A friend of mine who's been on unemployment benefits for a couple of years now due to the chronic depressions he's suffering from was actually very happy about yesterday's ruling.
In my opinion, the content of your post hasn't much to do with the actual reality we're living in. Instead it appears as if you try to force a certain ideology onto reality irrespective of whether this makes much sense or not.
At no point did I indicate that my friend never tried to find or hold a job. The sequence of events in the seven years or so I've known him was more like this:
- Unemployed when I first met him.
- Working full time for a year or so, until he quit because he felt this job actually increased his depression and anxiety.
- Unemployed for a while.
- Working part time for a year, until he quit because he felt his job still increased his problems.
- Unemployed for a while.
- Stayed in a clinic for a while.
- Asked the employment office to pay for a re-training in a sector he felt to be a lot less stressful. Request for re-training denied, instead he was suppossed to find another job in the same sector he worked before.
- Unemployed for a while.
- Stayed in another clinic for a while.
- Filed a lawsuit against the employment office.
The ideology of "someone must eventually hold a job no matter whether one suffers from a psychiatric condition and no matter whether the last jobs worsened the effects of that condition" is nonsensiscal and destroys people's lifes.
I'd say I know what I'm talking about. I was always holding a job in the past decade or so, even though I'm certainly suffering from similar problems as my friend. What makes me different? I'd say that my depressions and my anxiety is balanced out by obsessive compulsive behavior and a severe fear of failure, forcing me to continue working even when this leads to a worsening of the condition in my case as well. Sometimes I think that in the long run it would be better for my own health to just quit too.
I'd like to add to my earlier remarks that in the support group I once were we had a total of three suicides within four years.
With that in mind, telling them to "go find a job" is more of a mockery rather than an actual solution. One of the suicides temporarily held a job as a computer progammer at the Bayer AG, but ultimately she couldn't cut it due to her mental issues, then she was on unemployment benefits for a couple of years, then she was in a clinic too and then she threw herself off a high-rise building.
Mental disorders/issues are certainly a thing, and some people not being able to hold a job is understandable.
I am more concerned about those who take advantage of the system here. Austria has a generous benefits programme, and many immigrants are taking advantage of it.
Being a new 3rd Country/non-EU immigrant myself, I am no disillusioned native simply pushing the blame onto newcomers.
I hope you'll manage to overcome the issues you are having, or at least keep them under control as best as possible. I've heard exercise/sport can be of help sometimes, but you already probably know more about such things.
