The Big Short & The Cost of Unemployment

The Big Short told the story of the 2007/8 housing market collapse and banking irregularities and the subsequent economic collapse in an engaging way that meant I came out of the movie feeling entertained and educated.

The story is one we are somewhat familiar with and one we certainly know a lot more about by the end of the movie. However one thing mentioned, hit a chord for me. Among the banking and housing terms and the stories of cover ups and high finance greed, it was mentioned that in the US, every time unemployment increases by a percentage that 40,000 people die.

I checked. And yes, according to Thomas and Carson (2014)  this is, pretty much, as they put it:

'The Cost of Unemployment'

Thomas and Carson (2014) mention the costs 'in human terms' as eroding 'morale and self-esteem', destroying motivation and positive behaviour patterns and increasing negative social behaviour , 'morbidity, mental illness and crime' (p. 300).

Thomas and Carson discuss a study where a 'one-percent-point increase in the unemployment rate will be associated with 37,000 deaths' (Ibid).

These deaths include:

• 20,000 heart attacks
• 920 suicides
• 650 homicides

In the UK the Trade Union Congress (TUC,  2010) found the 'costs of unemployment' to include higher mortality (including infant and maternal), increased ill health (mental and physical), increased substance abuse and increased poverty related other issues.

The cost to children includes  all the fall out from the above, such as:

• 'by the age of 2, the children of long-term unemployed parents were up to an inch shorter than the children of other parents' (p.6)
• 'the death rate for children of parents classified as never having worked or long-term unemployed was 13 times that for children whose parents worked in higher managerial or professional occupations' (Ibid).

We could think of the 'big short' as that of the toddlers who are, because of other people's greed, shorter than their peers. At least they are not part of the real 'Big Short' - all those who are dead - the real cost of greed.

Thomas, W. L. and Carson, R. B. (2014) The American Economy: How it Works and How it Doesn't, Routledge
TUC (2010) The Costs of Unemployment, a TUC Briefing to Mark the European Year for Combating Poverty and Social Exclusion, 

Room

'Room' by Emma Donoghhue has had a great movie interpretation of the book, capturing the atmosphere, characters and situation of living for the first five years of a life locked up in a room. I cried through most of it and was riveted by the limited (but vast) world view of a five year old. It replicates the skewed perspectives which come from an unusual upbringing in a restricted environment.

This story is certainly a 'different kind of true' and the idea that 'everyone's got a different story' has special resonance.

My childhood story was certainly set on a stage larger than a room. It included rooms, houses, schools and playgrounds, fields and roads and cities and counties. But for all its horizons it was usually limited to the people in the vicinity and usually not much farther than a room. 

However big the house or however far I traveled, it was one room at a time and even when phoning home it was just from one room to another.  

In many places I've traveled I've seen a family live in a room, converting it at night to sleeping quarters by laying out bedding and clearing it away in the day to live. It has made me question my 'need' for so many rooms in my home, despite the modest size of our maisonette. 

My rooms:

1 room just to sleep in

1 room just to wash in

1 room just to toilet in

1 room just to cook in

1 room to lead me to the other rooms downstairs

1 room to lead me to the other rooms upstairs

1 room just to sit in

It seems ridiculous that many of our rooms are only used for a portion of the day and unused the rest. The nearest I've come to living in less wasteful accomodation is when I have lived in bedsits which convert from day to night and camping which is an all-in-one with communal toilets. 

And that is just our houses. What about our workplaces. Billions of rooms which are only used for a portion of the day, week and year while there are people sleeping in the streets calling a doorway their 'room'.

According to Crisis, last year 7581 people slept rough on the streets of London. And for every rough sleeper in London 100 people are in hostels and 1100 households are in overcrowded accomodation.

With all those empty rooms.

52x52: Buy the Big Issue

52 random acts of kindness that each take under 52 seconds. One action each week, over a year takes less than an hour of your life.

'The Big Issue offers people who are homeless the opportunity to earn their own money; a livelihood'  by selling The Big Issue magazine. All you have to do is buy it. Nothing difficult about it. If you see someone wearing a Big Issue badge, selling The Big Issue, approach them, offer them some legal tender appropriate to the price of the magazine and if there isn't a queue of other people waiting to purchase from the vendor, perhaps have a conversationn or discussion on the topics of the magazine. (Please be advised that the conversation and reading of the magazine is not included in this 52 seconds as they are under the banner of conversation and entertainment).

For more information on Homelessness & The Big Issue use link below:

  

Docupoetry: Kaiser

Kaiser

Perpendicular

With designer streets

Of designer clothes

Ebor street

Opens up the argument

In Shoreditch

Waiting

For a reply

Her voice arrived

Before she did

Cutting through

The gentrified air

Adding colour

To the graffiti

'Because you're male

And I'm female' she said.

Amidst the cursing

And swearing

And pointing

At the injustice

Hanging there

Plain to see

Unlike his manhood

She shouts down the side street

At one of four young men

Not saying a word

That could be heard

Over the tirade of abuse

She waged

And staged

Righteously

Standing in the middle of the road

Her oversized striped

Multicoloured

Padded

Lumberjack type shirt

Saggy tracky bottoms

And greasy short hair

Scraped back

Into a tiny pony tail

That did nothing

Practical

Or for appearance

But balanced her profile

Standing defiantly

And with the nonchalance

Of only someone

With a chip on her shoulder

She's had so long

It's a comfort

A cushion

To lay her head on at night

When the gentrified air turns cold

And regeneration provides

No roof

Over her head,

Or calms

Her head

This is her home

They are walking through

They should have more respect

And to a woman

Don't they know?

She wonders

Leaning up

Against the street art

The wallpaper of her world

Rolling a roly

In the great ashtray of her life

Only looking up

To berate the guys

Some more

Long gone

She swears at them

And at the world

And continues on

Past the street-long

Building-tall

Giant word

EXTORTIONISTS

Turning left onto

Redchurch Street

Still cursing

Long forgotten deities

In London's

18th Century slums

And called by Engels

The worst conditions

Of the working class

In 19th century England

But today designer streets

With no room on the inside

For her

She is gone

But her voice remains

Screaming 'Kaiser'

At the very extremity

Of her range

The louder she shouts

The further the sound travels

And the wider her world

This is her personal space

She shouts

'Kaiser',

There is no reply

'Kaiser' she shouts again

Still nothing.

Is he the illusive

Keyser Söze

The Usual Suspects ask

He will not be found

The Shoreditch crowd

Concur and continue

To confer in

Trendy bars and cafes

With the 70s eclectic look

Of London in New York

With eco-friendly earthy names

Like HunterGather Cafe

So far from its cave man roots

Apart from the carrot juice

Banana cake and WiFi

How far we've come!

A dog ambles in

Through the open door

Skirts the legs of people and tables

Can't be taken seriously

Wearing a snood

For a collar

Is it a bandanna?

Dogs don't wear snoods

Dogs don't wear anything

Emperor's new clothes?

Emperor. Caesar. Kaiser.

A scream

'Get out Kaiser'

He's found

And

Tail between his legs

Follows her out

As the Barista

Says quietly

'There's no need to shout'

When in fact

There is

Bank Holiday Monday, the afternoon of April 6th 2015 Ebor Street, by Eine's graffiti piece 'Extortionists' and Red Church Street, once the worst slum in London and now a place for the hipsters and wealthy of London to shop and dine.

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