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Representing Employees Since 1993
It is important to understand unemployment figures. The rates vary greatly by education and county. The present national unemployment figure of 8.3% is for high school graduates. There is a 12.4% rate for non high school graduates. The rate of unemployment for bachelor’s degree workers is 4.5% and 2.1% for those with a professional degree.
An Orange County jobs report today reports there is an overall 6.2% unemployment rate in Orange County which is very slow. The report indicates that outside of the Silicon Valley, Orange County has a large tech industry which might account for the job growth. During the recession Orange County had a higher than average unemployment rate which was blamed on the loss of jobs in the construction industry and mortgage banking. However, this report is based upon August data. I wonder if Disneyland, Knott’s Berry Farm, some of the other Orange County amusement parks, and the South Orange County Beach industry staffed up for the summer and that inflated this report. Orange County seems to be a unique job environment. The economy changed with the internet and a lot of people cannot re-tool. Some cannot re-tool because they do not have the education to work in a workplace where computer use, typing, spelling, writing, and reading skills must be on a 2 year college level in order to utilize the internet environment. While a degree from college in the wrong field might not help somebody get a job, it may enable them to learn new things which will allow them to enter employment fields that did not before exist.
Representing employees I make a point of spending a few hours a day to understand the true difficulties in finding work. Other problems I have noted include massification of electronic resumes many of which are not good, wrongfully terminated employees not applying for enough jobs, and I hate to say it but some people not being willing to give up unemployment benefits for a job they might get fired from. If you have any questions about wage loss due to a termination of employment, contact me.