More income peaks and valleys today

A new study from the Economic Policy Institute shows that family income has become increasingly volatile in the past 35 years. In other words, we're facing more up-and-down swings than a generation ago.

Researchers Jacob Hacker (professor of political science and resident fellow of the Institution for Social and Policy Studies at Yale University) and Elisabeth Jacobs (a fellow in the Multidisciplinary Program on Inequality & Social Policy at Harvard University) have this to say:

Recent analysis shows that families are facing much greater income swings than they did a generation ago. The Chart plots the increase in average family income volatility, showing various peaks and valleys around an upward trend since the mid-1970s. Over the last three decades, volatility by this measure has doubled.

Most Americans have little in the way of easily tapped wealth to tide them over when their incomes drop. It is on the downward trips of the economic roller coaster that jobs, houses, savings, and other things gained on the way up get lost. No wonder Americans are worried about their economic security.

They also put together this nifty chart, which is a little hard to read in this format. Here's a link to the site, which has magnifying glass icon that allows you zoom in.

I'm really excited to find this volatility documented, because it confirms what I've suspected in talking with friends and neighbors. Everyone seems to have a layoff story, and it rarely comes complete with a happy ending.

After they were laid off, people are getting lower-paying jobs, or the family as a whole is required to spend more hours working. By this, I mean that if one parent was staying home with kids, after they layoff they are forced back into the work force.

This bothers me because I suspect -- but can't yet prove -- that the self-same people who argue for "traditional" American values, like a mother staying home to raise children, would also champion corporate America's freedom to downsize at whim.

The boss who laid off my husband in 2001 was a father of three preschoolers. He liked to joke that he had never changed one of their diapers in his life.

The courtesy of a phone call

Today, Dan got a call from a recruiter who represents a law firm that interviewed him two days ago. The recruiter wanted to tell him that they were no longer considering him for the job. Possibly he's "overqualified." We were elated.

Don't get me wrong, we are long since past thinking "overqualified" is a compliment. It's simply something people say to mask a thousand reasons not to hire someone. It's just that those thousand reasons are all more difficult to say. "We realized that Jim's brother-in-law is a much better fit," perhaps. Or, "we hated your hair." Or, "our third-quarter numbers are in the tank, and we're freezing the hire." Who ever knows what irrationality lurks in the hearts of men? No, we were elated just to emerge from limbo. Overjoyed that someone took the courtesy to call. Because as any job seeker will tell you, much of the time, no matter how positive the interview, you are left to stew and wonder.

I remember when it was not this way. It changed sometime shortly after the turn of the century, or maybe right after Sept. 11 when everyone was hurting for many different reasons. Interviewers used to tell you when they would get back to you, and they pretty much kept their word. Even if it was a difficult call to make -- a "no" instead of a "yes" -- at least you knew.

Career counselors used to avise asking for feedback from employers who rejected you. Then you knew what to brush up on the next time. One time an executive editor told me I didn't seem to want the job enough. I didn't "reach across the desk" and grab him by the lapels. Seriously. Now, it's mostly just silence.

A silence that squeezes your soul like a lemon. I even prefer the lapel comment to silence.

Getting started

I'll never forget the first time my husband lost his job. I was eating a tuna sandwich at a diner near our home -- taking a break from what was at the time my professional occupation, writing freelance stories on my home computer. We knew that his company was downsizing -- we later learned management was preparing it for a sale. We didn't think it would be him. He had steadily increased his department's performance and had the numbers to show for it. Then he showed up at the diner in the middle of the day, and the look on his face said it all.

Our kids were preschoolers, and we were completely unprepared for what would turn out to be 20 months of job search that ended in moving from a neighborhood we loved to a new state.

The fourth time Dan lost his job, we knew what we were doing and went into what I've come to think of as layoff mode. We pulled back on contributions to our retirement and college savings. We took our girls out of expensive gymnastics lessons and signed them up for cost-effective softball. We calculated how long the severance would last (10 months, maybe more if we're careful).

We are in layoff mode as I write this. Job loss can be humiliating, and you might wonder why I would put any of this on the Internet for people to read about my family. My husband and I discussed this project at length before I began. We think that it's important for other layoff families to know that they are not alone. Silence surrounds job loss because people feel ashamed, but I think it might be time we got over that. Corporate America certainly has.

Here's a good story in today's New York Times Style section about how people are afraid to tell their neighbors they've lost their job.

Another reason I'm writing this is because I want to document what seems like a tectonic shift in my lifetime. I remember when companies worried about laying people off because they feared they would not be able to attract new employees. No longer. Any dishonor associated with firing people has all but vanished.

At first, employers displayed regret about the necessary cuts -- probably around the time the term "right-sizing" was coined -- early 1990s? Companies acted as though there was an achievable end to the layoffs, a right size they would arrive at. Now, companies seem to have few qualms about regularly cleaning house.

Finally, I see very little understanding among the uninitiated about what it means to have job loss enter your home. Maybe I haven't looked in the right places. But almost no one is making the connection between job loss and societal problems. I came across an extreme, stupid example from a blogger at a business publication, who ridiculed the idea that a layoff ruined his subject's marriage. (I'll put up the link when I find it.)

Five bucks says this guy is single.