Do you remember the 1950s and 1960s, when we manufactured TVs, radios, washing machines, fridges, toasters  and a million other goods?

Remember Aussie-made TVs such as Admiral, HMV, AWA, Astor, Ferris, Kreisler, even HG Palmer? Guess what – not one television manufacturer exists in Australia. The same goes for all those other goods. Nobody makes radios,
toasters, washing machines and beater-mixes here. Australia does not manufacture anything of note and all those people that worked at companies making Aussie goods for Aussie people – they don’t have those jobs any more.

Those manufacturing plants are closed. We have exported all those jobs to China. Australia used to have a huge textile industry, but virtually all the clothing manufacturers have either gone out of business, or closed their factories here and are getting the Chinese to make their garments.

This nation could literally be self-sufficient. We have the raw material to make literally anything. We have a workforce that is capable of manning factories to make anything we need locally. We have researchers, designers and scientists at the forefront of technology. We can acquire knowhow from anywhere. But is Australia doing this? No, of course not. We are making the Chinese wealthy and leaving our kids the legacy of being waiters and cleaners.

And what do you think will happen when the Chinese see that Australian industry is non-existent and they’ve got us by the goolies? They will stop selling us cheap stuff and they will hike up the prices and gouge us until they bleed us dry. And while they are doing that, we will tug our forelocks like medieval serfs and bow and scrape to them, because THEY WILL OWN US.

Read this article and weep – it’s long, but if you understand anything, you will become as enraged as I did when I read it and the implications sunk in.

Remember to substitute “Australia” for “USA” and see the catastrophe that Australia has made for itself.

I fall into the later group.

Granted, I’m a very experienced System Administrator (Windows, Linux and Mac) and can handle almost any task thrown at me, including desktop support. Not trying to blow my own trumpet here, just a statement of fact.

So it’s not surprising that I get a little annoyed, even rightly PISSED OFF when I speak to employers and/or agencies that say “oh, we think you’re OVERQUALIFIED”. One I spoke to today said “you’d be bored to tears and wouldn’t stay”

This is without interview, without speaking to me about the job, and without trying to find out the reasons I applied in the first place ! And you’re so sure I wouldn’t stay ?

This is nothing but a complete and utter cop-out on their behalf – OK, don’t OFFER me the job if you think I won’t stay, but at least INTERVIEW ME. You may be surprised when you find out that climbing the career ladder is not what motivates EVERY job applicant. Most of us just want to put food on the table and keep the bank from taking our house.

The other thing that pisses me off is employment agencies – they advertise a job, get people to apply and then don’t have the common decency to contact you and tell you that you weren’t successful.

I mean, how long does it take to copy and paste a heap of email addresses into a boilerplate “thanks for the application but no thanks” email ? And then if the applicant requires more feedback it’s up to them to contact the agency and find out why.