Third World America - Arianna Huffington [81]
“The ultimate measure of a man or woman,” said Martin Luther King, “is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.”115
LESSONS FROM THE FINANCIAL FOXHOLE
After spending months embedded with a thirty-man platoon in Afghanistan’s remote Korengal Valley, Sebastian Junger, who wrote War based on the experience, says that he was struck by how, after being put through “the worst experience possible,” soldiers often miss it upon returning home.116 It’s not because they are adrenaline junkies, he says. They are addicted to the brotherly love. “Every guy in that platoon was necessary to everyone else and that necessariness, I think, is actually way more addictive than adrenaline is,” says Junger. “You have an unshakable meaning in a small group that you can’t duplicate in a society.”
We actually can duplicate “unshakable meaning” and “necessariness” outside the battlefield. Indeed, we have to. In times of mortal danger, soldiers unconsciously create a sense of purpose and community and kinship. Right now, the perils we are facing here at home are not as tangible and deadly as those faced by our soldiers in Afghanistan. Nobody is shooting at us—and I don’t mean to draw an equivalency to the lethal threats our men and women in uniform are bravely facing every day. But twenty-six million people are unemployed or underemployed, and over 4 percent of U.S. workers have been unemployed for more than six months—nearly twice the percentage it was back in 1983.117, 118 Forty-six percent of the unemployed have been out of work for over six months; 23 percent have been unemployed for a year or more.
And more and more people are entering the ranks of “the 99ers”—those who have been unemployed for ninety-nine weeks, after which all unemployment benefits end.119 Since Congress has been unwilling to extend benefits beyond that point, by the end of 2010 over a million people will likely have exhausted all available benefits. Of course, a third of America’s unemployed never receive any financial support when they lose their jobs; they’re ineligible to receive unemployment benefits.120
Making matters worse, there is a growing—and disturbing—trend among some employers: job listings that explicitly ban unemployed workers from applying, with lines like “No unemployed candidates will be considered at all,” “Must be currently employed,” and “Client will not consider/interview anyone NOT currently employed regardless of reason.”121
“In the current economy, where millions of people have lost their jobs through absolutely no fault of their own, I find it beyond unconscionable that any employer would not consider unemployed workers for current job openings,” Judy Conti, federal advocacy coordinator for the National Employment Law Project, told the Huffington Post. “Increasingly, politicians and policy makers are trying to blame the unemployed for their condition, and to see this shameful propaganda trickle down to hiring decisions is truly sad and despicable.”
Make no mistake: Though it’s not war, it is financial warfare—and there’s an enemy out there that does not wish you well. The bad guys are not firing bullets; they are setting financial traps. Foreclosures continue to surge. Health-care costs are going to continue to skyrocket—even for the insured. And long-term unemployment is going to be a fact of life for the foreseeable future.
The consequences can be far-reaching: A study by researchers at Yale found that “high unemployment rates increase