From Folly:
Why Yahoo! and Other Job Information Sites are Full of Crap
Every day, Yahoo! has some story about supposedly secret jobs that you can tap into if you just got your ass off the couch. Today’s story is, “Great Paying Government Jobs.” Among these “great government jobs,” are:
* FBI Special Agent
* Patent Clerk
* Defense Intelligence Agent
* Aerospace Engineer
* ArchaeologistNow, does anyone understand what the requirements are for those positions? You don’t just walk into the FBI or wherever and ask for a job. All require AT LEAST a Bachelor’s degree if not a doctorate. Another article from Yahoo!: “10 Jobs with High Pay and Minimum Schooling.” Among the jobs listed:
* Police Officer
* Funeral Director
* Air Traffic Controller
* Real Estate Broker
* Advertising Sales Agent
I like this one:
Airplane Pilot, Department of Agriculture
There are plenty of openings for pilots across the country. Unfortunately, many of these positions do not pay very well, but if you’re the kind of person who has always wanted to fly, then perhaps the position will make up for the paycheck.
Annual Salary: $46,000 and $67,000
Oh, yeah? What this fails to mention is that Doc Utopia came down so hard on the execs who use private planes that the entire industry very nearly came to a screeching halt last year and thousands of jobs were lost. A means of transportation became elitist and wasteful and unseemly. Some small airports closed.
There are layoffs still and while it’s true that the industry is starting to bounce back, ‘plenty of openings across the country’ could be -like the rest of the story- grossly misleading.
And guess what? More people seem to be working for Uncle Obama than ever before – and getting paid, too.
Forbes recently reported that the government will be hiring 600,000 more employees during the next four years. If that’s not reason enough, USA Today reported that the number of government employees earning six-figure salaries has increased too. So, get your resume ready!
Unemployment seems to be soaring… except in government.
8. February 2010 at 10:56 am
I was almost an astronaut, except I didn’t like what those helmets did to my hair, it was horrid.
Once I worked at an Old People Storage Facility, in the Most Boring Job EVAH, and a friend in Florida would call every day when he knew I was at lunch, announce himself to the answering fill-in as being in HR at NASA, and to tell me the (constantly different) message and status of my “upcoming employment background check.”
People actually began to be nice to me, it was freaky. I was celebrity by (faux) potential.
That being said, I’d like to be a funeral director unless people are gonna cry on me. I don’t care for that.
8. February 2010 at 11:03 am
You are *too* much and I just love that about you!
8. February 2010 at 11:55 am
DOJ Civil Rights Division is looking to hire attorneys with targeted disabilities – now some of those disabilities are understandable – missing limbs, blindness, paralysis of varying degrees – but included in the list are mental retardation and mental illness. Some would argue that all attorneys are in possession of these traits. I, for one, am disturbed that any attorney would be in possession of these traits (the later, not the former) – but am puzzled? that DOJ would be looking in particular to hire mentally ill attorneys? I guess jobs are jobs…
This is for real, btw, I looked it up myself this morning. Right there on the website http://www.justice.gov/crt/recruit.php
8. February 2010 at 12:08 pm
EEOC at work.
8. February 2010 at 8:02 pm
Most attorneys fit that description. Except the ones who are drunks or drug addicts. I say that as a member of the profession.
9. February 2010 at 8:11 am
8. February 2010 at 12:25 pm
I read all those “what you should/shouldn’t do in interview/resumes/etc’ articles for a good laugh.
I mean the things they tell you are so common sense it’s a wonder that they would think the average person wouldn’t know this stuff.
I look at the goberment websites all the time, tons of jobs they are hiring for but nothing I could even remotely be qualified for.
8. February 2010 at 1:36 pm
Fine and dandy if you’re already a qualified whatever, otherwise it’s a joke. For the job sites to pimp careers like archeologist for the common out of work individual is ludicrous.
8. February 2010 at 1:17 pm
We could all apply for census jobs
8. February 2010 at 1:37 pm
Heh… I think you have to be a member of ACORN to be hired, though…
8. February 2010 at 1:24 pm
I get the AOPA (Airplane Owners and Pilots Association) eBrief almost every day – that attack on the 3 auto execs cost several hundred thousand jobs and almost made Wichita Kansas look like Detroit – There have been many entire companies closed due to those attacks alone, they killed the industry overnight.
The flight school I hang out at had over a 50% drop in business in less than a month after that lashing. That was a very careless attack by the government and Obama Marketing Media (formerly the news industry).
These people do not think before they open their mouths and program the people out there… As an example: During my last visit to my Mother the week before Christmas, this exact subject came up and my Mother got very upset and took up the defense that the government was correct in what they did and the execs deserved it… She is a big drinker of the Kool Aid, she lives in Chicago. I stood up, put on my jacket as she turned white and asked ‘are you leaving?’, and I said ‘yes’.
I almost made that the last time my 82 year old mother would ever see me, when it hit me this is what our dear leader wants, to have total control over everyone and everything with no regard for the consequences. I sat down and finished the visit and made another before the trip was over.
Before those words you were able to get a right seat with under 500 hours flight time, there was a gig need – now, they are laying off since so many people are unemployed, businesses close that there are that many customers – inside the airports I see almost 50% less people then I did just over a year ago – The flight I took here has been 100% full since 2000, this was the first flight that had over 20 seats empty on both flights.
There have been thousands of airline pilots laid off so there are currently no job openings until they are returned to work – remember they are Union.
I was reading somewhere last month that government jobs have now surpassed private jobs. This to me indicates we are in very deep shit – since government jobs pay more then private jobs, where is their pay coming from? We cannot support our government without huge foreign trade – and if they stopped trading with us, we will look like Haiti’s economy almost overnight.
8. February 2010 at 1:48 pm
Thanks for your input, darling.
8. February 2010 at 3:26 pm
yes, I got carried away again -
8. February 2010 at 4:33 pm
I never put much stock into these job opening announcements. They almost invariably sound too good to be true, and they always are. If they’re not outright scams, they are very misleading at the very least. Or you need credentials that few have.
8. February 2010 at 4:39 pm
Yes, exactly. The fact that TheStreet.com was cheeky enough to publish an article like that shows how out of touch Wall Street -or just some minions- are with the rest of America.
8. February 2010 at 6:31 pm
Police Officers have high pay? Must pick jaw off floor now.
Oh sure, some big cities have high pay for bluesuits, cities where a cup of coffee in a cheap diner is three bucks and if you had to buy a house, if you piled up that money in five dollar bills you couldn’t, the satellites would run into the pile, crash and destroy cell phone and TV reception.
Funny, though, the higher the pay in that line of work, the worse the working conditions. I never understood wanting to work where you needed a kevlar jockstrap to go with the vest… that may be why I stayed in the country.
As for FBI Special Agent, well a lot of street cops would apply for the job but don’t want to have the lobotomy.
8. February 2010 at 8:04 pm
Thanks for the props. I read Yahoo! purely for entertainment.