How You Made Your Child Unemployable

Most parents believe that they have an obligation to teach their children to obey the law, follow the rules, and work hard. They assure them that if they do these things they will be able to get a good job and move up in the world. However, we are now living in the Obama Administration where people wear hats on their feet and hamburgers eat people and where all the rules have changed.

This week one of my daughters was applying for some jobs posted on-line. She has a master’s degree and years of excellent work experience, but the job market has slim pickings, so after she applied for the more desirable positions, she looked at the postings for Macy’s.

After she completed Macy’s on-line application, a screen appeared with a Tax Information Survey that the applicants are also required to complete.  The questions on this survey are as follows:

1. Are you receiving food stamps and/or receiving benefits from the SNAP Program?
2.  Are you receiving Social Security Supplemental Income Benefits—NOT survivor’s benefits.
3. Have you been released from prison in the last year?

At first glance these questions appear to be a vetting process for weeding out employees who might not be a good fit for the numerous corporations, including Walmart, Lowes, and Home Depot, who use this survey as part of their application process. In fact, it is nothing of the kind.

The Tax Information Survey is designed to determine whether an applicant is in a category to allow the employer to receive a tax break from the federal government as an incentive for hiring him/her. Since the benefits to the employer are significant—that is if you don’t consider the possible downsides of hiring convicted criminals and the chronically unemployed—it is pretty much a given that if you are not on welfare or an ex-con, you do not qualify. After exploring this situation further, I actually discovered that one major corporation in El Paso has a loss mitigation department made up entirely of ex-cons and parolees.

Am I the only one who finds this new way of screening potential employees outrageous? I never thought that I would live to see the day when having been released from prison during the last year was a pre-requisite for employment. But, all of that aside, what is the real issue involved here?

It seems to me that the Obama Administration does everything possible to punish American citizens who struggle to support their families and work long hours so that their children can have better futures. The hardworking, honest people who built this country with their blood, sweat, and tears have been thrown to the curb in favor of those who have broken and continue to break all the rules.

It is time for us to get serious about our elected officials. Next year we will have an opportunity to elect men and women to both houses of congress who still believe in the American Dream, who still believe that honesty and hard work are virtues, and who still believe that in order to have a great America we much encourage our children to become great Americans.

Joyce Swann is co-author of The Chosen, a dystopian novel about the battle of one U.S. family to restore the Constitution and stop the indefinite detention provisions of the National Defense Authorization Act.  For more information, visit her website at http://www.frontier2000.net