After an internship at MTV Network during his senior year of college, Michael Gargiulo graduated in 2003 and scored a full-time job as a producer at the network. It was a job he enjoyed, he was at a big company, and he could see himself moving into a higher position after several years. The pay was not bad either, as he made upwards of $70,000.
The job allowed Gargiulo to move out of his parents’ home in Bensonhurst into an apartment with a roommate. All seemed well for Gargiulo. He worked on programs such as Teen Cribs, Top 20 Video Countdown, VH1 News, MADE, and Undateable. He also was able to travel at least twice a month to help produce shows, all at the company’s expense. He enjoyed the creativity he was able to exercise when working on a show.
“There were no worries,” Gargiulo, 30, said.
Things started to change in late 2008. Gargiulo left MTV to work for a new small production company for a year. After that company downsized, he went back to MTV, and worked on one show before being let go again in May.
Gargiulo was not worried. He had been working steadily for five years after college and he had every reason to believe his unemployment would be brief. In fact, he enjoyed it.
“It was awesome,” Gargiulo said. “I got in really good shape, started going to the gym twice a day. For me, it was alright.”
For a while. In August that year, he was expecting to hear back about a job with producers he had worked with before.
“Nothing came in,” Gargiulo said. “I started worrying. My emails were either not getting returned or [companies] said there were no shows going into production.”
He did freelance work, but stopped because he did not want to lose his unemployment checks and benefits, which just got him by. “That check was not really cutting it,” he said. “The toll it takes on you emotionally is catastrophic, and you don’t get a check for that every week.”
It was a new and disturbing experience. He had grown up in a middle class family. His mother works as a medical receptionist; his father held a good paying job as a post office worker for 30 years and is now retired with a pension. He expected his good education and work habits to ensure the same kind of middle class stability.
Gargiulo’s struggle is not an exception. In July, the Fiscal Policy Institute reported that college graduates have a 7.3 percent unemployment rate in New York. Those without degrees average a staggering 13 percent unemployment. That is cold comfort, however, since the recession caused unemployment among those with degrees to virtually double.
Gargiulo’s unemployment started to affect his personal life. He was dipping into his dwindling savings account to make ends meet. While hanging out with friends and girlfriend Emily Streeter, a New York City public school teacher, “all they would do is talk about work, and that was very depressing for me.”
It was an even bigger strain on Streeter, 28, as she tried to be supportive of him, but did not succeed. “I would think I would be helpful by asking how was his day, and if he found any leads, but he was upset about that,” she said. “We didn’t have full blown arguments, but we had tension.”
Though Gargiulo said times were rough between him and Emily, he still found the passion to keep looking when things are in the darkest of times. Sure, he could have decided to stop looking for work, and become what the unemployment characterizes as “discouraged” workers, it was the motivation he received from friends, and family.
“You have to give it your all,” Gargiulo said. “Use all of your talents and not be afraid.”
After a few months of sitting at home, sending countless resumes for jobs, Gargiulo developed a routine where he would wake up, and go to the gym. It was this relief that helped him. “It was less financially draining, more emotionally drained,” he said.
The next year became even more difficult for Gargiulo, as he started the year without work. Luckily, he was taking graduate classes at Brooklyn College, where he majored in television and film. His tuition was covered by MTV until he was let go. When the MTV support ended, Gargiulo took out loans to finance school, and was able to graduate. During the same time he was taking courses, with the little money that he had left, he started to see a career coach to see about a possible career change.
“My whole goal was to do something in communications and marketing, and non-profit,” he said. “I wanted to stay with what I knew, but I wanted to do something more stable.”
By September of last year, after being without work for a year, he found himself working outside of television as a job developer, helping recently released convicts find work. He was not satisfied with the work, because it was barely half of what he made with his previous job, but continued with it. While the job lasted he proposed to Emily, and they moved in together in Bay Ridge where they split the cost of a one-bedroom $1,200 apartment.
Layoffs began at that company too, and Gargiulo left his job in September, figuring he would be next. He has since picked up a temporary job in television, but that concludes in December. He said he does not know what he will do after that, as he is currently preparing for his wedding in July next year. But he’s upbeat.
“I’m done with pessimism. I tried that for a year,” Gargiulo said. “I have to be optimistic.”
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