6 Terrible Side Effects of Being Unemployed

We tend to talk about unemployment on how it affects the economy, and society. Like higher state and federal payments for the unemployed and bigger gatherings at beach parties during week days, but we never talk about how it affects that person other than just feeling shitty about themselves, like the impact on the unemployed standard of living, or why did he became a total dick all of the sudden:

1- Being Unemployed Will Change Your Personality

We believe we are the person we are under whatever circumstance. We might experience different moods, like the happiness we get when we hear about good ol’ Fred‘s promotion (you go Fred, you deserve it!), or the messed up feeling we get when we’re being fired or “let go” on that same day (bollocks). But our characteristic traits that define us will always stay intact, right?

It was also Fred’s birthday and they got him a cake! Good for....him?

Not so fast,

Apparently unemployment will drastically change some basic cores of our personality. According to a study done in the U.K. both men and women are very affected (although differently) on the five different traits of personality: Agreeableness, conscientiousness, openness, extraversion and neuroticism. They’re better known as the ability to happily high five people (The Barney), the ability to perform task focused and vigilant (the Batman), your honesty or transparency (The Washington), how outgoing you are (the Slut), and how much anxiety and worries concerns your day to day (The Piglet), in other words, they define the way we behave, and unemployment will mess them up until you become a completely diferent version of yourself, sort of like Peter Parker in the third Sam Raimi film but with way less dancing.

2- Your Mental And Physical Health Turns On You

It’s been proven that short term unemployment leads to depression, it’s obvious to see why, especially if it’s sudden and unexpected, but it can be changed by having a new job quickly. Some of us might fantasize about quitting our job, but our job means more to us than we think.

We’re social animals, employments makes us part of something, it feels like we belong (when inclusiveness is done right). Sure, you might hate Mark from accounting who keeps whistling all the time and didn’t hold the elevator for you that one time, but we still want to be a part of something bigger than us.

He's also the one who left the can of tuna opened in the fridge

Being fired is basically being rejected, discarded; it’s pretty much what it feels like being dump. When this happens depression is not alone anymore, in any of these cases, stress, low self-esteem, identity crisis (more on that later), and growing anxiety are not uncommon, like the movie Inside Out, but with an all-dark-gothic-emo cast. These feelings usually lead to unhealthy habits, and an unhealthy lifestyle, so the probability of getting sick or getting into an accident also increases.

3- The More Time You Spend Unemployed, The Less Likely You’re To Be Employed Again

Now this is a messed up one. 

If you’ve ever been unemployed you know how it feels. You’ll want to avoid people, maybe spend more time looking for a job, trying to get your shit together; hope is the last thing you lose, right?

Right, except, your anxiety grows with every interview, the more rejections you get, the more nervous you get, your stress levels rise to the moment where you cannot keep it cool anymore, this is something that it’s currently speculated to be reflected in a decrease of the chances of finding a job quickly. Not only that, but all of that time without work is killing your working skills and abilities, even the lack of social interaction can be a direct influence in your job finding mission. Worse of all, businesses themselves are prone to only hire people with less than 6 months of unemployment.

4- It Will Ruin Your Relationships

“For better and worse, for richer and for poorer”

 Not exactly.

Unemployment has been for a while associated with the decay of relationships, friendship, families and couples. You’re far more likely to end up hating your depressing friend who’s always bringing everyone down and living at your couch than falling in love with him, and the same stands if you were already in love with them to begin with.

It happens in married couples a lot, and most of the couples are not going to survive if one, or both parties are unemployed, divorce is quickly followed most of the times, but guess what? Most couples cannot even afford divorce after unemployment, so we have a huge amount of young married couples hating each other but that need each other in order to overcome the whole financial mess.

"Linda, if you're going out to dinner with freaking Fred, at least bring the leftovers home"

5- Your Whole Identity Might Disappear

For people who have dedicated much of their life to their careers and working skills, being fired might mean more often than not a complete nightmare to their own sense of identity, they are no longer with purpose nor use, especially when it happens at an elderly age, some people will avoid other people just to not talk about being unemployed, others will put up a suit, take the train, and go sit at the park for the rest of the day pretending to be at work like Homer does every two episodes.

Think about it, if Batman were to end all the crimes in Caracas, I mean, Gotham, he would have no way of transitioning into being Bruce Wayne all of the time, that's why he has the "no killing" system, because that way he guaranties to keep being a vigilante forever, it’s not like he’s educating them or giving the criminals a helping hand, no, he’s braking arms and noses and rarely taking them to jail, that’s also why most of the times he dies as Batman and that's why the ending of the Dark Knight Trilogy could only ment that Alfred had gone insane and he’s tripping balls with a “normal” Bruce Wayne still alive and healthy (there’s no way such a public figure could fake his death and hide in plain sight, except Tupac).

But I digress. This identity problem can directly lead to substance abuse and a disregard of our own self, which takes us to our last darkest entry.

6- Unemployment Increases Your Mortality Rates

Yep, a few of you saw this coming.

There are literally hundreds of documents studying the correlations of mortality rates and unemployment. Health issues, bad habits and accidents, all related to our other entries are taken into account in most of these studies. But the most taboo and feared reason is suicide, which presents a horrible and significant correlation with unemployment. 

We see this happening again and again through history, whenever there’s high unemployment rates, the suicide number also increase significantly, showing a direct and horrible correlation between these two factors.

You might ask, Oswaldo, why are you being a dick? are you trying to tell us currently unemployed people that we are gonna off ourselves? Oh, au contraire mon amie, I want you to use this knowledge to your advantage. Once we know what are the social and scientific effects of problems like unemployment and how depression works on our brains, the better of a chance we have of taking control of the situation and coming out victorious. Don't alienate yourself, go out with your friends, talk about your problems and try and have a laugh about it too, at the end of the day, we've all been there.

So, don't give up, and don't let even unemployment stop you, you can conquer anything. I leave you with a picture of Fred's new puppy to think about it.

Oswaldo A. Badillo is a happy salesman who has being unemployed from time to time but totally loves his current job and what he does. He also writes and paints in his free time and definitely not while on-the-clock at work. Contact him at [email protected] or through his not-yet-live website www.elsocarron.com

Sources: 

ttp://time.com/3705838/unemployment-personality/

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-leahy-phd/unemployment-health_b_2616430.html

https://www.investopedia.com/financial-edge/0811/the-cost-of-unemployment-to-the-economy.aspx

*there's a few more sources i couldn't link, if you need them contact me.