Idaho StatesmanTyler Chorn fills out unemployment forms Friday at the Idaho Department of Labor while his wife, Pidor, and his 2-year-old daughter, April, wait. Chorn was laid off Friday morning from his job as a machine operator at Micron Technology. He started working at Micron in 1991.People come to an unemployment office looking for a job that will bring hope. But they don't always find one.
The Idaho Statesman
BY BILL ROBERTS - broberts@idahostatesman.com
Published: 03/07/09
Tyler Chorn got the bad news Friday. His job as a chip maker at Micron Technology was gone.
By 10 a.m. he was at Boise's Idaho Department of Labor office filling out paperwork for benefits.
"I may go to school (or) try to look for a job," said Chorn, 43, who came to this country from Cambodia in the 1980s and has a wife and toddler. "There is a job out there."
Chorn is among the faces of Idaho's increasing jobless.
The February unemployment rate for the state hit a 21-year high of 6.8 percent, two-tenths of a percentage point higher than January. In the Boise-Nampa area, unemployment leaped six-tenths of a percentage point to 7.7 percent, coming close to the national rate of 8.1 percent.
The total number of jobless Idahoans broke through the 50,000 mark for the first time in February to 51,000. That doesn't include 2,000 Micron layoffs planned by August that the company announced late last month.
But the state's unemployment rate has yet to exceed 9.4 percent reached during the recession in 1982-83 - the highest level in the past 30 years.
Economists expect joblessness will continue to rise nationally for the rest of the year and into early 2010, with the unemployment rate reaching 9 to 10 percent before it turns around. But even then, with so many job losses centered in manufacturing, economists say many positions will not be coming back.
That's not good news for Boisean James Rowan, 60, a machinist who was laid off from his job in the electronics industry Monday along with nearly 40 other employees.
His job paid between $10 and $11 an hour. But jobs with similar skills on the Department of Labor's Web site are paying $8 to $10, he said. He needs the additional money to help support his wife, who cannot work.
Even those lower-paying jobs can be hard to get because Rowan is competing with people less than half his age.
"There are a lot of things they can do I can't do anymore," he said.
Meanwhile, his resources will last only a few weeks - except for a military pension he earned after serving as a medic.
His $214 a week unemployment check helps. But he bought a car last fall, shortly before the economy tanked. And he's got bills to pay.
If he can't find a job, he said, "I'm going to be in serious trouble."
Monique Huelker, 54, of Boise, has already had to make cuts in her life. Her full-time job with a nonprofit group was reduced to part time in November.
She not only lost part of her salary, but also health care benefits for her ailments that include rheumatoid arthritis.
At home on a recent chilly Boise evening, she didn't turn her heat up above 50 degrees. She bundled up in a coat because her monthly utility bill had more than doubled from $75 to $155.
Huelker, like Rowan, comes to the employment office several days each week looking for a full-time job with health benefits.
But she's discovered there are some things she needs to learn first. She's not up-to-date on all the computer programs for a job as a clerk or secretary, she said.
And she's not familiar with networking - finding a job by getting your name in circulation or going through friends or acquaintances.
She tried, when a friend lined her up with a job prospect. But the company got 400 applications and she never learned that she hadn't made the cut until she called.
"I want to do more," she said.
Chorn, the laid-off Micron worker, had known he might be cut. He has saved a bit of money. But he also thinks his wife may have to get a job to help out.
If he's forced to take an economic step backward, he's prepared to do it. He has a perspective many Americans don't: His family fled Cambodia in the 1970s to escape the murderous Khmer Rouge, led by Pol Pot and responsible for hundreds of thousands of deaths.
"That was worse," he said. "This is OK. I've been here before."
The New York Times contributed.
The Idaho Statesman
BY BILL ROBERTS - broberts@idahostatesman.com
Published: 03/07/09
Tyler Chorn got the bad news Friday. His job as a chip maker at Micron Technology was gone.
By 10 a.m. he was at Boise's Idaho Department of Labor office filling out paperwork for benefits.
"I may go to school (or) try to look for a job," said Chorn, 43, who came to this country from Cambodia in the 1980s and has a wife and toddler. "There is a job out there."
Chorn is among the faces of Idaho's increasing jobless.
The February unemployment rate for the state hit a 21-year high of 6.8 percent, two-tenths of a percentage point higher than January. In the Boise-Nampa area, unemployment leaped six-tenths of a percentage point to 7.7 percent, coming close to the national rate of 8.1 percent.
The total number of jobless Idahoans broke through the 50,000 mark for the first time in February to 51,000. That doesn't include 2,000 Micron layoffs planned by August that the company announced late last month.
But the state's unemployment rate has yet to exceed 9.4 percent reached during the recession in 1982-83 - the highest level in the past 30 years.
Economists expect joblessness will continue to rise nationally for the rest of the year and into early 2010, with the unemployment rate reaching 9 to 10 percent before it turns around. But even then, with so many job losses centered in manufacturing, economists say many positions will not be coming back.
That's not good news for Boisean James Rowan, 60, a machinist who was laid off from his job in the electronics industry Monday along with nearly 40 other employees.
His job paid between $10 and $11 an hour. But jobs with similar skills on the Department of Labor's Web site are paying $8 to $10, he said. He needs the additional money to help support his wife, who cannot work.
Even those lower-paying jobs can be hard to get because Rowan is competing with people less than half his age.
"There are a lot of things they can do I can't do anymore," he said.
Meanwhile, his resources will last only a few weeks - except for a military pension he earned after serving as a medic.
His $214 a week unemployment check helps. But he bought a car last fall, shortly before the economy tanked. And he's got bills to pay.
If he can't find a job, he said, "I'm going to be in serious trouble."
Monique Huelker, 54, of Boise, has already had to make cuts in her life. Her full-time job with a nonprofit group was reduced to part time in November.
She not only lost part of her salary, but also health care benefits for her ailments that include rheumatoid arthritis.
At home on a recent chilly Boise evening, she didn't turn her heat up above 50 degrees. She bundled up in a coat because her monthly utility bill had more than doubled from $75 to $155.
Huelker, like Rowan, comes to the employment office several days each week looking for a full-time job with health benefits.
But she's discovered there are some things she needs to learn first. She's not up-to-date on all the computer programs for a job as a clerk or secretary, she said.
And she's not familiar with networking - finding a job by getting your name in circulation or going through friends or acquaintances.
She tried, when a friend lined her up with a job prospect. But the company got 400 applications and she never learned that she hadn't made the cut until she called.
"I want to do more," she said.
Chorn, the laid-off Micron worker, had known he might be cut. He has saved a bit of money. But he also thinks his wife may have to get a job to help out.
If he's forced to take an economic step backward, he's prepared to do it. He has a perspective many Americans don't: His family fled Cambodia in the 1970s to escape the murderous Khmer Rouge, led by Pol Pot and responsible for hundreds of thousands of deaths.
"That was worse," he said. "This is OK. I've been here before."
The New York Times contributed.
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