There's an episode from the classic 1960's TV show, "The Twilight Zone," about aliens who come to Earth to "recruit" volunteers for the home planet. The extra-terrestrial tourists bring a gift for mankind - some kind of book called "To Serve Man." They find willing and able Earthlings and are ready to depart. By the end of the show, one of the humans has figured it out and tries to stop his friends from leaving Earth. He warns them not to go, because "To Serve Man" is a cookbook.

The globalization of the American economy seems a bit like that. The words "downsizing," "re-engineering," "restructuring," "rightsizing," "temporary employment," and "employee leasing" are becoming common these days. There's a revolution going on in the business world. Corporations have to be lean and mean to be competitive. The Information Age is upon us, and technology is driving these changes.

These ideas made sense to me until the day I was laid off. On May 19, 1995, my job and 35 others at Minnesota Public Radio were eliminated in a cost-cutting measure, and my life was forever changed. Until that day, I hadn't paid much attention to work issues, because there were other, more appealing stories to work on. And, because I worked on many research projects simultaneously, I didn't spend much time on any one issue. We had NEWS to deliver! I was always busy, always learning something new. However, in the last year, I've learned new lessons about real life, about compassion, and about the human costs of downsizing. It's been the biggest slice of humble pie I've ever been served up.

And in the Twilight Zone of unemployment, I realized that the new work economy.... is a COOKBOOK! Something fundamentally critical is happening here, and we've got to pay attention. The first lesson came when I realized that finding a new job wasn't as simple as I thought it would be. I had arrogantly assumed that coming from a company with a good reputation meant that I would be ahead of the competition. "I don't have to worry - -I'll be snapped up immediately," I thought. After a few weeks of interviewing for jobs that wouldn't pay a livable wage, I realized a simple truth: It's a buyer's market out there. Middle management has been cut out of the American corporations, and there are many gifted and talented people competing for fewer high level and/or high-paying jobs. It doesn't matter where you've been working - employers want to know if you can do their job and do it well at the cheapest possible price, with the fewest benefits. And I soon found I wasn't alone.

In the Twin Cities, there are many excellent job support groups that meet weekly at various local churches. In many, whenever a job seeker gets re-employed, s/he brings the good news to the group, and shares job-hunting strategies and cookies with the others. These are called, "Cookie Testimonials" and it's always heartening to see batches of cookies at the meetings because it means that you will hear something positive.

In November, at a job support group in a St. Paul suburb, I heard an eloquent testimonial from a middle-aged man who described his 10 1/2 month job search. He did everything he could to stay competitive, including dyeing his graying hair black and losing weight. He kept sending out resumes, and knocking on doors, networking until, finally, he found his dream job. It was an inspirational story. The next week, I noticed that several other middle-aged men had jet-black hair. It was the first time I really thought about "ageism" in America. It's one thing to read about an issue, it's another to meet people who are living it.

About five weeks later, at another job support group in a Minneapolis suburb, I saw this same man. "What happened?" I quietly asked some friends. He had lost that dream job when his new company started downsizing during the Christmas holidays.

In job support groups, the unemployed are always reminded about the importance of keeping a positive mental attitude during the stressful months/years of unemployment. These support groups have tremendous value, because it's where jobseekers can truly unleash negative feelings to each other, privately - the fears of never working again, of not being able to keep afloat financially, the fears of losing homes and families-everything that gave a sense of stability to the past. I've met people who were struggling to make mortgage payments, people who have lost their spouses because the job loss was the final stress that broke their marriages apart, and people who, desperate for money to live on, cashed in their hard-earned 401K's (pension funds). Job support groups are places where people can go to claim ownership of their feelings of stark terror at the economic quicksand enveloping their lives.

While the unemployed face one kind of stress, their families and friends face a different kind. Loved ones try to understand why it's taking so long for their jobseekers to "get his/her acts together" and start working again. Why can't they pull themselves up by their bootstraps - It's the American way, isn't it? When the going gets tough, the tough get going, don't they?

Family and friends try to be supportive by telling their loved ones that "Everything is going to be all right" "You just have to try harder!" or asking "Have you tried hard enough?" "What's holding you back?" There's a certain amount of shame in not being able to hold on to one's piece of the American Dream. It's hard to talk about feelings about work and self-worth (and the lack thereof) to those who have not experienced a layoff or firing. After all, we used to be so competent in our jobs, so strong, and the next thing we know, we are no longer wanted, and are shown out the front door, holding boxes containing the personal items we had proudly displayed on our desks.

During the jobhunt, it's as though we are living in a different time zone from the rest of the world - we respond promptly to want ads, yet employers take their time to get back to us to let us know if we got the interview or the job offer. God forbid we should be a second late to the interview itself. We're desperate - we need results NOW. Sometimes, we never hear from companies again. It's as though we are as disposable as an icon in the Windows '95 desktop. There are hundreds of books on jobhunting; yet the there are no set rules. Sometimes one's resume or informational interview has an impact; sometimes it doesn't.

If we try to break into a new field, we may not have enough experience, or perhaps our computer skills are under the weather. We realize that there are 20-year-olds who are more computer literate than we are, and willing to accept less than we are in salary. Suddenly, we're living in middle-aged bodies, and feeling as though we, too, have to start over like we did when we were 20. Where do we fit into our lives? How do we learn to re-invent ourselves?

We begin to make Big Connections between our loss and the larger world. Suddenly, Pat Buchanan soars to popularity, and it's not hard to understand why - he's the only Presidential candidate who was willing to talk about the economy. The significance of Seattle's grass-roots "Simplicity Movement" becomes clear - Americans have long had too many material possessions, and we have to give up some of our former lifestyles because we can't afford to keep buying material possessions when our incomes can't keep up with our desires. Monthly news stories include reports about retail sales figures dropping, and there are definite connections between the corporate restructuring and Americans' unwillingness to spend money.

We can't help but ponder the ways in which we spent our money and consumed resources in the past. The phrase "Buy American" has new meaning, as we take a good, hard look at the items we own. Where does our clothing come from? Did an underpaid woman in the Third World make the clothes we're wearing? Suddenly the personal becomes political, as we re-examine our spending priorities and think about where our dollars actually go. We begin to pay more attention to issues like minimum wage, livable wage, affirmative action, ageism, sexism, and, particularly, executive compensation.

Corporate executives are not hurting over their decisions to lay off thousands at a time. They are considered heroes because they "saved" their company and made it more competitive. Meanwhile, the unemployed are left wondering where their lives are headed, while the "survivors" of the layoffs deal with the guilt of having been left behind to deal with the low morale and stress of trying to cope with an increased workload, worrying and wondering if they are next in the coming round of layoffs.

Official statistics are deceptive. One is only considered "unemployed" while one collects unemployment insurance. What about those who still haven't found jobs after six months. We're no longer counted by the U.S. Government. We're invisible. Everything seems fine on the surface, yet there's something murky underneath that we don't want to see. All of a sudden the poor don't seem that different from us.

Our lives become simplicity itself as we curtail our spending and try to make do. Small rituals take on big meaning because we have no feeling of control over when or where we'll be employed again.

Last summer, I went to the grocery store every week, excited about my latest discovery, a particular brand of delicious, fat-free brownies. Unfortunately, the next week every other housewife in my neighborhood had discovered the same brand of brownies, and the shelves were empty on the day I had decided to do my shopping. Infuriated, I decided to speak with the store manager. Where the hell were those brownies, and why couldn't they keep the shelves stocked?

I marched through the store, and suddenly stopped in my tracks. My God, what was happening to me? A few weeks before I had been Teresa the News Researcher, able to come up with any facts and figures needed, mentor to young interns, friend to any who needed a research question in a hurry. And here I was in the local supermarket, Teresa the Reluctant Suburban Housewife, angry about brownies, wearing a shirt I had worn for three days straight. It was one of my most pathetic moments. I laughed and went home. At least I still had a sense of humor.

Yes, the lessons I've learned are ones I couldn't have learned any other way but by hard life experience. There's a revolution going on in the work world, and it's time we sit up and pay attention. The global economy will never be just another news story to me again. It's a Cookbook.

April 24, 1996

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