Unemployment Essay Assessment

The topic in which I will be discussing in this essay, is unemployment, different ways people are unemployed and how unemployment can have a negative effect on society. Talking about the many flow on effects and problems that can cause issues with the flow of society, the functionality of society and can disrupt the equilibrium of society. I'll be talking about the multiple reasons to which someone could be unemployed and how the circumstances leading to being unemployed can affect the long-term issues of said person.

I'll be going over the support network and how that can affect the situation depending on whether the individual has or has not got any post unemployment. I will state a few solutions to how we can benefit our society by implementing certain strategies to help people find jobs easier as that is a lingering issue today, it's not what you know, its who you know a lot of the time. Lastly, I will be concluding my topic and essay.

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Unemployment is an epidemic that has affected society in a multitude of ways for many decades. Unemployment rates have fluctuated in the last 10 years. The main increase spike was from 2010 till about 2012 when the rate of unemployment was at an all time high of 17.5% roughly. Since then, the rate of employment from 2012 till 2015 has decreased back down to around 6.5%. Being unemployed has diminished the equilibrium from society in all sorts of different ways, it has also been the causing individuals direct stress, mental health issues and even the taking of their own life because there living circumstances hasn't provided them with any happiness.

An analysis of cross-sectional studies has established that unemployment was associated with anxiety or depression symptoms with a moderate (Cohen's d) effect size of 0.51, indicating a doubling of considerable psychological distress from 16% in employed populations to 34% in unemployed populations". Paul., Moser. (2009). The main cause of stress caused by unemployment is financial stress. Sub-analysis of the same study indicated that the relationship between unemployment and psychological symptoms was mainly mediated by financial strain. Vinokur et al. (1997).

All these studies and information support the fact that unemployment can cause stress, depression and anxiety within individuals who are unemployed. The stress from being employed amongst the unfortunate circumstances it can put you in can cause individuals to do taboo, unlawful and criminal activities in the eyes of the law and society. It has been proven using American panel data that individuals who are employed are less inclined to commit crime and individuals who are unemployed. Witte., Tauchen. (1999). There was an empirical study done to show the connection between unemployment and criminal behaviour. several of these studies used panel data, for example, Levitt. (1996), (Ahmed., Doyle., and horn. (1999), Raphael., Winter-embre. (2001), (Gould Weinberg., Mustard. (2002) for US state and country level investigations both concluded that the deteriorating conditions from unemployment and from the labour market has caused higher crime rates such as property crime. The Scandinavian Journal of Economics. (2005).

The emotional stress caused by unemployment while having attachments can also affect the things you do. For example, an individual who has a family with kids is going to be more emotionally involved since he must be a provider for his family. If an individual cannot provide an adequate amount of scarce resources for his family, more-so his children, said person is obviously going to be way more inclined to find away to make ends meet for his family, even if it means in a criminal manner. Unfortunately, there are some flow on affects for individuals in families being unemployed.

One major flow effect that imbalances the equilibrium of society is the children effected by being amongst the negative repercussions of their parents being unemployed. Unemployed parents lack the resources to support the healthy development of their children. Often, children of unemployed parents do not have access to nutritious meals, safe living conditions, or resources for learning and growth. Christina Kelly. (2013). Without the necessary resources and nutrition, a child can really suffer and fall behind in school as well. The brain needs to meet a certain standard of nutrition to be able to function properly enough to take in the things that the child is learning. Moreover, these losses at crucial developmental periods have effects that last a lifetime. Long-term unemployment can change the dynamic of the household and affect a child's attitudes and aspirations, which shapes their future achievement.

Research cited in the brief shows that parental unemployment can lead to lower rates of college access and lower future earnings Christina Kelly. (2013). So that said, that also lowers the probabilities of some of our future generation getting a job that is socially high. And because there is a high chance that the child will grow with less aspirations and will settle for a job that isn't as financially stable as a socially better one, there's a possibility of the circumstances that happened to the child to repeat again for his/her own family. So, unemployment affects nearly every aspect of society and its institutions.