing test, got interviewed then hired. The job would be for me to take orders over the phone. Simple, right?

For the most part, yes. Except for the people who'd go ballistic when orders didn't arrive, or weren't like what the catalog had pictured, or when stuff went on backorder (which was all the freaking time). The only real benefit to this job was getting 30% off stuff with no additional shipping.

The place was in what was a K-Mart store and they only gutted the building and put in rows of desks, some training rooms and offices. The heating and air-conditioning was never fixed. In fact, there was no real heat in the building at all as the temperature always seemed to be set to meat-locker. I mean, it was so cold that people were wrapped up in blankets and I was glad I got to wear sweats when I worked Saturday mornings. More than once I wanted to ask where they were hanging the meat. The thing was, we were the meat. We were nothing but bodies in desks expected to move merchandise that wasn't in stock.

It was my first taste of how people could be on the phone because some were cool- especially the cross-dressing guys because they had excellent taste, knew their sizes, and to coordinate. And how did I know they were cross-dressers? Size 14 shoes and way too much knowledge for a guy about womens' clothing. To tell you the truth, I could have talked to these guys all day and been very happy. It was the cheapskates that really ticked me off. Oh, and the pervert who used to call and harass the crap out of us (though I put a stop to that when I heard kids in the background as he was being extremely ugly to me- I marched up to the control desk and filled out a form and made sure it got to the powers-that-be. I was told I had steam coming out of my ears that day.) Then there was a bonkers lady by the name of Joyce Scaggs- if I ever write a screaming crazy lady character I'm going to name her after this nutso. She used to call and cuss out whoever was lucky enough to get her. I heard the company eventually tracked her down and turned her in to law enforcement.

The most fun I ever remember having was tossing around these rubber stress balls across the rows on Saturday morning when none of the managers were around. Why anyone would call on a Saturday morning has always been beyond me but hey, I got paid to toss rubber balls around and/or sit on my ass.

But it all went downhill when the company began to squeeze out the full-timers in hopes of getting an all part-time workforce. They should have said no more full time and offered us the option of part-time or the door. Now I was also watching my mother die of cancer and trying to help take care of my grandmother so towards the end I just stopped caring and my performance suffered and yes, I was shown the door.

I got close to two years of call center experience which in turn got me my next call center gig. I also still have a pair of boots and a couple of dresses I bought way back then (though the dresses aren't going to fit much longer). Also, I heard the place closed down a few years ago when call volume slacked off due to people shopping on the Internet (my preferred method of shopping when I don't want to go out).

So what were my lessons from this job: don't take it personally, use a wrist pad for your keyboard to save your wrists, always keep something to drink on your desk, have a pencil to take written notes with (because pens will always run out of ink when you need them the most), and make sure your ass doesn't expand too much (meaning, get up and move even if it's just to the bathroom and back).