05-18-2009, 01:34 PM
I feel like I'm pretty lucky right now... I work for a great Transportation Logistics company called Railcar Management. We were bought out a couple years ago by the Carlyle Investment Group. I was worried that things would change for the worse soon after that took place, but everything ran smoothly. My company has 160 employees and I'm the only guy that does internal PC/network support for them. Our VP's had to make an executive decision of whether to slightly cut pay for ALL employees, along w/ 401k matching, bonuses, etc or cut 5 employees. They ended up laying off 5 employees, which isn't bad out of 160 with the current status of our economy. I feel horrible for those that were let go though, as I'm sure they aren't having an easy time right now. I wouldn't say that I'm depressed, but I do think a lot about the future and what would happen if I lost my IT job. I would have to start kicking my butt into overdrive w/ my mask hobby/job until I found something sufficient enough to support my wife and myself. I've always wanted to get into maskmaking fulltime as my job, but it's such a risky business that I've never cared to put my IT career aside to pursue it. I'd be really worried about moving to LA especially, although it would be somewhat like living a dream to me. For now I'm going to keep playing it conservative until things stabilize. I've noticed that mask sales for everyone have pretty much gone way down since the first things people cut during hard times is hobby-related (non-essentials). Sorry to hear that some of you are having hard times right now. I wish everyone the best and hope it picks back up soon enough.=CHAD=