Job cuts for the advertising industry during this recent recession topped 65,000 after December. That’s 65,000 families (give or take) living off pension or unemployment and completely unsure about the industry’s future, let alone their own. That’s 65,000 people who within a few months could be struggling to pay mortgages, put their kids through college, and eventually put food on the table for every dinner.
The scariest thing is, that 65,000 is only a sliver of the job loss pie decimating the American workforce this year. Almost three million are living the same nightmare—and sometimes I start to disbelieve how someone like me has survived when so many good people are being left without any options.
For the moment, I’m grateful and willing to fight for my place away from the unemployment line; but if and when the time comes when even my characteristically safe agency buckles under the pressure of collapsed ad budget and I lose my job, I’m not sure how I’m going to handle it.
3 years ago