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Hard Times
For the first time in almost a year, Mike Rust has a line on a job. He lives in Burns and lays natural gas pipeline around the West. But he's been out of work since last October. Now he's heard from a friend who's going down to a job in California that there may be more work there. Mike is sixty one, so he is hoping to land work as a supervisor. But if he has to tote 90 pound bags of sand again, he will.
Mike is one person OPB News has been following in our Hard Times series. We've decided to bring Mike and two other Hard Times folks together for a Labor Day special to talk about how this economy has affected them, and what they hope the future brings.
Ben Perrins isn't just out of work, he's out of a home to call his own. His most basic hope is stability:
All I want my kids to do is go to school, play, and be kids. I don't even want them to realize we're in a recession. And if I can do that and keep a smile on my kids' face by handing them an ice cream or a popsicle or something, it makes my day.
And Angie Blackwell dreams about getting her new business off the ground, even as she searches for a full time job. She also hopes an uptick in the housing market could help her get out from under her mortgage.
Angie's husband still works, so she doesn't think her family will end up like Ben's with no roof over her head. And she does have health insurance, unlike Mike. But still, she says, these difficult times are a mixed blessing for her: returning her focus to the importantance of friends and family, while at the same time pushing her back down towards poverty, which she thought she'd escaped.
This program was pre-recorded for the holiday so we won't be taking phone calls. But please tell us here how these times are affecting you. And if anything is getting better.
Tagged as: hard times · homeless · unemployment
Photo credit: Ethan Lindsey
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i thought your program Hard Times was very moving. However, i had to shake my head when Ben, answering a question about what he had to give up due to his unemployment, mentioned his sports caps. Sports caps are virtually a dime a dozen in thrift stores and at yard/garage sales; perhaps he needs to give up the thought of buying them new at Walmart or Shopko or whereever.
Besides, it sounds like he has an addiction to sports caps to go along with his other addiction. Unemployment teaches lessons, such as getting along without those things you don't really need.
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Will the audio for this program be posted here? I was hoping to download it because I missed the original air-date.
Thanks
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This show made me so sad. I listened to you ask the question over and over again regarding how to continue a healthy relationship with your family when under stress. The three on your show were very fortunate they still have their family. My situation is slightly different. . . . I owned a home under my credit but my fiance was helping me pay the mortgage and day to day bills. Unfortunately I was at the beginning of the cure and the house foreclosed. I did not have the option to "bail out" or "quick sale", my credit is ruined, I lost my job and my relationship of eight years. The grief of loosing a job, a home and a relationship was/is devastating. It all came so abrupt and the family I relied on was gone. I take responsibility for my part. Now I need to rebuild my credit, rebuild my self esteem, and find the strength to move on without my relationship. At times it has been soo difficult. God was the only thing that helps me move on.