The unemployed can also levitate by simultaneously trampling one another

[danohu]

The coalition have apparently figured out the root cause of unemployment. It's not that there are more workers than jobs, or that a small army of victims of the cuts are now joining them on the dole. No, they're just lazy; a few weeks of forced labour will sharpen them up, render them employable and thus employed:

where advisers believe a jobseeker would benefit from experiencing the "habits and routines" of working life, an unemployed person will be told to take up "mandatory work activity" of at least 30 hours a week for a four-week period. If they refuse or fail to complete the programme their jobseeker's allowance payments, currently £50.95 a week for those under 25 and £64.30 for those over 25, could be stopped for at least three months.
...
"This is all about getting them back into a working routine which, in turn, makes them a much more appealing prospect for an employer looking to fill a vacancy, and more confident when they enter the workplace. The goal is to break into the habit of worklessness."

I can't do much better than refer them to The Onion:

With unemployment at its highest level in decades, the U.S. Department of Labor issued a report Tuesday suggesting the crisis is primarily the result of millions of Americans just completely blowing their job interviews.

According to the findings, seven out of 10 Americans could have landed their dream job last month if they had known where they see themselves in five years, and the number of unemployed could be reduced from 14.6 million to 5 million if everyone simply greeted potential employers with firmer handshakes, maintained eye contact, and stopped fiddling with their hair and face so much.

"This economy will not recover until job candidates learn how to put their best foot forward," said Labor Secretary Hilda Solis, warning that even a small increase in stuttering among applicants who are asked to describe their weaknesses could cause the entire labor market to collapse.

Comments

[oedipamaas49.livejournal.com]

yes, I'd like to believe that it's something they know is unworkable. So they talk it up, get the media praise for being brutal to the poor, and nobody will notice when it fails to go anywhere.

but...germany has something very similar with the "one euro jobs" system. [in fact it's even worse than the UK proposal. Not only are people forced to work for less money than they'd get from picking up beer bottles in the park, but the government then uses this as a reason to no longer count them as unemployed]

[karohemd.livejournal.com]

Nothing new in Germany. It's how the Autobahn network was built in the mid/late 30s which doesn't help with the popularity of such schemes.

[jholloway.livejournal.com]

Yeah, but make-work schemes were all the rage worldwide during the Great Depression. There were similar projects in the USA.

[friend-of-tofu.livejournal.com]

Good point. I'm going to rely on hope that the Germans can do it because they're much better at organising large projects than we are, and put my faith in pointless optimism!