Unemployment Affecting “Health, Heart, Head, and Hand”
At a panel hosted by Half in Ten and the National Unemployment Law Project, Paula Stein provided an unemployed worker’s perspective on the current unemployment crisis.
After sharing her story, Paula noted the need for Congress to take action to help workers like her, saying ” Losing your job is devastating enough, especially when unprepared; but having the newspaper, television, radio and everyone you talk to tell you how much the economy is in trouble is very depressing and overwhelming. I know for myself, I am trying to do the very best I can with the little I have. Something has to give somewhere or there will be far more foreclosures, more lay-offs, more crime, more illness, more deaths and less faith, less compassion, less quality of life. Our economy doesn’t just affect people’s pocketbooks; it affects their very essence of being an independent whole person. It affects health, heart, head and hand.”
Read Paula’s full testimony:
My name is Paula Stein, and I live in Manakin Sabot, Virginia, right outside of Richmond. I never thought I would be someone who needed unemployment benefits, let alone extended unemployment benefits, but here I am, representing over ten million unemployed workers who can’t find a job no matter how hard they try, as well as all the people who can‘t claim unemployment benefits because they are self-employed. I hope that by being here today, and sharing my story, I can help to put a face to the struggles going on throughout the country and encourage our elected representatives to do everything in their power to help us get through this tough time and come out stronger on the other end.
At 58 years old, I had the perfect job for me. After 30 years working for IBM, I found a job working for a land-development company at Lake Anna, VA, where I was an Administrative Assistant and Office Manager. I thought this would be my final job before I retired. I loved this position — it allowed me to utilize all my skills plus my biggest love – creativity. I felt very lucky to have a job that I really enjoyed getting up every morning and going to.
But on October 11, 2007 that all changed and I have been on a downward spiral ever since. I was angry, thoroughly depressed and spent weeks in tears. I own a home in Goochland County with a friend of mine, but because of my job loss, we came close to losing our home. I received unemployment until May 2008, and then got the additional 13 weeks after the first extension, but that money ran out in the first week of October. My friend, who had a part-time job with the promise of full time employment in the future, lost her job last week due to budget cuts. She has applied for unemployment but we don’t yet know how much, if anything, she’ll receive.
Even when I was getting unemployment and my friend was working, we still couldn’t pay all our bills, and we do not live an extravagant life. Like so many others, we started juggling our bills. We had to miss a few mortgage payments to make sure our electricity wasn’t shut off, to pay for our car, which we need in order to get to and look for work, and to buy food. We cancelled a cell phone to pay for our land line, and are juggling several credit cards, paying those that we can in any given month, and getting to other cards and bills the next month. When our bank threatened to foreclose on our home in two weeks if we didn’t pay the months we missed, we stopped paying our other bills to make at least one month’s mortgage payment, but now all our other debtors are screaming for their money. In addition to facing foreclosure, we’ve had a judgment placed on us from one of our credit cards, and now the companies we were working with regarding small payments have turned us over to collection attorneys. We still face late fees, over-limit fees, and constantly compounding interest.
On a more personal level, we cannot afford prescription medications we should be taking for conditions such as high blood pressure and arthritis. Because of an outstanding balance of $138 on my mail-order prescription account, the service will not send us our medications, no matter how many of our doctors call them, telling them how badly we need the medications. And the weekly trip to the supermarket is an exercise in denial. How can you make a choice between necessities such as milk, eggs, bread, toothpaste and deodorant? Yet those are the choices we make every week . . . things we thought were necessities now become luxuries, and the mere act of opening the door to an empty refrigerator or medicine cabinet is painfully dehumanizing.
We have tried every charitable and government organization we could find for assistance and the only one that said they would help was Catholic Charities. We filled out 4 inches of paperwork, drove the paperwork to their office, but that was only to find out that they couldn’t help us either because they had run out of money.
We were finally able to borrow some money from friends and were able to avoid losing our home for the time being, but with my unemployment out and my friend also out of work, I know that we’re going to be back in the same situation very soon.
I’ve been looking for a job ever since I lost mine. Trust me, I am not sitting home and enjoying the life of leisure while collecting unemployment. In addition to the unemployment benefits not being enough to support myself, I also WANT to work. I have applied for every job I could find and within a fairly wide distance from my home. I am not looking only within specific industries, but for everything I am even remotely qualified, or over-qualified, for. But there is nothing. For every job I apply, too many others apply; one company recently setting up shop in Richmond VA had over 5,000 applicants. And for so long, just the cost of driving to interviews was crippling. I am thankful that gas prices are finally dropping, but worry that they’ll rise again, which makes it harder for me to consider even taking a job far away from home, but at this point, I’m willing to consider almost anything.
Losing your job is devastating enough, especially when unprepared; but having the newspaper, television, radio and everyone you talk to tell you how much the economy is in trouble is very depressing and overwhelming. I know for myself, I am trying to do the very best I can with the little I have. Something has to give somewhere or there will be far more foreclosures, more lay- offs, more crime, more illness, more deaths and less faith, less compassion, less quality of life. Our economy doesn’t just affect people’s pocketbooks; it affects their very essence of being an independent whole person. It affects health, heart, head and hand.
After the election, everyone seems very optimistic about “change.” I hear it everywhere, and to be honest, I wish I could share the optimism. I have been down for so long, with no relief, and it is hard to think positively anymore. But I force myself to share in the hope for a better day.
On behalf of all unemployed workers who are struggling to just get by, I ask our elected leaders at all levels to make human needs their first priority. The Congress has to extend unemployment benefits as quickly as possible for as long as possible. Those hoping for extended unemployment can‘t even begin to think for today, there is too much catch-up first. Winter is coming, and in certain parts of the country, is already here. The holiday season is going to be bleak enough even with an extension of benefits – imagine how bad it will be if Congress fails to act quickly.
Congress and the new administration also need to find solutions to this economic crisis, and ones that impact the lives of every-day people like me. Our representatives need to figure out ways to create new jobs; to keep good jobs in this country; and to fix our unemployment system so that as many unemployed workers as possible get the support they need while they are looking for a new job. They were elected to serve the people of the United States and in my lifetime, we’ve never needed you more.
