Best Places for if We Relocate? Update! - Page 3

[SunshineJ]

Originally Posted by mammastar2

If the employment situation is poor for him because of the combination of age, disability, and education, would the two of you consider either switching roles or coming up with a 'share,' where each of you works part of the time and cares for the kids part of the time? It seems like a natural to me.

Honestly I really don't think any of this is the case. We just moved from that area within the past 6 months, and were also in the tech field. In the past year, the news reported that companies have announced that within the first HOUR of posting a job they were getting on average 200 applications. Many companies have announced that they are now cutting off resume acceptance for positions after the first THOUSAND are received. As of the first part of last summer they were still posting in the newspaper that the area was losing 5000 jobs per month on average (most of them tech related). Employers are now in the position where they can be exceedingly specific, wait to get what they want exactly in qualifications, and low ball the salary. Most of the people in our crowd were healthy, between the ages of 33 and 40, had at least one degree and up to 16 years direct experience and I know of one person who was able to get a receptionist job at a fraction of his old salary. When we left in August, several of our friends and aquaintences were going on more than 6 months unemployed. Since he's actually finding jobs to apply for it sounds like things are starting to improve a little, but it's been pretty desperate there for a while now.

[mammal_mama]

I think all of dh's interviews have actually been in customer-service jobs -- I'm not sure if he even still tries for IT/tech jobs or not.

[mammal_mama]

Update

I thought I'd let you all know that things are looking up for us, right here in Kansas City! One of my friends has been working at home, for the past couple of years, giving one-on-one training in business English over the phone.

The company she works for did a recruitment last summer -- but I was slow to send in my resume, and by the time I did they'd already finished hiring. Well, two weeks ago my friend let me know they were hiring again, so I got my resume in right away, and I just found out a little while ago that I got the job!

So pretty soon I will be working from home part-time, late at night after my girls go to sleep. The late-night hours are available because of the learners being in different (mostly European) time zones. I'm so excited! I'll be bringing in some money, plus connecting with people from all over the world which will greatly broaden my world.

Dh has had more interviews, but no job as of yet. It sounds pretty definite that he will get the extension he applied for on his unemployment, which just ended at the end of February. We've managed to hang on to some of our tax return, which should tide us over if it takes a while for his unemployment checks to resume.

If he still hasn't found a job by the time the company I am working for does another recruitment (they do them a couple of times a year), he will try to get on with them, too.

[4evermom]

Hope it works out well!

[mammal_mama]

Thank you, 4evermom! I hope so, too!

[arb]

Originally Posted by mammal_mama

Also we will have to check into North Carolina.

Check out Durham, NC. Smaller, cheaper, and more manageable than Raleigh. Plenty of great stuff for kids, including a nice city park system & rec centers, Museum of Life & Science, wonderful Farmer's Market, and more. Progressive politically, racially & economically diverse, and from what I know, homeschooling-friendly.

[Turquesa]

I haven't read all of the posts, but this might help you:

http://money.cnn.com/pf/features/lis..._unemployment/

And this:

http://www.forbes.com/2009/01/05/cit...105cities.html

Good luck!

[dauphinette]

Originally Posted by mammal_mama

I'm kind of wondering about Texas or Louisiana -- I actually heard a while back that Louisiana was doing a lot better employment-wise than some other places. I also wonder about Arizona.

I can say that Baton Rouge/New Orleans are GREAT places to live and NEw Orleans is back better than ever....although it does still have it's issues and I don't know how you handle the idea of crime.
I haven't read the whole thread.