Part 3 of a 3-Part Series on Baby Boomers, New Technology and the Job Market
…one thing alone is clear. We are waiting for Godot to come. Samuel Beckett
Can anyone tell me why I’m waiting in a line again? Anonymous baby boomer
A recent article in the NY Times reported that many people over age 50 are worried they will never find work ever again. This actually shouldn’t be a big surprise for a generation of baby boomers who have had to go to school on double sessions, wait on lines, be on waiting lists for housing and deal with a shortage of jobs ever since getting out of school. Personally I like long lines, they make me feel like something is really worthwhile. I remember standing on a very long line to see the first Star Wars movie. It built anticipation, gave me a heightened sense of worth and made me really appreciate getting inside to the bathroom. I had a very similar reaction to standing on an unemployment line.
Now the same group of people who once wanted to join the Peace Corps and build hospitals in the Belgian Congo are facing the prospect of no more employment for the rest of their years. At the same time, the government is trying to push back the retirement age to save on social security payouts. So what are we all to do? We can’t just stop eating and we have to pay the rent. Some boomers got into trades and craft work and can fall back on those skills to make and sell baskets and beaded items, but the rest of us ended up working at traditional jobs. What can we do to survive these difficult times? I decided to try a variety of alternative jobs to find out. I figured that if I couldn’t get a traditional job, I could still be resourceful enough to find some other type of work. “Far out” idea, huh?
I started my quest by looking for things that were somewhat related to my past work experience. I had done a lot of writing and research, so I answered an ad for product researcher at a major consumer products company. I was hired and given a box of product samples to take home to test and write reports on the results. Did you know they actually pay people to test and research hemorrhoid creams? After just a week I felt that I wasn’t really a good match for this position and moved on.
My next venture was to apply to a manufacturer looking for a furniture tester. How could I not like that? I’m good at sitting and even better at lying down. They thought so too and I was put to work right away. Unfortunately, you don’t get to sit or lie down for very long. I was introduced to an entire warehouse of mattresses and told I had one day to try all of them. This didn’t quite gel with me either. I was thinking more along the line of testing one mattress for several days.
A department store wasn’t hiring regular retail sales help, but they had one opening for an experienced bra fitter. I explained in the interview that I had been married and had lots of experience helping my wife to adjust her bras, both putting them on and taking them off. The interview did not go well so I never really got a chance to try this job out.
Shortly after that experience I applied for a job that I thought would let me put all my marketing and creative skills into play. Generic Mills needed someone to write copy for the outside of cereal boxes. They gave me a box of Captain Crackle and told to enhance it, which I did. They liked my idea of introducing a serialized story about the Captain, and each month the box would have a different episode ending in a cliff-hanger.
It would have worked except that I forgot that no one had to actually buy a new box of cereal to get the story. Since it was printed on the outside it could be read right there on the store shelf. Generic Mills ended my contract after sales went down 87% in two months. They also felt the stories were too dark for the youth audience and that I shouldn’t have introduced a subplot about Captain Crackle’s ex-wife and their battle over ownership of his pirate ship.
New technology has put a lot of us out of work, but it has also created some new jobs. Did you know that you have to regularly clean an Imax screen? Because of their design they get dusty and need regular servicing. A very clever young man started a screen cleaning business to take care of the nearly 2,000 Imax screens in the U.S. and has done very well since he has few competitors. Unfortunately the work itself is also for the young since it involves climbing onto a very tall scaffolding, then wielding a heavy vacuum hose attached to a long pole to reach the highest points of each screen. I just had to stand on the floor and look up to decide this wasn’t for me.
The job I finally ended up with and really enjoy is writing fortunes for fortune cookies. I get to make some people happy with forecasts of wealth and good health, scare some people with warnings about vague future events and even impart little pearls of wisdom about life in general. One of my most popular fortunes has been one I adapted from my grandmother’s favorite saying about how every problem can be fixed by giving someone a “swat upside the head.” It was a little difficult to re-phrase it to suit an Asian style, but it seems to work: “Look to an elder to impart wisdom to you.” I also finally got to learn what all the numbers are on the back of the fortunes, but I was warned not to reveal anything or I would have a representative visit me to impart wisdom about telling secrets .
Here are some other odd and unusual jobs you can try yourself (and they are all real). Get your applications in before the millenials find them first:
odor tester – smell armpits to determine if deodorants are working wrinkle chaser – use a special iron to make sure wrinkles are out of new shoes pet food taster – focus groups for cats and dogs have not worked well so companies use human tasters instead; hey toughen up, if it doesn’t kill your pet it may not kill you either professional sleeper – work with medical staff conducting sleep studies; not to be confused with your Uncle Zeke’s profession for the past 27 years paper towel sniffer – test to make sure that paper towels are odorless; we assume there may similar jobs for other types of paper products coconut safety inspector – ever wonder why visitors to tropical resorts never get bonked on the head even though they have palm trees everywhere? line position holder – stand in a line for someone else for just about any reason, though I tend to think of this in the same category as everyone taking in each other’s wash
Note: In September 2010 the Bureau of Labor Statistics released a detailed survey on the work patterns of baby boomers from 1979 onward. Baby boomers born between 1957 and 1964, the latter years of the boom itself, held an average of 11 jobs between age 18 and 44. The pattern of changing jobs slowed considerably as they grew older. Hourly earnings for boomers grew the fastest during their younger years, from 5.2% to 6.8% per year until their late 20’s, then it slowed down to around 3.5% a year in their 30’s and down even further to 1.4% per year from age 39 to 44. The BLS survey has no details on what percentage of time boomers have had to stand in line to apply for jobs or unemployment benefits.
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