By Alexei C. Summers (Contributor) – Email
Date Posted: October 5, 2011
Print Edition: September 28, 2011
It is no secret that it is difficult to obtain employment in the town of Abbotsford, British Columbia. Abbotsford was hit rather hard in the recession of 2008, and has never fully recovered. As soon as the recession hit, many people who had steady jobs for years were required to leave, as lay-offs occurred in the wake of this devastating event. The unemployment rate for the past year in Abbotsford has more or less kept a steady nine per cent, sometimes spiking, and sometimes dropping a few points of a per cent. The national unemployment rate itself is going up, rather than going down. While the straits we are in are nowhere as dire as they were during Great Depression of the 1930s, and nobody is having to ride the rails to find work, it is still having serious repercussions on young people, particularly university students.
Most students who attend the University of the Fraser Valley have the need to work. Work in Abbotsford is scarce, and with the growing cost of tuition, goods, as well taxes to worry about, many university students are finding themselves to be very stressed out over these economic concerns.
It is particularly difficult to obtain work for those who have little, or no, experience with work in the past. Employers in the town of Abbotsford, even for very basic jobs, usually like to see a long list of experience in the field for which one is applying. This can become a serious obstacle if one does not have enough previous experience. If that is the case, the applicant usually ends up being turned away. Of course, with this attitude adopted by Abbotsford employers, acquiring a job becomes a Catch 22, where the unemployed must have experience in order to procure a job, but cannot get said experience without already having said job. This creates a vicious cycle which fuels unemployment. Abbotsford also has a large population of young people, and there are fewer jobs than there are people.
There is also the new system of hiring that many local businesses have adopted, in which face-to-face applications do not occur. The new system forces many to apply to the desired job online. The online application process speeds things up in many ways, but many have argued that it takes away from the human contact aspect of the application process, disallowing the applicant to show off their winning personality, or tactful charm – something that doesn’t come across on a resume. Instead, it has been argued, that the online application process turns the applicant, in the eyes of the employer, into a statistic rather than a potential employee.
All that aside, while it may at times feel like an unattainable goal, the procurement of work in this town is not impossible. Be persistent, get involved with the community, and keep an eye out. Soon enough, you’ll have work. It might not be your dream job, in fact you might hate it, but it’s something in these harsh economic times. Because of all these previously mentioned factors, you might just have to take what you can get. Just remember that the most important thing is to keep calm and carry on.
