I get so exasperated when I hear some expert trot out the statistic that 85% of military spouses want or need to work.
They make it sound like hoards of spouses in business suits are climbing over each other like a scene out of World War Z. They make us sound like we are waving our resumes like sticks and banging at the gates of the local military installation held back by MPs in full battle rattle.
Which spouses are looking for work?
The experts ignore the fact that at any one time, only about 15% of spouses are actually looking for work. They ignore that looking for work is something you do alone, for a long time, with ever increasing buckets of despair.
Lately, when I talk to the folks at our military family organizations like MOAA or the National Military Family Association or Blue Star Families, we all are considering how we can actually help spouses get the jobs they want for themselves.
The type of person you are
I think we need to start with how we think about spouses. The type of person you are and your stage of life determine what kind of job you want. This week I wrote about the different kinds of spouse jobseekers we see among our SpouseBuzz and Military.com readers. (Find out which type of spouse you are here).
So we would like to get some input from you. Are you Young and Educated? Career Ambitious? Resilient Bill Payer? A Creative or Entreprenuer? A SAHM? A Momjob Seeker? Post-SAHM? A Hellhole Dweller? Or are you in a category we haven’t thought of yet?
