All Aboard the Gravy Train!

With Congress about to extend the unemployment extensions (don’t listen to the drama queens bewailing what are basically minor procedural hurdles; it’s a done deal), I bet a lot of you poor working people would love to get on this 99-week gravy train.  I mean, a two year paid vacation?!  You’d have to be a goddamn fool not to.

Problem is, in order to get unemployment, you can’t quit – you have to be fired.  And it can’t technically be your fault.  It has to plausibly appear that it was due to circumstances out of your control.  So what’s a poor demoralized worker bee to do?  A few suggestions:

• If your company is struggling, sometimes you can simply ask to be laid off.  Your stupid boss may very well be under pressure to cut budget, and having your salary off the books could make the difference between him getting a promotion and having to blow a VP as he pinches a loaf in the executive bathroom.
• Don’t underestimate how stupid your “superiors” are.  I used to swagger around the office exuding “I don’t give a fuck” vibes, waiting to be axed.  This never ever worked; I eventually realized that my moronic bosses saw my indifference as confidence, and assumed that I had a reason for not being afraid of the axe.  For them, “not afraid of being fired” = “must be no reason to fire him.”  When I switched gears and started slinking around, fearful and perspiring, I immediately began hearing rumors that I was about to be fired, and I soon was.  For them, “scared of being fired” = “must be some reason to fire him.”  You’ll have to sell it.
• Sometimes, the simplest approach is the most effective.  I know a woman who drove a delivery truck, and was caught, on the clock, drinking a fifth of whiskey in the driver’s seat.  She was fired and her ex-boss tried to block her unemployment.  In the court hearing, the woman pointed out that her boss had never told her explicitly that drinking in the company truck wasn’t allowed.  The boss protested but the judge had to rule in favor of the woman; getting fired for something you weren’t explicitly forbidden to do means it wasn’t, legally, your fault.  This means you could literally – LITERALLY – drop your pants and take a shit on the conference table during a meeting and still qualify for unemployment, as long as there’s no “NO SHITTING ON CONFERENCE TABLES DURING MEETINGS” section in the employee handbook.