Interview: Tanya Duncanson

Friday, September 16th, 2011

Below is an edited transcript of a recent interview with Tanya Duncanson conducted by Naima Ramos-Chapman. Duncanson has been looking for a job for almost six years.

How long have you been looking?

Since 2006 ... I am competing with recent college grads, and I don't have a degree ... That makes my prospects, like I said, very grim.

So how have you been making ends meet?
I am being supported by my husband.

He is employed. If I didn't have my husband, I don't know what I would do.

I was laid off. The company for which I worked found an automated company to do the radio frequency coordination that I performed by hand.

If you could guesstimate how many resumes you've sent out...
I would say I sent out about 1,000 resumes.

How many interviews?
How many interviews? oh, maybe five.

And job fairs?
Job fairs are just a general waste of time ... They weren't really taking applications or resumes even though we were told to bring resumes. Nobody wanted a resume. I have probably already done everything they suggested. There were a few new companies here, and I could check those out.

Do you have any children?
One grown child, 27.

Has she been able to find work?
She just finished nursing school, and after a search of about a year ... she found a job through a job fair.

So there is some hope...
Yeah.

What Went Wrong

Donald Barlett and James Steele are revisiting America: What Went Wrong, their landmark 1991 newspaper series, in a new project with the Investigative Reporting Workshop. Over the next year, the project team will examine how four decades of public policy has shaped America's ongoing economic crisis.

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