The best of times, the worst of times.

Finding a job in your chosen career can be difficult at the best of times. We are certainly not in the best of times! I have now been looking for full time work for almost four years (it will be four years next month.) Right now according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics I am technically in the involuntary part time workers category, and it is no fun. Sometimes I feel like I am in the marginally attached category (those who want to work full time, but have stopped looking because they feel like they can't/won't be able to find a job.)

Either way I am suffering, and so are millions of Americans. For the raw data some of you may be interested in the actual BLS report for July. It is rather dry to read, but here is what I take away... little has changed in the past year. Thats a bad thing! In the last year the stock market has gone up over 20%,  home prices have risen a little over 12%, home sales are up, and every month it seems that the private sector hiring is higher than the overall number. For example in July ADP reported that private sector hiring created 200,000 jobs, yet the overall number just released by the BLS was a gain of 162,000 jobs. So the quick math would indicated that the public sector lost 38,000 jobs in July. Initial analysis by CNN/Money seems to agree with me that this is not good. Bloomberg News also notes that hours worked and earnings were down slightly for the month. All of this adds up to bad news.

I realize that this may be an oversimplified example... but if the Federal Reserve still contends that the government should be spending more on infrastructure (roads, bridges, schools, etc.) then instead of spending $85 billion per month to buy bonds, why can't they spend on infrastructure? Even $1 billion per month would make a difference.

Certainly some of the job loses in the public sector since the rescission began in 2008 were jobs that may have not been necessary... but we can't sustain this. The private sector can't hire all 12 million unemployed Americans. It certainly can't absorb all the unemployed/underemployed/marginally attached workers (I think that number is closer to 25 million!)

Yesterday I wrote about a disturbing trend to shift work to part time or temporary work. If we relay on the private sector to rehire all the people who want to work, this trend will get worse and so will the country as a whole. So while these are by no means the best of times, things will get a whole lot worse in my opinion if this trend continues.

To best position yourself remember to prepare your self for any opportunity with sound research about the company and industry you are interviewing with. Be prepared to make connections between your skills, abilities, and background to their position and situation. As always good luck, and fi you have any thoughts I would love to hear them.