Wednesday, January 01, 2014
A moment to reflect...
2014 is shaping up to be an interesting year. After a long
conversation with Scott, I again realized that there is little holding me to
Westchester save my job. My family ties are here, but that's an oblique
way of saying I'm close with my brother, and that's about it. My not
being here wouldn't change that. My mom is another story, with her
recent behavior so atrocious I cannot stand the thought of spending time
with her. My friends are all here, save a few in Miami Beach, but that
was the case when I left in 1994. It's pretty much the same people from
back then, and we're still friends today.
This is a long way of saying that baring any romantic coupling, if and when the job goes, I would follow suit. Note this doesn't mean quitting, getting fired, or getting laid off. That would require too much work on the college's part for the last two, and the first option isn't going to happen under present circumstances. There are other options I could take, but that another post I'll never publish. No, I'm convinced the college will fight a war of attrition, with retirements not being replaced. That wouldn't affect me. The most likely scenario affecting me is the loss of faculty status. I've often wondered about this, and it turns out my suspicions were not far-fetched. Some among the teaching faculty feels counselors are... over-titled. Lest anyone believe this change is impossible, it turns out there's precedence, as the CUNY system changed its counselors into CSEA staff members. What this meant for one's salary, benefits, and vacation is, at the moment, unknown. It's worth investigating. If I were to have my salary slashed in half, and most of my vacation taken away, I would then have carte-blanche to seek greener pastures IF (and only if), I prepare now.
Added to this is the eventuality of the economic system unwinding its leverage and placing the USA in a bitter depression. I say this as academic statement rather than an experiential one; it is true because there are always depressions, booms, busts, and economic flat-lining. This doesn't give the sentence a predictive quality and can be called an empty truism that merely sounds pithy.
To avoid that we need to give the above declaration a timeline. First. we need to define our terms. Where I use the term collapse, Neil Strauss used the term the snap. Both involve the loss of social constraints, and of economic disaster. The problem with both terms is that it implies a bifurcated reality: peace and prosperity in one moment and near civil war and poverty in the next. Even the LA riots were somewhat predicable, if you understood the racial resentment bubbling just below the surface. Really, we both planning for when the systemic problems already present in society affect us personally.
So, the collapse I am expecting is already occurring, but how long until I am personally affected? I venture my guess by harkening back to Chile. As the government to presently constructed, I'll give it two years, maybe three. However, governments do not stay static, unless you live in North Korea. So asking myself the same question, what would be the timeline if the GOP lost the House in November? The answer for me is three years with an outside shot at four, but for my Chilean associates, 18 months. Why the difference? As I work in the public sector, the Democrats running the show would mean more money sent to colleges, but the pain and the crash would be much messier. Community colleges are counter cyclical, so I'd get more business the worse things got. until the system itself crashes. If the GOP took the Senate in 2014, I'll still go with two years, but I wouldn't expect three.
Armed with that timeline (which, importantly, doesn't need to be perfectly accurate; it just needs to motivate me), the next the guiding philosophy I'll take to determine what goals I'll have.
This is a long way of saying that baring any romantic coupling, if and when the job goes, I would follow suit. Note this doesn't mean quitting, getting fired, or getting laid off. That would require too much work on the college's part for the last two, and the first option isn't going to happen under present circumstances. There are other options I could take, but that another post I'll never publish. No, I'm convinced the college will fight a war of attrition, with retirements not being replaced. That wouldn't affect me. The most likely scenario affecting me is the loss of faculty status. I've often wondered about this, and it turns out my suspicions were not far-fetched. Some among the teaching faculty feels counselors are... over-titled. Lest anyone believe this change is impossible, it turns out there's precedence, as the CUNY system changed its counselors into CSEA staff members. What this meant for one's salary, benefits, and vacation is, at the moment, unknown. It's worth investigating. If I were to have my salary slashed in half, and most of my vacation taken away, I would then have carte-blanche to seek greener pastures IF (and only if), I prepare now.
Added to this is the eventuality of the economic system unwinding its leverage and placing the USA in a bitter depression. I say this as academic statement rather than an experiential one; it is true because there are always depressions, booms, busts, and economic flat-lining. This doesn't give the sentence a predictive quality and can be called an empty truism that merely sounds pithy.
To avoid that we need to give the above declaration a timeline. First. we need to define our terms. Where I use the term collapse, Neil Strauss used the term the snap. Both involve the loss of social constraints, and of economic disaster. The problem with both terms is that it implies a bifurcated reality: peace and prosperity in one moment and near civil war and poverty in the next. Even the LA riots were somewhat predicable, if you understood the racial resentment bubbling just below the surface. Really, we both planning for when the systemic problems already present in society affect us personally.
So, the collapse I am expecting is already occurring, but how long until I am personally affected? I venture my guess by harkening back to Chile. As the government to presently constructed, I'll give it two years, maybe three. However, governments do not stay static, unless you live in North Korea. So asking myself the same question, what would be the timeline if the GOP lost the House in November? The answer for me is three years with an outside shot at four, but for my Chilean associates, 18 months. Why the difference? As I work in the public sector, the Democrats running the show would mean more money sent to colleges, but the pain and the crash would be much messier. Community colleges are counter cyclical, so I'd get more business the worse things got. until the system itself crashes. If the GOP took the Senate in 2014, I'll still go with two years, but I wouldn't expect three.
Armed with that timeline (which, importantly, doesn't need to be perfectly accurate; it just needs to motivate me), the next the guiding philosophy I'll take to determine what goals I'll have.
