Since we're also talking about being more creative during this economic slump, why not think outside the box of looking to work for another in the first place?

I'm rather amazed that there are plenty of skill sets that are for whatever reason not "conventional" enough to be taught in schools, but the mastery of which would lead to more autonomy.

Most of us are trained to be employees- nothing wrong with that, but I'm convinced that thinking that way is a kind of tunnel vision that keeps many from learning skills that wold allow them to carve out there own path to income.

One of them is as close as the computer in front of you. For the first time in history, we are 3 feet in front of the world, yet few learn how to use it in a way to render 1) value to others and 2)income for themselves.

leavethejobbehind.com

I also posted an article titled "How To Keep Your Job In A Recession" … it is a simple solution and may be of interest to your readers as well :-)

We now must wait until baby has been born before she can get back into the workforce. Particularly tricky as I must postpone my university studies (I'm a Ph.D candidate) to get into the workforce to cover the sudden loss of her income (she was primary breadwinner).

I know this is a bit off topic, but my advice to any preganant women out there is this: don't tell anyone at work. Deny it for as long as possible if people start asking if you're pregnant. You have nothing to gain and everything to lose by disclosing this information.

And it will get worse.

If a Democrat gets elected the multinationals will get taxed and money printed which will ease things for awhile and then they will crash as they must since we did nothing to fix the economy.

If McCain gets elected then we fight wars of empire and do not change what we are doing so instead of a steep up followed by a crash we get an even slide further dowards.

As much as I'd like to see the social reform of Ron Paul, his pure Austrian economic model would have tanked what remains of our economy good.

There is a solution. Fix what we are doing and then use nationalization as a driver for productivity: in order. We did exactly that when confronted with a Cold War. Check out some of the articles at The Paleo Conservatist. I read them.

Nature has a way of cleaning itself. If you actually stop, close your eyes and think about all this crap we've created, you will understand why we need a deep cleaning and you wont be shocked when it comes.

One quibble is that almost all Gen Y'ers, at least those out of school now, have only had experience in bad economies. Most of us graduated in 2001 or later (or not at all yet), hardly boom times. Job-hopping has become something of a necessity for us rather than anything strategic, but I agree with your premise that in the long-run we're better off for it. Once the masters of the universe figure out that our parents and grandparents are overpaid and overhoused, things will actually start looking better for us. We've been able to thrive in what is arguably the worst economic situation since at least the 1970's, some people are saying the 1930's, once there is an actual labor shortage the demand seen now will seem like lean times.