Taking bets whether difficult child is now unemployed or not!

[Lil]

What I was told tonight is, he's still employed at that company, but he isn't working on that contract - that is to say, the building he was working. They are going to put him on another contract - different building. But he hasn't been put there yet. Not told he's fired, not given any work.

 

[BusynMember]

My son-in-law was hired under contract for IT work. It wasn't very stable. He was on/off and got no benefits for it either. He finally got a job where he was an actual employee and now he has a steady paycheck. Beats the heck out of waiting with no money in between work. Not criticizing your son, just saying...maybe a lower paying steady job will end up more fruitful than one that can't be counted on. That's what my son-in-law has decided anyway.

 

[Lil]

Not criticizing your son, just saying...maybe a lower paying steady job will end up more fruitful than one that can't be counted on.

Criticize away.

I get the impression this occurred because he called in sick and the supervisor in the building he was working in wanted to fire him, so he asked to be put on another contract.

 

[dstc_99]

Having worked contracts that is what we did when we had employees who didn't perform. They stayed employeed they just never got any work. This way we were protected from firing them and having to pay unemployment. Technically they were hired we just conveniently had no work for them.

 

[BusynMember]

Isn't it illegal to fire somebody for an illness? Maybe he kept calling in. I know companies do all sorts of things to avoid unemployment. However, your son hasn't been there long enough to even qualify for unemployment...so....who knows? He may be playing with you, Lil, and jot be on contract at all. I possibly suspect he may have just not gone and is totally unemployed.

That's how it goes sometimes with these types of young adults.

 

[Lil]

Well he still has his uniform shirts, so he hasn't had to turn them in, which I think they'd require for his last paycheck. I know because he was wearing one last night. I guess that's easier than doing laundry.

He said he called in with his back hurting. This is why I hesitate to have him get any serious psychological evaluation. He is told he has moderate scoliosis and golly gee...he has pain and can't work. Let him be told he has Aspergers or some other problem and he'll have something else to blame. Not overcome, not work around, blame. It's what he does.

So he called in and his supervisor (the one he thought fired him before but hadn't) had said something about "Do you want a job or not?" and he told her he couldn't come in. The next day he called the main office and they said they'd find him another contract....not under her.

I don't know. I don't particularly care. He needs to just find another job. If that one starts scheduling him again, he can work two! See how easy that is?

 

[BusynMember]

Can't help but laugh, LIl, although it's not funny, but it does make me wonder about our young adult kids because of another experience I had about ten years ago. Now, remember, that makes me 51. I was volunteering at the humane society and there were a bunch of other workers (paid) AND volunteers (many doing Community Service) and all were no older than 21 tops.

I was helping in the cat room.

Honestly, ALL of the kids, every single one, had back aches and couldn't reach up or down to clean the cat cages. NONE OF THEM because of their aches and pains and arthritis and rheumatism (getting a little silly here), but all of them were too sick to do any work. Guess who climbed the cat cages and went down low and did all of them? Right. Me. And I do have a sciatica that's sore and have for years and years and that day I remember taking Tylenol for a headache.

I really believe our young are in trouble. They are either so out of shape they can't do what 50 year olds can do with relative ease or they can not deal with pain at all (it incapacitates them).

I remember coming home from the Humane Society and laughing about it with my husband.

Lil, I don't know about you, but I don't miss work unless I'm being restrained in the hospital for trying to get to work. I have to have a fever of 104 or be vomiting so much I can't get off the floor. This new generation isn't like that. They cough a few times and call in sick. I notice that where I work now too. The few of us who are older are always there. The younger ones are forever getting migraines (real or fake?), backaches, sore arms, sore legs, sore throats...the older the employee, the better the attendance. The ones who complain the most about aches and pains are 20-30 years old. It's sad.

 

[SeekingStrength]

I remember retrieving the mail, and seeing difficult child had an unemployment check. He was 19yo and perfectly healthy. He was beating the system. Living at home, being totally obnoxious, not lifting a finger, and collecting a check for it. I came into the house, pretty upset (okay, LIVID), to give him a lecture about .....being 19, able bodied, and NOT who unemployment was meant for. I was embarrassed to have raised such a human.

Guess how much impact that speech had.

These were some of our darkest days with him. Trying to get him out of the house with the police saying we had no recourse. Unless he physically hurts one of you, this is his address. If we tried to get grown kids out of the house every time parents complained, that is all we would be doing.

Meaning, we were stuck with a leech until he finally moved on and we could change the locks. That was ONE of the worst periods.(there have been others, and some worse).

difficult child liked/loved not working. Granted, when he was earning money for his first car, he had incentive and did work 11 months at a grocery store. After he had the car, nope.

I have more stories, but you may have heard a lot of them.

 

[SeekingStrength]

hmmmm, that is interesting. Each time I typed difficult child, it changed it to "difficult child".

 

[Lil]

Lil, I don't know about you, but I don't miss work unless I'm being restrained in the hospital for trying to get to work.

I can't say I've never called in just because I was exhausted or upset or just kind of icky feeling and didn't want to go, but I've worked this job for over 20 years, I'm salaried, I work overtime for free if I get behind, and I try really hard to not inconvenience my co-workers by my absence. If I miss work, most of work is not done by others, but is still there when I get back.

If I were paid by the hour and didn't have paid sick leave and vacation, I'd work if I were practically on my deathbed!

As it is, I had a cardiac cath a few years ago following a weekend in the hospital after a abnormal stress test. I'm laying on the table, the doctor has the thingy up my artery, says, "Everything looks good! You don't have any blockage at all."

My response was, "So can I go back to work?" (I couldn't, of course, positive or negative, I still had a hole in my artery.)