Oct 24, 2011

The History of My Employment - Part 4

I was hired by Tedious Systems, known as Mountain States Telephone in those days,  on June 16th, 1969.




The guy who hired me negotiated me down to a wage of $95 week, and he apologized for not being able to offer more.  I nearly leaped over his desk and kissed him;  $95 was about a 25% pay raise from my salary at Bayless..

My first day on the job I was told to expect to work 58 hours a week, with time and a half over 40 hours and double time after 49.  I was fabulously rich!  My first week's check was $157.57, take home! That is a number I will never forget.

I worked at Tedious until December 2001, when they offered me a year's pay to get out of their sight.   They were laying off about anyone who would go, so I went.

That was an easy decision, since I was already eligible for a pension equal to about 1/3 of my salary.

My plan was to go into teaching.  What I hadn't really counted on was the difficulty that a 52-year-old guy has finding a job.  Especially when the competition is a hoard of fresh out of college idealists.

I landed a long-term sub job for the 2002-2003 school year in a middle school.  I wanted the job permanently, but so did a young teacher, so he got first dibs.  That guy was subsequently fired for hitting a kid.

I also did free-lance work for one of the contractors for Tedious, between January, 2002 and July 2003.

In July 2003, Tedious Systems offered to reinstate me with full seniority and benefits and I went back to work for them,  staying until July, 2007.  A week after starting back at Tedious systems, the school called to tell me that they fired the guy who poached my job and offered it to me.  I was tempted, but I couldn't just quit a job that I just started.

By mid-2007 telecommunications as I knew it, was a dying field and it was time to get out.  Working for a dying company is a stressful.   The only solution for a falling market share is to cut costs.  If you aren't 'right-sized' out the door, you are expected to work harder...I mean, smarter, yeah that's the ticket, work smarter.

Tedious is still not dead, but the market for its services is shrinking. 

As you know, I went to work at Ace in January 2008, my last job, I think.  Not a day goes by that I don't plot quitting Ace.  It does keep me in golf and bowling money, though, so I plug along.

I am eligible for Social Security in March of next year, so perhaps I will hang it up once and for all.  Maybe.





Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong, sometimes just full of it, but always judgmental and cranky

5 comments:

The Bug said...

I can't imagine working for the same company for that many years. Although I've been at my current job for almost ten years so I'm over a quarter of the way there... Wow, that seems like a LONG time. My dad worked for UPS for about that long - I think he was plotting his escape for the last 10 of those years.

Barbara said...

I worked for the same Federal agency for 35 years, retiring just a few months before you did. I thoroughly enjoyed all but about 6 of those years, working in a variety of jobs there. Looking back now, 35 years does seem like a very long time. There is not one day goes by that I wake up and say "I really wish I could go back to work." There are just too many other things to do.

Kurt said...

I don't have any social security (teachers don't pay into it). I'm screwed, aren't I?

Merle Sneed said...

I didn't know that teachers in California don't pay into SS. They do pay into SS in most states.

Lighina VB said...

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