jobs

American Time Management Is the Worst

Hamilton Nolan · 06/23/11 11:15AM

One positive side effect of our entire nation being unemployed: we're spending less time at work! The Labor Department's latest annual survey of what the hell we do with all our time found that we, as a nation, work less than four hours on the average weekday—six minutes less than in 2009. Layabouts! And what are we doing with our abundant free time? Laying about! From the WSJ:

Supreme Court Kills Huge Discrimination Suit Against Wal-Mart

Hamilton Nolan · 06/20/11 10:16AM

The Supreme Court has just ruled that what would have been the largest sex discrimination suit in history—more than a million women suing Wal-Mart—cannot proceed as a class action suit. The women are all free to sue the company separately, but the mega-humongo class action suit would have been a serious financial threat to the company, while various isolated lawsuits will not be.

Tips for Your Post-Wall Street Life

Hamilton Nolan · 06/17/11 01:29PM

Unemployment is falling in half the country, but not the most important half: Wall Street. There, the beleaguered derivative-shufflers are facing a third straight month of rising unemployment. Literally thousands of former bankers are now wandering our city's streets, driftless. How will they adjust to life in the post-banker world?

Lawyers Can Now Be Ordered Like Pizzas

Hamilton Nolan · 06/17/11 11:13AM

Though we are loath to continue pointing out the myriad ways in which the practice of law has become a degrading wallow in the depths of human desperation, we will simply note—for those of you keeping score in your law-school-graduation-present moleskines—that, thanks to a handy new website that allows you to order up a lawyer at any time of day or night, the legal profession has, at long last, become just as respectable as the fast food profession:

That Lowly Temp Worker Is Probably a Lawyer

Hamilton Nolan · 06/15/11 12:06PM

Life as an American attorney these days is little more than a steady progression of more and more degrading news stories about the ever-declining status of your job, and, by extension, the rapid downward spiral of your worth as a human being. When we last checked in on the unfortunate underemployed would-be litigators, they were getting their own formerly outsourced jobs backsourced to them, at a fraction of the pay.

Economy Update: It's Still Bad

Jim Newell · 06/03/11 12:43PM

The economy added a whopping 54,000 non-farm jobs last month, and the official unemployment rate is now back to 9.1 percent. That's really, really bad.

Give Us Your Summer Job Horror Stories

Brian Moylan · 06/03/11 12:30PM

Yes, it's that time of year when high school and college kids partake in the great ritual of finding a summer job. Seasonal employment sucks and usually entails meager pay, physical labor, embarrassing costumes, or putting up with swarms of pesky kids. But now your torture could win you a prize.

Osama Bin Laden Offered 'Excellent HR Benefits'

Jeff Neumann · 05/31/11 05:25AM

Osama bin Laden was many things: Terrorist, mass murderer, psychopath, sociopath, chronic masturbator, poon hound. But for all of his faults, bin Laden was a pretty decent employer, in jidahi terms, at least. Much of that stems from his degree in economics and public administration. From NPR, we have more tales of Osama bin Laden as micro-managing terrorist mastermind:

How to Stay Fit at Work

Hamilton Nolan · 05/26/11 11:59AM

Another day, another alarming finding about America's complete lack of core strength. A new report points to a possible culprit for our nation's ongoing descent into blob-dom: our cushy, chair-bound jobs. Does this mean you're doomed?

The 'Writing About Yourself' Trap

Hamilton Nolan · 05/24/11 09:13AM

Remember Lena Chen? She was big on the internet a few years back for being a compulsively oversharing sex blogger while she attended Harvard. Anyhow, she graduated, and stopped sex blogging, and we forgot about her. Now she's back! And we're going to use her story as a peg for some completely unsolicited advice-giving.

You Can Work For Us, Katie Couric

Hamilton Nolan · 05/19/11 02:41PM

Tonight marks Katie Couric's final broadcast as the anchor of CBS Evening News. It's the end of a well-intentioned but fruitless experiment. Sad. Sadder still, Katie still doesn't officially have a new job lined up. That's what friends are for!