An Address to the Unemployed

RUSH: I want to talk for a moment to those of you who are out of work. Can I have your attention please? Those of you that have been fired, those of you who have been laid off, not just recently, either, but maybe in the past six months or so, but particularly to those of you laid off in the past couple or three months. I want to speak brazenly honestly with you, extremely openly with you. As you know, I’m an optimist, and I have a philosophy that guides me most of the time, even I, strong and committed, a rock, a spine of steel, even sometimes I slip, and the negative outweighs the positive. I catch myself. One of my operating philosophies and theories is that no matter how bad something is there’s always good to be found in it. There’s always something good to be found in bad. It’s hard to look for the good, ’cause a lot of people want to wallow in the bad, ‘Oh, woe is me,’ it’s natural. It’s human nature. The first thing that I think those of you who are out of work — and there are two kinds of people that are out of work, those that want to start working soon and those who are content to live on extended unemployment benefits. I’m primarily speaking to those of you who want to go back to work.

There’s a reason that you have been fired, and it may not be all that apparent to you. But the private sector is made up of, especially the winners in the private sector, made up of very smart people. By definition, they have to be. There’s some luck, naturally, but outfits, companies, organizations that have enjoyed a long life span and have had success over most of their life span, at some point, you know, luck is simply where preparation meets opportunity. There’s a lot of skill and there’s a lot of smarts involved. If smart people are thus paring their payrolls and their workforces and laying people off, then there’s something they fear, something that they think they know, and this is leading them to hedge their bets. If you’ve been fired recently by a company like this, you are the bet. They’re smart people, and they’re watching television, and they’re watching what’s happening in the markets, and they’re listening to what the incoming administration is saying about its plan, and it doesn’t inspire confidence. We can see that it’s not inspiring confidence by looking at the indicators in the private sector where confidence is inspired.

There’s not too many people operating with confidence. The stock market is not operating in confidence today. Individual businesses, for the most part, are not. There’s some that are, by the way, I mean even in the worst downturn there are certain sectors of the business community that have great performances, but even they are a little bit tenuous on somewhat shaky ground because the whole foundation on which everything is built is teetering right now, and the announced plans to fix all this are not the kinds of plans that inspire confidence in successful businesses. Successful businesses overcome the odds placed in front of them by government. Failing businesses are those who are looking for help from government to keep them going. Now, what is the good thing here, what is the positive opportunity, if you have been fired? Well, the statistics would say — and of course you can do anything with statistics you want — but the statistics would say that most people fired have been fired from jobs they’re not really crazy about. Some of the fired have lost jobs they really loved. But, on average, you’d have to say that a significant number of people who have been laid off or fired really did not get laid off or fired from a job that they loved. That’s the opportunity that you have.

You now have, out of necessity — we could go cliche all we want, necessity is the mother of invention, fear is a great motivator. But regardless, you now have an opportunity to choose what you want to do, depending on the urgency that you feel to get back to work. In some people’s cases it’s going to take a couple jobs, if you choose to go back to work, to make up what you lost if you were laid off or fired. But there are plenty of opportunities out there, and those opportunities are only going to increase over time, because, again, statistically, the odds are that this down cycle will come back, despite what government does. The more of Obama’s plan that is successful, the longer it’s going to take, and, sadly, as we can see, the Republican Party, they’re not willing to fight this. They want to go along with it, so they appear to be harmonious, non-confrontational and so forth. And a lot of businesses, frankly, are scared to death to oppose the government because there’s so many businesses that are regulated and overregulated by government so they have to go along with some of this, like the green initiatives and all these other things. And if they think they can turn a profit going green, even when they don’t believe it, they’ll do it.

I think one of the problems the car companies have had is they’ve bought into the notion that every one of you believes global warming and if they come up with some green mobile that would inspire you to purchase the car because you want to save the planet, and if a car company can make you think you’re saving the planet by buying one of its products, they’ll damn well do it, rather than fight the prevailing winds that this hoax is just that, a hoax, and continue to make cars that people want. Fighting the government, as you see, is a huge, huge battle. Now we’ve got an FDR type government, by definition, coming in, and we talk about all these jobs that Obama’s gonna create, and let me find the story here because it’s just hilarious. The Associated Press, early on Saturday afternoon, reported: ‘Obama stimulus will create three-and-a-half million jobs.’ That was 12:45 in the afternoon on Saturday. ‘Facing growing criticism of his economic recovery plan, President-elect Barack Obama made public Saturday a detailed analysis by his economic advisers that estimates the $775 billion plan of tax cuts and new spending would create 3.5 million jobs over the next two years.’

Then 30 minutes later, the AP reported that Obama advisors say the plan would create up to 4.1 million new jobs. ‘President-elect Obama countered critics with an analysis Saturday by his economic team, showing that a program of tax cuts and spending like he’s proposed would create up to 4.1 million jobs, far more than the three million he has insisted are needed to lift the country from recession.’ Now, where does this stop? Apart from the fact that he can’t settle the number of new jobs he’s going to create out of thin air, it went from three-and-a-half to 4.1 million, over the course of 30 minutes Saturday afternoon. If you look at all the infrastructure improvement plans he wants to do to save the economy, I’m led to the following realization. Ted ‘Bridge to Nowhere’ Stevens was ahead of his time. We just ordered a guy to go to jail for doing exactly what Obama is going to do, build bridges to nowhere, fix bridges that don’t need fixing and so forth, but the real question that you need to ask yourself, if you are unemployed and looking for work and you don’t yet see the opportunity and you’re listening to Obama talk about — I don’t care what it is, three-and-a-half million, four million, six million new jobs saved or created. How are we going to tabulate the saved jobs, by the way?

My job will be saved by the Obama plan, right? Not by anything I’ve done to maximize our earning potential, no, no, no. My job will be saved by Obama. Is that how this is gonna work? How they gonna calculate this? Here is the question. Okay, we’re going to have an infrastructure plan. I think Ted Stevens ought to apply for a pardon right now, just based on what the AP reported on Saturday afternoon. ‘Hey, you need an advisor on these bridges to nowhere, and I’m an expert.’ At any rate, infrastructure jobs, three-and-a-half million, four million. Could somebody explain to me how long one of those jobs lasts? Somebody explain to me, if you want a career, say, in infrastructure, where do you go? Well, you might go to college to become a civil engineer. But if you’re gonna wear the hard hat where do you go? You go to a construction company that you’re gonna sign on and off now and then to infrastructure gigs? Do you go out and join a union? Is that what you want, do you want a career in infrastructure gigs? So how long are these jobs going to last? I mean, you could probably put six million people to work tomorrow for a couple days, send them up and down the highways picking up trash and pay ’em whatever the minimum wage is and say, ‘Hey, I just created six million jobs.’ Two days later you fire ’em because the trash is picked up, but then you’re back to where you started.

So my point here is a job’s a job. A career is a different thing. And a career has goals, objectives, short- and long-term. A career, somebody has a career vision, more than likely has a passion for what they love to do and know what it is. So that’s, to me, wherein the opportunity lies. I mean it’s sad that people are out of work, and it’s sad they’re being laid off, but it’s also very sad that some of these layoffs are happening as a preventive measure not yet necessary because of the economic downturn. These are just smart people hedging the bets, and you’re the bet. They’re betting taxes are going to go up. They’re betting it’s going to cost more to have health care for employees. They’re betting it’s going to cost more to give Medicare and whatever it is. None of these businesses are bottomless pits of money, and so they’re getting ready for the additional costs of doing business. The most expensive cost of doing business is labor. The fastest way to bring the budget in line is getting rid of people. Faster than getting rid of printers, faster than getting rid of paper clips, faster than getting rid of the coffee machine or charging for lunch in the cafeteria or what have you. So you have an opportunity here. You may not like it, may wish it never happened to you, but while you’re out of work anyway, and those of you remember to whom I’m addressing, you want to go back to work, figure out what it is you really love.

Figure out what it is you really want to do, and then look into how to do it and get it done. Now, it may seem like, ‘Oh, Rush, it’s so hard.’ I know it is. But everything starts with the first step. I don’t care who somebody was before they were somebody or something, it started with the first step. And if it is something you love it won’t really be like a job. It won’t really be like a career. And, you may not know what it is yet. That, again, is part of the opportunity. You have the chance to choose. ‘But, Rush, I need to work immediately.’ I know, so start thinking fast. Start thinking fast and start acting fast. ‘But what if there aren’t any opportunities?’ You don’t know ’til you try. You have no idea. Remember, 80% is showing up. You’d be amazed. We had the guy call here from Tennessee on Friday. He didn’t even have an opening, some woman walked in, desperately wanted to work there, just sold this guy on how much she loved the blue jean business, and he created a job for her. I will guarantee you employers want passion, excitement, energy. Don’t go in there and the first thing, ‘Okay, what’s the sick day schedule, how many vacations?’ don’t ask that stuff at the outset. Make them have to tell you in fact.