It’s been a long time since I’ve been unemployed. I just got laid off last week. I want to keep busy but I know that jobs are hard to find. I have no doubt that I would be able to find seasonal (retail) work for the next couple months.
Is seasonal work a good idea if you are on unemployment? My biggest worry is that I get a paying seasonal job and then get a temp offer, my choice would be to quit the seasonal or to say no to the offered temp job. Both choices I feel would raise the eyebrows of Unemployment. I’m also not certain that a seasonal job would be keen on me not being able to commit to the job thruout the holidays.
Is it a better idea to keep applying for temp & perm jobs and ignore the seasonal potential? I want to get out of the house and work and earn but I just don’t know if holiday work is going to be worth it. I’m not particularly worried about the number of hours or pay, I’m worried about how it will affect my unemployment.
If it matters, I will be living solely on unemployment in about 2.5 to 3 months (after I spend my severance).
Welp, on unemployment the paperwork is times 10 if you’re making any money at all from a part-time job. If it’s full time but seasonal, I suspect it goes away entirely.
And if you do the paperwork now online, the easy way, I believe you have to start doing it the hard way, through the mail. You’ll probably still get a small amount of unemployment, but I am honestly not sure it’s worth it. IF you can survive on what you get from unemployment, it might be better to just wait.
This is just my 2c, of course, but you might be better off just doing things you normally don’t have time for while you wait and hunt for a job that will take you off unemployment for good. Or until the next layoff.
Suggestion: if you want to work somewhere that uses volunteers, now’s a great time to do that. Keeps you busy, gives you an in, and doesn’t affect your unemployment or job searching.
I second the suggestion for volunteering. Look for something where you can use your skills (whatever they are, there’s a charity somewhere that needs them). It’ll keep you busy, and look great on a resume. I worked for a big-name charity for a while - more than half of their full time staff started as volunteers, myself included.