Politics & Government

Northeast Queens Residents Search for Employment Despite Dismal Figures

Long-term unemployment plagues many Queens residents, many of whom have been out of work for more than a year.

Despite the area's relative wealth, many residents of northeast Queens are not exempt from dealing with long-term unemployment.

According to the Bureau of Labor statistics, 44.4 percent of the nation's unemployed have been out of work for more than 27 weeks as of June of this year.

This has certainly been the experience of Andrew Hill, a Bayside resident who was camped out at the Starbucks in Little Neck Plaza with his laptop on Friday morning, searching for jobs. He said he’s been searching for employment for more than a year.

Find out what's happening in Bayside-Douglastonwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

“It's hard out there,” he said. “For one job, there could be 3,000 to 4,000 people applying for it."

Hill said that despite the daunting odds, giving up is not an option.

Find out what's happening in Bayside-Douglastonwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

"You just have to plug away. I have a friend who's been out of law school for a year and still does not have a job."

While such long-term unemployment is by no means rare, it can be demoralising for job-seekers who feel that no matter how hard they try, a good job remains out of arms-reach.

Queens resident Johnny Pacheco, 35, said he’s been out of full-time work since Halloween, and had only been able to nail down a series of impermanent odd jobs since then. He moved back to New York from Texas in 2008.

“This city takes no prisoners,” Pacheco said. “I used to just walk into a place down in Texas and they’d hire me on the spot.”

Pacheco had been working at a New York Sports Club on Wall Street in Manhattan before he was let go.

Raizy Mushell, the head of the Connect-to-Care job seeking service at the Samuel Field Y, said the service attracts everyone from the newly unemployed to the emotionally exhausted.

"You have a mix really," she said. "You have the people coming in who are extremely moitvated and very determined, and you have people who have just gone through so much [that they are less motivated]."

Such high unemployment has left many workers looking for someone to blame. Michael Auerbach, a union member with the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, said the number of illegal workers employed in the U.S. is higher than the government is letting on.

"There's a lot of unemployment with us [unioned electrical workers] because most of these construction projects are hiring illegals, or just people who are not American," he said.

"There are so many people working illegally. They say there are 17 million, but that's only not to panic people. "


Get more local news delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for free Patch newsletters and alerts.

We’ve removed the ability to reply as we work to make improvements. Learn more here

More from Bayside-Douglaston