Chris Core, who found himself on the losing end of stupid-assed corporation at the end of February, has a great post about unemployment up today:
[Y]ou would not believe how many of my friends, actual, responsible grown-up taxpaying adults, have encouraged me to apply for unemployment insurance! They say, “You/WMAL paid into it, you are entitled to it. It’s free money, go for it.” I have said, “Absolutely not.” First of all, I don’t qualify, thanks to the Newseum, XM Radio and freelance producer Rodney Minor. I am making some money this month. But besides that, what kind of a hypocrite would I be if I, who rails against too much wasteful government spending and too many government handouts took one myself? But I will admit that it’s quandaries like this that make me miss being on the air. I mean, don’t you think that the question “Should I apply for the Unemployment Benefits?” would be a great talk topic? And I promise about a third of you would be like my friends saying I should take it.
It’s a great topic actually.
Seriously, unless you are the sole breadwinner for a family and you absolutely need the money to survive, where’s the morality in taking money from the government when you rail against government waste on a daily basis ? Personally, if I was in the same situation, and I absolutely needed (as in couldn’t even get a job as a cashier at Lowe’s kind of need) then, yea, maybe I’d take it.
Otherwise, nope, I’m not a leech.
Chris goes on:
One out of twenty Americans is now unemployed. While this is the envy of places like Argentina, it’s not usual in the USA. And more join the list every day. This is not the fault of the administration or even corporate America. This is part of the cycle of the U.S. economy. But, because all of us it happens to react immediately and instinctively by figuring how our how to cut our own personal spending, we can see how this cycle gets extended. About the worst thing the government can do is to try to fix it. Like it’s trying to do with the tax-rebate checks. When my check comes, I am going to donate it to some charity helping our military men and women coming home from Iraq, and I am going to encourage you to do the same.
What the government should do instead is just let the economy work itself out. Things will get better, they always have. Still, as big a mess as Iraq is, the combination of high gas prices, growing unemployment, and the nervous stomachs of workers who think they could be next on the chopping block means “It’s the economy, stupid” is likely to be the mantra of the fall campaign as much as Senator McCain and his party try to steer the conversation to the much scarier and complicated problems of national security.
And the idiots at Citadel fired this guy ? God I hope none of my mutual funds own stock in that company.
