The Construct

A frustrating local job market

Alex @ February 9, 2008 | | Personal, Politics and Society, Work |

It’s February and it’s crunch time for university seniors. Dating and partying takes a back seat. Everyone’s rushing his or her thesis. Laboring day after day, night after night to gather and analyze data. Writing page after page of stuff that one would probably just leave behind after everything has been said and done. And to what result? A diploma. For what? The real world. Yes, the real world where, despite your 14 years of education would turn you to a bum.

Yes. The journey through all those years of toil memorizing stuff like Avogadro’s constant and writing position papers end in a dead end. Just because we live in a country where there aren’t any real jobs to speak of and all the opportunities lie in being answering machines for other people and being shipped off to some distant land to wipe other people’s butts. Definitely not the type of work that your bachelor’s degree in Engineering or Management trained you for.

My former students are still bugging me to workshop their resumes, fervently believing my words that good communication would help them land good jobs. Well, sure, aside from a few other things. But I’m not the type of person who would shatter their dreams by saying that being a crony and a whore would give them much wider access to good positions and shitloads of money. And if they don’t have those connections or aren’t willing to compromise dignity, all the local job market can offer them are bum jobs with bum pay and they would spend everyday behind their desks wondering why those idiot colleagues of theirs got promoted.

It makes me feel that the job market in this country is hell for unconnected smart people. Sleeping your way to the top seems to be more of a strategy than being the first one in and last one out in the workplace. Or maybe I’m just bitter and feeling all Avenue Q. Yes, let’s face it. If you don’t want to work in a call center, English is a useless degree. I often get to thinking what if I just pursued computer science instead. That was what I was good at.

I even have to admit that I’m just finishing my master’s degree just because I don’t want all the time and money I have invested in it to go to waste. I am bored and at wits end. Same professors. Same subject matter. Nothing really new. I only took up English to take up law but my mother messed those plans up real bad. Earning a second degree is way complicated since time isn’t at my side. 24 is the new 40.

I remember back when I was a senior who just finished writing his thesis. While my career plans then was to enter the academe, circumstances (like older faculty not retired or dead yet) forced me to find work elsewhere. I had a tough time looking for one primarily because I swore that I’d never take up work in a call center. I tried applying to a heck of a lot of firms. I had a string of rejections with excuses like I was overqualified for rank and file and underqualified for management. And who said graduating with honors and having a solid skill set were useful?

Now, I am pissed off with the fact that comparing my status now to those of my other batchmates who worked call center jobs or had connections to enter some snazzy firms, they seem to be way better off than I am. Oh sure, I’m teaching at the country’s top university but prestige doesn’t buy you food. Or even a pack of smokes to slowly kill yourself with. I’m even more frustrated with the fact that some people can explore what they want to do all because they have trusts that their wealthy parents gave them while as for myself, all my parents left me is a heck a lot of debt to deal with.

Good thing I have some great opportunities provided for me right now. And that helps me cope with my frustrations with the local job market.

Tags: Education, Politics and Society, Rant, Teaching, Work