“And FYI, after hundreds of knockbacks, I finally found a job working in a video game store earning $220 a week. When I turned 20 they sacked me and hired another 17 year old.”

My son had the same problem two years ago in hi9s gap year despite being very hardworking and running a paper run since he was 11 rain and shine. He might have been better off keeping that paper run because so many places want the newest cheapest lot of school leavers and only want to give them a shift r two a week.

The early 90s was bad. I was working and going to uni part time and my company collapsed. I could see it was coming so I negotiated a redundancy pay privately with the GM (who was being pressured to find heads anyway) before anything became official and the men in black suits came to shut the doors. But my offer came with strings “give me time off to look for another job, a glowing reference and when I have a new job to go to my redundancy payout takes effect.” He agreed. We were all in the same boat anyway with pressure from corporate office and ultimately he (and all else) lost his job.

My advice is if its looking bad, move before it gets worse. Dont hang around when you start seeing those HR guys in offices with people.

These days redundancy pays are virtually non existent or very poor because everyone is on short term contracts (which dont give people the security to make big decisions in life eg getting married, having babies, taking out a mortgage).

We have gone crazy with the casual contracts in Australia which is not ideal.

Public housing is a debacle in Australia.

So very true. But at least here in my area there has been a noticeable improvement in behaviour since CanDo announced ” 3 strikes your out “.
He coped a lot of flack but it’s working.

You think this is bad ….. NDIS will be DSP on fucking steroids.

I’ve been successful at 80% of job interviews I’ve been to. But when I was 18, I sent out hundreds of job applications that didn’t even get me an interview. Most of them probably got lost in the shuffle and weren’t even read. That’s pretty discouraging, especially when we are talking about low paid, entry level jobs.

I graduated high school in 1993. Unemployment for 18-24 year olds was running around 40% in the late 90s.

Yobbo, my nephews’ dad was the same, only he had a marihuana problem, a record of family dysfunction and of complete school failure, a bit of something like autism (quite bright actually), and a chip on his shoulder. Apparently he tried half-heartedly for jobs, but was never even in the race. He became hopeless in his outlook and then a father of two to women who couldn’t cope themselves; then he suffered a severe injury which semi-incapacitated him phyically but not enough for the DSP which he was too proud to try for anyway. He’s been long-term unemployed ever since, with patches of shelf-stacking etc before his injury.

Keating’s ‘recession we had to have’ was a bad one for the marihuana-affected generation of the 1990′s. Our times help to define us if we let them do so.

Skuter, what you say should happen with public housing tenants is of course the case, but it definitely does not happen. One outrageous tenant can ruin a whole small block and their ‘rights’ are paramount over the rights of others to live in peace and safety.

So true Lizzie

I am hoping to get my little nephews out of this situation this year. But other little children there will not be so lucky. What on earth makes us think that this situation is any different to that of aboriginal children also caught up in the madness?

Of course there is very little difference between metropolitan and remote destitution. I don’t know what the answer is but sit down money is poison.

Your example of breaking out of that situation is very powerful for those kids and your desire to help them is very admirable. But the kids left behind, well who knows what their future holds. I wish you all the best!

Fuggin’ Chifley. Tory stooge and closet Ayn Rand fanatic.