Recession/depression...blues.. You?

[🪦 Jason-V ●]

So i was just wondering, with the dwindling economy and all. How has it affected all of you? For me, metal fabrication had dropped. No structual steel or general fabrication is being produced, we have some work however not alot. Im laid off every other 3 weeks or so for a week, which isnt bad but not good. Im trying to get on with a huge construction company currently workin or rebuilding a steam power plant locally. We really only buy the neccessitys for the family now,cant drop 100$ on a mask really right now.. Theres actually money to be made if people would turn things loose. However no one wonts to spend cash on projects if there is no future..So how is it affected you guys?Mike

[🪦 Homicidal#9 ●]

I managed to get really lucky this year. I am a teacher, as most of you know, and our school system announced 800 job cuts for this upcoming school year. My principal really stepped up and fought for me to keep me on next year. Every other new teacher and non-tenured teacher got let go except for me. My wife had the exact same thing happen to her as well. We are just being really careful right now, since no one know how much worse it may get before it gets better.take care,Tommy

[🪦 DrenTheLiar ●]

I work in electrical distribution and are sales are down but we are still quite steady thankfully.

[🪦 SirMWK ●]

My masks aren't selling.

[🪦 mpetrie ●]

I work as a Welfare Case Manager for the State of Utah during my weekdays so my job gets busier and busier when a bad economy hits. Unfortunately, I'm paid hourly instead of on a case by case basis. I've stopped my glove sales due to recent health issues and also due to having too many orders from earlier in the year that I haven't caught up on. I think I was working too hard and I drove myself into sickness and that has hampered my ability/energy to get gloves out in a faster fashion. Hopefully I can open up once again because I still get a lot of emails from people wanting to buy gloves.

[🪦 The Death Curse ●]

All of this sounds awful. I hope everyone's bad situations get better as soon as humanly possible...I know so many people who are having a rough time right now that it's really getting to me on a daily basis. I personally work with customer inquiries all day long and I have heard real horror stories from some customers that have made me feel lucky to be alive and in my current situation, but also depressed me all to hell on many occasions..In terms of my money, I don't have much extra cash to waste on replicas and props nowadays due to my car and insurance payments that I have to pay consistently for at least 2 more years...but I still manage to buy some cheaper things here and there. Then I look at things like that new Jim Kagel SPFX mask design and just CRY because I know I'll NEVER be able to afford one without making a very bad financial decision for me. haha! Still, I know that's okay as long as I'm making enough money to support myself and pay the bills...Cheers,Ryan

[🪦 booman101 ●]

Great topic and yes I am depressed. I live and work about 5 minutes from Louisville KY. I thought everything was fairly stable with our economy being close to a city and all but Friday at work I had to tell 170+ employees at the Psych hospital I work at that their pay was going to go from $14.50 an hour to just $11. It was a horrible day. We were told that no raises would be passed out this year. It's just crazy. Even working in the medical field which is generally thought of as secure we are really starting to feel the effects. I just hope things turn around and soon...

[🪦 Mutilated ●]

Well, my mom lost her job back in December, her unemployment is running out, our savings are almost gone, our house is in fore closer and we have to move back in with my grandparents soon. There isn't any jobs where I live, they're shutting down a good majority of our shops here, our steel mill is shut down, so pretty much you live here in Cleveland you're screwed.

[🪦 Deadguy71 ●]

Kyle, good luck man.. that really sucks.The two companies I work for have recently begun picking up more work (one is a metal fab company). Everyone's been closing up shop around us and so we went and got extra salespeople. The idea being that whatever's left of the dwindling local market is ours, even if we're stuck losing a little bit of money. It's better to lose money on a job than literally have no money circulating.. it at least offsets the paychecks and overhead. It's working for us though.. we're recovering, and seeing more money moving. Our "area" was from mid-to-lower Florida, but now we've got stuff in Alabama and Virginia. I guess our lower pricing is helping other folks too. We're taking a bit of a hit, but every now and then, we get a project that makes enough extra money to cover it.My gf on the other hand, lost her job awhile back and the dried up market has got her back in school now (medical field) She's was supposed to be getting unemployment, which should have paid the bills, but her old boss contested the claim. We're still waiting on that, she managed to network her way into another job, but there's still another 2 weeks until her first payday. Without her income, I'm paying for all kinds of stuff, that I really can't afford. Sucks with her diabetes and asthma, etc.. it's a lot of medicine, plus her daughter living with us (on our couch). I had to take the big nasty stance, stating that if she didn't have a job by the weekend, she neded to go EVERYWHERE to look for a job.. not just picking favorites. It's the same as at my work... Get SOME money moving, even in an undesirable part time job, and we can keep things together long enough for a better job to come along. I was going to take a few days off work and escort her on her job hunt. It's not cool, but it was coming to a point where I was going to stop being able to get gas in my tank, which would mean moving into my workplace, or lose my job entirely. I CAN move in there, but I couldn't bring her and her daughter. Any way you look at it, the end of the road was looming, and we had to take steps.Thankfully the landlord has been cool about taking partial payments and stuff. We also rely on Amscot a lot.. Borrow $300, then return it and borrow again immediately afterwards. Slowly we're working our way back, and with her income starting up in a couple of weeks, we'll probably be alright. It was a pretty close call though. Everything worth pawning, was pawned and lost already. It sucks, when there's no money I just wanna' hibernate. I come home from work and just want the day to end. There's just no energy anymore, and part of me is rationalizing that if I'm asleep I won't have to think about anything. Time will cure these wounds in the long run. I just eat my raman noodles for dinner, make a peanuit butter jelly sandwich for lunch, sleep, skip breakfast, go to work, come home and want sleep.I can't even imagine what happens if I lose my job. I don't think it's in immanent danger, but I don't think it's completely safe either. I was already living paycheck to paycheck before the recession started. Upon news of her new job, we splurged and went to McDonalds for the first time since November. Placed our orders, and discovered that our only bank account was in the negative again. What do you do? you know? You laugh, and tell the cashier you'll be back in like 10 minutes with the cash. Drive home in silence, and make-up some sandwiches.. play the avoidance game, and just rattle-on about how happy we are that she's working again and how it's gonna' fix everything.. Rather than admit that you're broke and angrily point fingers, claiming we're broke again because she took her daughter to get new shoes and downplayed how much they actually cost. She needed the shoes, how you gonna' say "no" to her, especially on her birthday, no less. Just gotta' hold on, brainstorm ways to get some extra money into play.. lower your expectations, and hibernate.

[🪦 WarLocK ●]

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=