Illionis unemployment benefits

My bosses mentioned at my yearly review in mid-April that they plan to change my title and responsibilities and go from 40hrs a week to 8hrs a week. Of course this means loss of benefits, and a wage change was mentioned. I have nothing in writing except an updated job description.
I'm not entirely sure when this is supposed to go into effect but I think it's within the next couple of weeks. Without anything in writing, it feels almost like a set up for a no call no show. In addition, I believe I would need it to file for partial unemployment.
If I haven't recieved anything in writing, is it acceptable for me to continue working as normal until then? I never gave any verbal agreement, I only was notified of intent and asked for clarification on role expectations.
*I did ask for an updated contract, to which I was told contracts are not provided, only offer letters...so I requested that instead, but I am still waiting.

I am a severely disabled man who currently lives on his own, I currently claim UC + PIP. Living on my own is very difficult and I spend many hours layed on the floor unconscious. The doctor and my medical specialist know how serious my condition is and they are unsure of what help I can get.
A few weeks ago, I collapsed onto my floor and laid their covered in urine and poo, for 19 hours whilst I waited for an ambulance to arrive due to how stretched the services are, then I spent over a week in hospital due to my condition. These things would be easier if I could have someone live with me.
I have asked the Jobcentre for help due to the severity of my condition and discussed my partner moving into the flat to help take care of me and to make our lives easier.
My partner is unemployed claiming UC living with their parents, they get £300 a month and due to the benefit cap, this amount would be reduced if we had a joint claim. I have a letter from the Jobcentre explaining this. I can't expect my partner to move in and live on less than £300, it's pretty much impossible.
I am not trying to circumvent any rules or break any rules or do anything illegal. Which is why I am here asking for advice on if there is anything else I can do, if there are alternatives to having a joint claim. Or if there are other benefits I can claim which would make this more possible. Are there any other benefits or care that I am entitled to, which could make this easier for me?
Would we be able to rent two separate flats next to each other and claim benefits legally separately still?
I did ask on DWPHELP but got bullied/threads locked and accused of benefit fraud. When I just want my partner to be able to live as physically close to me as possible, without breaking any rules. I'm not trying to find a way around the rules, I just want to live within them as comfortable as possible.

TLDR: no one will rent to me because i’m on disability benefits and can’t work due to autism and poor mental health.

it’s so hard to find a landlord willing to rent to you when you’re permanently unemployed and on benefits due to having just a bit too much autism (and mental instability) to function. just got rejected (again) which is so disheartening because i’m starting to believe i’m never going to be able to find my own place ever.
sure, no one ever says explicitly “we rejected your application because you’re on benefits and disabled” but nor do they ever give another reason. sometimes i don’t even get a response at all.
i know it’s technically illegal to discriminate in this way, but that doesn’t mean they can’t just do it covertly or invent some other reason for rejecting you.
how is it fair that just because i’m disabled i’m likely going to live with my parents for the rest of my life? it’s not like i asked for any of this, it’s not like i woke up one morning and decided, on a whim, to stop functioning. it’s literally how my brain works and it’s not something i’m able to fix.
why am i any less deserving of a place to live than anyone else? my rent may be paid via benefits but that doesn’t make it any less reliable than rent-money garnered through a 9-5 job. i even have a very reliable guarantor, but apparently as a tenant, i’m still considered incurably insufficient.
and yeah, alright, i know i’m extremely privileged and lucky to have somewhere to live at all, but it’s really not working and being trapped at home like an overgrown child is slowly making my mental health even worse. i just want my own space. why does society have to be structured in a way that makes that next to impossible?
sorry for all the complaining- i do know this is a realistically small gripe in the grand scheme of things. i’m just so disillusioned at the moment and the more i find out about the world, the more unfair it appears to be.
has anyone had any luck renting whilst unemployed and on benefits? i just need some hope or at least some success stories. thanks for reading!

Considering my last two threads have been deleted because every seems to be confused at the advice I am asking for. I am going to try one last time.
I am a severely disabled man who currently live on his own, I currently claim UC + PIP. Living on my own is very difficult and I spend many hours layed on the floor unconscious. The doctor and my medical specialist know how serious my condition is and they are unsure of what help I can get.
I have asked the Jobcentre for help due to the severity of my condition and discussed my partner moving into the flat to help take care of me and to make our lives easier.
My partner is unemployed claiming UC living with their parents, they get £300 a month and due to the benefit cap, this amount would be reduced if we had a joint claim. I have a letter from the Jobcentre explaining this. I can't expect my partner to move in and live on less than £300, it's pretty much impossible.
I am not trying to circumvent any rules or break any rules or do anything illegal. Which is why I am here asking for advice on if there is anything else I can do, if there are alternatives to having a joint claim. Or if there are other benefits I can claim which would make this more possible. Are there any other benefits or care that I am entitled to, which could make this easier for me?
A few weeks ago, I collapsed onto my floor and laid their covered in urine and poo, for 19 hours whilst I waited for an ambulance to arrive due to how stretched the services are, then I spent over a week in hospital due to my condition. These things would be easier if I could have someone live with me.
My landlord has genuinely suggested splitting my flat into two properties and writing two separate tenancy agreements, all completely above board and legal. My landlord is very supportive of my condition and how difficult it has effected me. They have suggested something related to creating a flat with multiple occupancies, I know that students quite often share a flat but rent separate bedrooms on separate tenancies, this isn't illegal or against any rules.
I do not wish to have a joint claim due to wanting separate financial control. They need their money separate and so do i. They only seem to do split payments in special circumstances. When having a "joint" claim the money isn't specified on who's is who's and this could lead to arguments or stress. As I've said before I was disabled, both me and my partner earned money from our jobs and got paid separately this was considered normal.
I am not trying to break any rules or do anything illegal, I am just a disabled man looking for some advice and support, so I can have someone live with me so I can have a slightly more comfortable life living with my disability without laying on the floor covered in my own bodily fluids for hours.
Is there any advice or benefits or anything else we can do or try, or apply for?
Edit: I am not trying to commit benefit fraud or do anything illegal. The exact opposite.
If the ideas above aren't possible, could I move out and both of us then rent two completely separate flats next to each other?
Is it okay to find a way where we could live close together without breaking any rules? People think I'm trying to find a way around the rules I'm not. I understand you have to have a "joint claim" but I want to be able to live as close together as possible, without having to do that. It's not circumventing the rules, it's following them exactly as they're intended.
​

Full Story → https://PiQSuite.com/reuters/us-weekly-jobless-claims-fall-labor-market-gradually-easing
The number of Americans filing new claims for unemployment benefits fell last week, pointing to underlying strength in the labor market.

Tl:Dr: So I started a new job last week. Tech support t1 for €35k in Ireland. So I recently quit said job because it wasn't what was said it was going to be. Got sick for the second week and quit today.
Also on mobile so format may be shit, don't care. Any spelling mistakes are my own, and I own that. Also please don't share this on any other platform.
Storytime:
So some background I applied for t2 for an ecommerce company (think shopify but not shopify) back at the end of January, which was perfect, when my department was closing at the start of January. Was advised that the job was 70% emails, 20% live chat, 10% IBC and obcs. Which as someone who hasn't done calls really in 6 maybe more years, sounded perfect, mostly emails and live chat are my jam. Can do that work for days because I hit my targets mid week and just close out cases for my last 2 days in the week.
So interaction with the recruiter was brilliant, and told me all the things I wanted to hear. Start time anywhere between 6 and 9 am. Latest I would be in would be 6pm (which is perfect so I can get dinner done before the missus gets home), I would be t2, writing scripts and fixing issues not a problem. Some weekend work was advised but not often (once a month for 1 day type of thing).
The 1st round interview was the general, where you worked, what you expected from the role, and all that. Grand out, was over prepared, so that's always good. Finished the interview and seems all good.
Assessment was to design a store (that was easy but their ui is a bit stupid) and submit before the end date. Got the store done easy, got someone else to review and double check it.
No word for about 2 months. Got an email in March saying they are looking for an April start date if they have the head count for t2.
the 2nd round was at the end of March, 2 weeks before the start date originally provided. Aced the interview, no issues, got good background in cxc and tech sup over 12 years.
Was told in the interview it would be the end of the week as the start date is now May not April. The following day, the recruiter rings and says a good interview should be this week (a week earlier than the interviewers said) when a result will be announced.
2 weeks goes by, no notice, emailed once to see if things are all OK, if there were any issues, if I could supply references. No word, no response, nothing, I started getting worried.
1 week before the May start date (now 5 months living off my savings. now stressing about work) gets a call. Gets offered a job, but as t1 because they are hiring 3 t1s and a product service engineer instead of 1 t2 and a pse.
Accept an offer for 35k instead of 45k for t1. Less responsible and same hours and benefits they said.
The training starts (elearning, just call it fucking learning, stop with putting e infront of everything) and it's 5 weeks of content condensed into 9 days (I would know, I trained a lot of people in my last team and knew the way to train others).
Lots of learning is grand, but the big test was daunting, but the presentation for the store we were building through training was going to be done by the two local manager, 2 local tech leads, 2 UK tls and 2uk tech leads, and the 4 tech leads and 4 tls from texas along with the coo. I mean no. Pressure for 7 days of modules and barely any classroom training (1.30hrs a day).
Was advised that 1 weekend a month is now 3 rotations of days, Tues-Sat, wed-Sunday, Thurs-Mon. Which is grand if you're into that lifestyle, but no, I want to spend time with my family, and partner. Also, instead of 6-9am start times, it's not 6-12am which means the latest I'll be in would be 10pm. 4 hours after my partner is finished work and also leaves 30 mins of interaction with her before she has to go to sleep for her 9-5.30.
First 3 months will be on a late shift because we will be nesting with a team over in the US, not in the EU. Which means we work their hours for 3 months on and 3 months off.
Tuesday, I broke down during training, thinking how I was going to deal with it. And suddenly I remembered after 31 years on this earth, and 14 years of working (started working around 17) I didn't have to deal with this shit.
Called into support, said I was sick, went home early (just logged off WFH) and sat down and called my doctor. Explained the situation, and was told to just leave, which was something I thought of during the weekend. So I quit.
I quit their lies, I quit their culture and I quit making myself worried sick because they really lied to me during the 5 months of interviews and such. I realised that I am more than a job, and I can find something else.
Remember folks, your mental health is not worth the money. You are not your job. And before I get asked, yes the missus is OK with me leaving, in fact encouraging me more so than anything. Yes I will get unemployment, but I will have to wait 6 weeks due to me leaving the job. And lastly I will send back their stuff because it will just take up space otherwise.
Edit: Also for got to add, I learned that we bought a lot of 3rd party companies so we could host them as our own so other e commerce companies would have to pay for the to use their apps. Also they laid off staff before starting hiring for my position. This also seemed scummy and off IMO

Hello. I hope walang mambash sa akin or think na what I'm asking is ridiculous 😅 I saw someone post "anong dream business/work mo if money is not an issue?" and it kinda woke up the business woman in me.
I got my Unemployment Benefit Claim and I am planning on creating a business plan with it. Below 20k lang naman siya but I wanna utilize it. Currently, I am just renting in MM and hybrid setup ang work (twice per week rto). Wala rin akong sariling bahay even my parents so nakikitira lang kami because we weren't able to pay the rent na after both my parents got sick and they stayed at my brother's house.
Okay enough with my sob story, ayun nga parang di na keri na isa lang ang work sa panahon ngayon so I am continuously trying to enter the VA world with GY shift and remote setup but unfortunately, di pa rin ako nakakapasok and hanap ng client. Some days naman, a VA I met in reddit is giving me paid tasks (btw thanks @helpuuuu) so I am still able to get by eventho I am currently supporting my parents.
With the amount I got from SSS, gusto ko sanang mapayabong pa siya. I'm thinking of printing business but printer pa lang mahal na. I am also into clay kineme and anything related to arts but I know sobrang dami na ring nagooffer nito. One thing I am considering is something related to food kahit paorder lang within the area. Originally, I want to start a themed cafe business but nagastos naman for my parent's hospitalization so I am kinda drained financially.
Anyone who can share a business plan that will fit my budget? I badly wanna start something right now. Any tips are welcomed.
BTW. If you're hiring for someone to help you with data entry/ 2D CAD/school works and other tasks, I'll be happy to assist you. I am also currently working as an ODOO Functional Consultant so if u are thinking of implementing it for your business, just ping me and I will walk you through.

Hello, asking as it's own post in case my comment in the monthly thread is too buried.
I was recently laid off (role eliminated) in April and am in my redeployment phase before my final date of June 15. Assuming I don't find another role in the same company by that date, I am looking into doing some freelance/1099 contractor work. I am trying to figure out if/how that may affect my ability to claim unemployment. Can anyone give me a quick summary of if it would be wiser to not do the 1099 work in order to maximize unemployment while i continue the search for another full time W2 job?
Second to all that, I am also expecting a baby, due end of June but may come sooner. Would doing 1099 work affect my PFL benefits at all?
Thanks for any info :)

And would allow me to go back to my previously active unemployment claim that was started not too long ago and continue certifying for benefits under that claim which has an end date about a year out from last month? Or will it make me ineligible for benefits under my old claim any more? I know that those are valid reasons for refusing a job offer but what happens if you have already started the job and realize it shortly afterwards? Can they be used as reasons for quitting for "good cause"?

Edit: spelling
TLDR; how can I change the date of my phone hearing for a case my employers are appealing? I didn’t get the letter until 2 days beforehand and was told to submit evidence but I don’t have time!
I got a letter from IDES that my employer is once again appealing the approval for benefits that I’ve already received two or three times. I got a letter saying that there will be a phone hearing on Friday at 9am and to submit all evidence I have that proves why I should be eligible and why I told them that my termination reason are false accusations on my employers end.
A little backstory without giving any hints of my identity, (I may have old coworkers in here), when I first applied, I got denied of course then had a phone interview with IDES about the inconsistencies in my employer’s reason for termination and request for denial of benefits. My ex manager told ides that I was terminated for something that would severely affect my license but told me something completely different so I was absolutely dumbfounded when ides revealed that info to me. My employee file was submitted to ides for review and they stated that since the investigation was unfounded and I was not fired for my own wrongdoing, IDEA approved me for benefits.
My question is, I got this letter WEDNESDAY but the hearing is FRIDAY???? How would I go about getting that date pushed back so I can prepare for that? Can I even do that? Honestly I don’t need unemployment anymore because I just started a new job but I don’t want to just not show up because I’m sure they’ll make me pay them back and they don’t deserve that after fucking me over 😂
Yes I am speaking with a lawyer about this whole termination situation and legal action will be taken. I know this description is kinda vague but the case is strong.
Also, anyone know of any good employment lawyers in Illinois? 😂 my lawyer friend isn’t practicing anymore :(

III. Changing Modes of Making It: From Horatio Alger to the Happy Hooker
…
From “Self-Culture” to Self-Promotion through “Winning Images”
In the nineteenth century, the ideal of self-improvement degenerated into a cult of compulsive industry. P.T. Barnum, who made a fortune in a calling the very nature of which the Puritans would have condemned (“Every calling, whereby God will be Dishonored; every Calling whereby none but the Lusts of men are Nourished: …every such Calling is to be Rejected”), delivered many times a lecture frankly entitled “The Art of Money-Getting,” which epitomized the nineteenth-century conception of worldly success. Barnum quoted freely from Franklin but without Franklin’s concern for the attainment of wisdom or the promotion of useful knowledge. “Information” interested Barnum merely as a means of mastering the market. Thus he condemned the “false economy” of the farm wife who douses her candle at dusk rather than lighting another for reading, not realizing that the “information” gained through reading is worth far more than the price of the candles. “Always take a trustworthy newspaper,” Barnum advised young men on the make, “and thus keep thoroughly posted in regard to the transactions of the world. He who is without a newspaper is cut off from his species.”
Barnum valued the good opinion of others not as a sign of one’s usefulness but as a means of getting credit. “Uncompromising integrity of character is invaluable.” The nineteenth century attempted to express all values in monetary terms. Everything had its price. Charity was a moral duty because “the liberal man will command patronage, which the sordid, uncharitable miser will be avoided.” The sin of pride was not that it offended God but that it led to extravagant expenditures. “A spirit of pride and vanity, when permitted to have full sway, is the undying cankerworm which gnaws the very vitals of a man’s worldly possessions.”
The eighteenth century made a virtue of temperance but did not condemn moderate indulgence in the service of sociability. “Rational conversation,” on the contrary, appeared to Franklin and his contemporaries to represent an important value in its own right. The nineteenth century condemned sociability itself, on the grounds that it might interfere with business. “How many good opportunities have passed, never to return, while a man was sipping a ‘social glass’ with his friends!” Preachments on self-help now breathed the spirit of compulsive enterprise. Henry Ward Beecher defined “the beau ideal of happiness” as a state of mind in which “a man [is] so busy that he does not know whether he is or is not happy.” Russell Sage remarked that “work has been the chied, and you might say, the only source of pleasure in my life.”
Even at the height of the Gilded Age, however, the Protestant ethic did not completely lose its original meaning. In the success manuals, the McGuffey readers, the Peter Parley Books, and the hortatory writings of the great capitalists themselves, the Protestant virtues - industry, thrift, temperance - still appeared not merely as stepping-stones to success but as their own reward.
The spirit of self-improvement lived on, in debased form, in the cult of “self-culture” - proper care and training of mind and body, nurture of the mind through “great books,” development of “character.” The social contribution of individual accumulation still survived as an undercurrent in the celebration of success, and the social conditions of early industrial capitalism, in which the pursuit of wealth undeniably increased the supply of useful objects, gave some substance to the claim that “accumulated capital means progress.” In condemning speculation and extravagance, in upholding the importance of patient industry, in urging young men to start at the bottom and submit to “the discipline of daily life,” even the most unabashed exponents of self-enrichment clung to the notion that wealth derives its value from its contribution to the general good and to the happiness of future generations.
The nineteenth-century cult of success placed surprisingly little emphasis on competition. It measured achievement not against the achievements of others but against an abstract ideal of discipline and self-denial. At the turn of the century, however, preachments on success began to stress the will to win. The bureaucratization of the corporate career changed the conditions of self-advancement; ambitious young men now had to compete with their peers for the attention and approval of their superiors. The struggle to surpass the previous generation and to provide for the next gave way to a form of sibling rivalry, in which men of approximately equal abilities jostled against each other in competition for a limited number of places. Advancement now depended on “will-power, self-confidence, energy, and initiative” - the qualities celebrated in such exemplary writings as George Lorimer’s Letters from a Self-Made Merchant to His Son. ” By the end of the nineteenth century,” writes John Cawelti in his study of the success myth, “self-help books were dominated by the ethos of sales-manship and boosterism. Personal magnetism, a quality which supposedly enabled a man to influence and dominate others, became one of the major keys to success.” In 1907, both Lorimer’s Saturday Evening Post and Orison Swett Marden’s Success magazine inaugurated departments of instruction in the “art of conversation,” fashion, and “culture.” The management of interpersonal relations came to be seen as the essence of self-advancement. The captain of industry gave way to the confidence man, the master of impressions. Young men were told that they had to sell themselves in order to succeed.
At first, self-testing through competition remained almost in-distinguishable from moral self-discipline and self-culture, but the difference became unmistakable when Dale Carnegie and then Norman Vincent Peale restated and transformed the tradition of Mather, Franklin, Barnum, and Lorimer. As a formula for success, winning friends and influencing people had little in common with industry and thrift. The prophets of positive thinking disparaged “the old adage that hard work alone is the magic key that will unlock the door to our desires.” They praised the love of money, officially condemned even by the crudest of Gilded Age materialists, as a useful incentive. “You can never have riches in great quantities,” wrote Napoleon Hill in this Think and Grow Rich,” unless you can work yourself into a white heat of desire for money.” The pursuit of wealth lost the few shreds of moral meaning that still clung to it. Formerly the Protestant virtues appeared to have an independent value of their own. Even when they became purely instrumental, in the second half of the nineteenth century, success itself retained moral and social overtones, by virtue of its contribution to the sum of human comfort and progress. Now success appeared as an end in its own right, the victory over your competitors that alone retained the capacity to instill a sense of self-approval. The latest success manuals differ from earlier ones - even surpassing the cynicism of Dale Carnegie and Peale - in their frank acceptance of the need to exploit and intimidate others, in their lack of interest in the substance of success, and in the candor with which they insist that appearances - “winning images - count for more than performance, ascription for more than achievement. One author seems to imply that the self consists of little more than its “image” reflected in others’ eyes. “Although I’m not being original when I say it, I’m sure you’ll agree that the way you see yourself will reflect the image you portray to others.” Nothing succeeds like the appearance of success.
<The American Religion by Harold Bloom (California Orphism)>
The Apotheosis of Individualism
The fear that haunted the social critics and theorists of the fifties - that rugged individualism had succumbed to conformity and “love-pressure sociability” - appears in retrospect to have been premature. In 1960, David Riesman complained that young people no longer had much social “presence,” their education having provided them not with “a polished personality but [with] an affable, casual, adaptable one, suitable to the losing organizations of an affluent society.” It is true that “a present-oriented hedonism,” as Riseman went on the argue, has replaced the work ethic “among the very classes which in the earlier stages of industrialization were oriented toward the future, toward distant goals and delayed gratification.” But this hedonism is a fraud; the pursuit of pleasure disguises a struggle for power. Americans have not really become more sociable and cooperative, as the theorists of other-direction and conformity would like us to believe; they have merely become more adept at exploiting the conventions of interpersonal relations for their own benefit. Activities ostensibly undertaken purely for enjoyment often have the real object of doing others in. It is symptomatic of the underlying tenor of American life that vulgar terms for sexual intercourse also convey the sense of getting the better of someone, working him over, taking him in, imposing your will through guile, deception, or superior force. Verbs associated with sexual pleasure have acquired more than the usual overtones of violence and psychic exploitation. In the violent world of the ghetto, the language of which now pervades American society as a whole, the violence associated with sexual intercourse is directed with special intensity by men against women, specifically against their mothers. The language of ritualized aggression and abuse reminds those who use it that exploitation is the general rule and some form of dependence the common fate, that “the individual,” in Lee Rainwater’s words, “is not strong enough or adult enough to achieve his goal in a legitimate way, but is rather like a child, dependent on others who tolerate his childish maneuvers”; accordingly males, even adult males, often depend on women for support and nurture. Many of them have to pimp for a living, ingratiating themselves with a woman in order to pry money from her; sexual relations thus become manipulative and predatory. Satisfaction depends on taking what you want instead of waiting for what is rightfully yours to receive. All this enters everyday speech in language that connects sex with aggression and sexual aggression with highly ambivalent feelings about mothers.
In some ways middle-class society has become a pale copy of the black ghetto, as the appropriation of its language would lead us to believe. We do not need to minimize the poverty of the ghetto or the suffering inflicted by whites on blacks in order to see that the increasingly dangerous and unpredictable conditions of middle-class life have given rise to similar strategies for survival. Indeed the attraction of black culture for disaffected whites suggests that black culture now speaks to a general condition, the most important feature of which is a widespread loss of confidence in the future. The poor have always had to live for the present, but now a desperate concern for personal survival, sometimes disguised as hedonism, engulfs the middle class as well. Today almost everyone lives in a dangerous world from which there is little escape. International terrorism and blackmail, bombings, and hijackings arbitrarily affect the rich and poor alike. Crime, violence, and gang wars make cities unsafe and threaten to spread to the suburbs. Racial violence on the streets and in the schools creates an atmosphere of chronic tension and threatens to erupt at any time into full-scale racial conflict. Unemployment spreads from the poor the white-collar class, while inflation eats away the savings of those who hoped to retire in comfort. Much of what is euphemistically known as the middle class, merely because it dresses up to go to work, is now reduced to proletarian conditions of existence. Many white-collar jobs require no more skill and pay even less than blue-collar jobs, conferring little status or security. The propaganda of death and destruction, emanating ceaselessly from the mass media, adds to the prevailing atmosphere of insecurity. Far-flung famines, earthquakes in remote regions, distant wars and uprisings attract the same attention as events closer to home. The impression of arbitrariness in the reporting of disaster reinforces the arbitrary quality of experience itself, and the absence of continuity in the coverage of events, as today’s crisis yields to a new and unrelated crisis tomorrow, adds to the sense of historical discontinuity - the sense of living in a world in which the past holds out no guidance to the present and the future has become completely unpredictable.
Older conceptions of success presupposed a world in rapid motion, in which fortunes were rapidly won and lost and new opportunities unfolded every day. Yet they also presupposed a certain stability, a future that bore some recognizable resemblance to the present and the past. The growth of bureaucracy, the cult of consumption with its immediate gratifications, but above all the severance of the sense of historical continuity have transformed the Protestant ethic while carrying the underlying principles of capitalist society to their logical conclusion . The pursuit of self-interest, formerly identified with the rational pursuit of gain and the accumulation of wealth, has become a search for pleasure and psychic survival. Social conditions now approximate the vision of republican society conceived by the Marquis de Sade at the very outset of the republican epoch. In many ways the most farsighted and certainly the most disturbing of the prophets of revolutionary individualism, Sade defended unlimited self-indulgence as the logical culmination of the revolution in property relations - the only way to attain revolutionary brotherhood in its purest form. By regressing in his writings to the most primitive level of fantasy, Sade uncannily glimpsed the whole subsequent development of personal life under capitalism, ending not in revolutionary brotherhood but in a society of siblings that has outlived and repudiated its revolutionary origins.
Sade imagined a sexual utopia in which everyone has the right to everyone else, where human beings, reduced to their sexual organs, become absolutely anonymous and interchangeable. His ideal society thus reaffirmed the capitalist principle that human beings are ultimately reducible to interchangeable objects. It also incorporated and carried to a surprising new conclusion Hobbes’s discovery that the destruction of paternalism and the subordination of all social relations to the market had stripped away the remaining restraints and the mitigating illusions from the war of all against all. In the resulting state of organized anarchy, as Sade was the first to realize, pleasure becomes life’s only business - pleasure, however, that is indistinguishable from rape, murder, unbridled aggression. In a society that has reduced reason to mere calculation, reason can impose no limits on the pursuit of pleasure - on the immediate gratification of every desire no matter how perverse, insane, criminal, or merely immoral. For the standards that would condemn crime or cruelty derive from religion, compassion, or the kind of reason that rejects purely instrumental applications; and none of these outmoded forms of thought or feeling has any logical place in a society based on commodity production. In his misogyny, Sade perceived that bourgeois enlightenment, carried to its logical conclusions, condemned even the sentimental cult of womanhood and the family, which the bourgeoisie itself had carried to unprecedented extremes.
At the same time, he saw that condemnation of “woman-worship” had to go hand in hand with a defense of woman’s sexual rights - their right to dispose of their own bodies, as feminists would put it today. If the exercise of that right in Sade’s utopia boils down to the duty to become an instrument of someone else’s pleasure, it was not so much because Sade hated women as because he hated humanity. He perceived, more clearly than the feminists, that all freedoms under capitalism come in the end to the same thing, the same universal obligation to enjoy and be enjoyed. In the same breath, and without violating his own logic, Sade demanded for women the right “fully to satisfy all their desires” and “all parts of their bodies” and categorically stated that “all women must submit to our pleasure.” Pure individualism thus issued in the most radical repudiation of individuality. “All men, all women resemble each other,” according to Sade; and to those of his countrymen who would become republicans he adds this ominous warning: “Do not think you can make good republicans so long as you isolated in their families the children who should belong to the republic alone.” The bourgeois defense of privacy culminates - not just in Sade’s thought but in the history to come, so accurately foreshadowed in the very excess, madness, infantilism of his ideas - in the most thoroughgoing attack on privacy; the glorification of the individual, in his annihilation.
<…>
Standing-Reserve.
Note a lack of the “Greek” in Lasch.
Visions of Excess: Selected Writings, 1927-1939 by Georges Bataille, Edited by A. Stoekl, Translated by A. Stoekl, C.R. Lovitt, and D.M. Leslie Jr.
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I’m disabled and have been living with a close relative since September of 2022. He’s getting evicted because he got behind on rent after being let go after 15 years of working at his company. He applied for unemployment and the company is fighting it. He likely will win but it’s been 3 months at this point. I gave every cent I had to keep the place going but we are now owe 4 months back rent. The landlord and my relative also got into a heated argument which made things worse. He has found a job but doesn’t get his first check until next week. The landlord doesn’t want him here and knows I can’t afford it on my own.
The eviction doesn’t list me on it. The landlord is well aware I live here. My legal address was changed back in September of ‘22. The electric is in my name.
Do I have any rights? This is in upstate NY. I have reached out to legal aid and have not heard back from them. I have no other friends or family to live with. I am heading to social services tomorrow but don’t think they will have much for me, at least not right away.
My relative is going to ask for an adjournment and I know he’s entitled to at least two weeks but after that I’m going to be in trouble.
I’m not trying to screw anyone over. I should have made sure I was on the lease and I take that responsibility. The place is clean and will be easy to get ready to rent again. I have looked around for roommates without any luck. I do not want to end up homeless or in a shelter so if it is in try legal rights to stay a month or two longer it would greatly benefit my chances of making out of this mess. And I feel for the landlord and what it’s like not receiving rent.
Thank you for any relative information.

I think there’s an 80% chance I’m going to be fired in the next couple months for underperforming in my role. If I take an unpaid stress leave now in order to start searching for a new job right away, I doubt they would fire me while I’m away on unpaid leave?
I don’t care about getting unemployment benefits/severance, I have a ton of savings. It’s very easy to switch jobs in my industry (accounting) and I live in a big city so tons of job opportunities. I’ve got a strong resume/interview skills, so I’m confident I can find a new job within a few months. It’s much much harder to find a new job when you’re unemployed and clearly fired from your previous position. That’s the scenario that I’m desperate to avoid.
For context, my company is midsize/large about 700 employees. Other accounting people I know here have taken unpaid stress/personal leaves.

With the unemployment rate surging past 4% and expected to climb higher, has anyone been granted an extension of benefits beyond their claim limit? This economy is one of the toughest we've seen for job seekers. Despite applying to over 150 jobs a week, responses are rare and often lead nowhere. My benefits are running out in a few weeks. Any advice would be appreciated!

I’m very depressed and low currently - I don’t need Reddit Cares or a referral. I need solid advice from post-menopausal women and other folks 50+ I have asked for advice in some subs and being a relatively regular Redditor I did not expect the anger and mean responses. If you have a mean response, please choose instead not to respond.
For those willing to give solid advice: I am on the verge of what could be a new chaptephase of life and I want to prepare now to enter it well and rebuild myself through it.
I am currently unemployed, this most recent period of unemployment has been 5 months. I am in week 3 of a 6 week recovery from a total abdominal hysterectomy. The week prior to my surgery I took a 5 day in person Level 1 RV tech service class co-sponsored by RV Technical Institute & RV Women’s Alliance - both of which I learned about via Reddit. Apparently there is high demand for RV techs and while the entry salary is $40-50K when you are certified you can make 6 figures (entry and later have 401K match - this is important to know later on). They work M-F 40 hours, no weekends. Day 4 of class I was verbally offered a job - they are waiting on my doctors clearance to work. I loved my time meeting these folks and learning the industry. I passed the class and its exam, and the job offer company offered to pay for the remainder of my certification.
I applied to take the Level 1 class because I want to RV part-time. I don’t yet own an RV, I watch a lot of YouTube & camped about 3 times in my adult life. I love being outdoors, I wanted this to become a post-retirement hobby. I’m thinking Class B van. When I became unemployed, I considered what are the best opportunities of things I enjoy to make lifelong income?
As this was happening a statewide nonprofit offered me a job right away - I applied for one job and they considered me for 3 roles, they are putting me in the highest paying role of the 3 (about $80K, 401K employer match, fully remote but must reside in-state). I am happy they are excited about hiring me but super leery due to my recent past. This job is in my career field and a very different role. 2024 is my 31st year in my career. Almost 4 years ago, the onset of severe perimenopause symptoms upended my entire life. I had just left my job of longest employment of 8 years (began at 55K, left at $68K) for another job in the same organization that paid $115K and seemed like a reach. It was, I wasn’t a good fit and I quit 8 months later. Over my 8 months unemployment without benefits I decided to sell my house I’d owned & lived in 7 years to a broker, allowing me to break even and move out quickly (I had no help moving & moved myself). I took another job as I moved in with family, that job ($70K) would have been perfect but the org foundemy boss was not willing to do what was needed and necessary to make the job manageable and practical. I quit 8 months later and was able to secure unemployment benefits.
The new statewide nonprofit job asked me candidly about my last job -I was honest about my shortcomings & contributions, as well as the environment. I encouraged them to contact my references, who know my shortcomings and how a truly developmental environment would aid me in finally overcoming them. They are still excited to finalize the job offer. I expect they will by this Friday & then I will contact the RV company declining their job offer. But, I want to stay close to RV’ing.
I also am launching a lifelong side business based off of lessons learned from what I most enjoyed about my career in community development - I will soft launch in June with a hard launch planned in early 2025, it’s a virtual space as I want my work from now on to be home-based and/or fully remote; and I am getting through these tough baby “how to start an LLC in my state” baby steps.
I am never married, no kids. I last dated in 2004. I had a 17 year FWB 2004-2022. I tried an international non-denominational church on and off from 1996-2002, 2011-2014, and 2020-2023. I found that church isn’t really prepared to serve or engage older folks so I am not sure I’ll return & I am doubting joining any church as a senior single.
I am the youngest sibling but the one charged with being responsible for my immediate family. My parents, divorced, are 80 & 82. My next oldest sibling is 58. The three of them are chronically ill. I am healthy & trying my best to stay that way and improve it. My older sibling has lived with one parent for about 4-5 years. I’ve been here just over 1 year. I plan to move out into a housing cooperative apartment ASAP (if approved, their “rent” is a fraction of traditional rent).
I spent my life’s savings & retirement the past 4 years to now. I believe having a community of support will be crucial as I age - if I become sick where I cannot work, there is no one to support me. I never have had friends - I have many acquaintances & 1 friend of 30 years. I have never dated more than 2 years but almost all my exes tried to befriend me after apologizing to me about our relationship. I can think of 3 men whom if I said yes to dating them my life would have been different but I simply did not want to & it’s hard to regret that. I do not believe someone will emerge to date now whom I will be attracted to, who actively wants to be healthy & will be with me in my healing into my best self. That makes me sad and holds me back.
I do not want to be sad so much or depressed so often - it comes from never belonging. I am not perfect, I know my flaws & I try to be honest about them as I work on them (learned that as I began my career & never stopped). But I failed in my view, I don’t have a life where I feel whole & fulfilled. All I have written here are my attempts in progress to rebuild not just my income and life’s savings, but to do so as I build my best life. I tried my best and nothing worked out. I’m taking things slower than I have and I ask myself if what I am doing brings me freedom, peace & joy.
How should I change my view/my mindset as I rebuild? Other specific advice?

I just got a job working in a dermatology office which was great news for me as I have been unemployed or underemployed for years, and dermatology is one of my special interests. However, I have never worked a 9-5 type of job and have never been able to sustain full time work. So this is pretty new to me. And although I’m happy to finally have a decent paying job with benefits, it’s proving to be difficult… and it’s only my second week!
Particularly, the social aspect is very hard for me. This job is for extroverts. You’re literally surrounded by coworkers, supervisors, doctors, and patients the whole day- and people want to converse all day. We get one tiny break room and have to take our breaks together. I’m pretty good at masking but only up until a certain point… after a while, I lose my ability to mask and become very overstimulated if I can’t get away from people. Then I start to feel very irritable, and I know people can pick up on this.
It’s not really the patients I mind as much as the coworkers, as I’m literally with my coworkers 75% of the day but not with patients as much. And so far I like the job itself, but like I said, I really struggle with the social aspect. My coworkers are constantly joking and laughing and talking. I don’t understand when people are joking and they’re already picking up on that. “I was joking!” It makes me very anxious and I constantly ruminate on social interactions and now it’s amplified with this job. I don’t know how I’m going to make it through. I’m already thinking of quitting but wouldn’t be able to afford to live and would hate to have to go back into retail making poverty wages.
Today the woman training me overwhelmed me so much. She was watching my every move and correcting me which was driving me crazy and made me mess up more. I unfortunately snapped at her a little because I was so overstimulated. I felt bad and did apologize, even though I probably shouldn’t have because she was correcting me on something I was right about. I just wanted to keep the peace since it’s only my second week.
Lastly, I live in the US and chose not to disclose my disability in fear of discrimination. I do not want anyone in the office to know I’m autistic, and this is why I’m uncomfortable disclosing and asking for accommodations (I don’t even know what accommodations I would ask for anyway.)
I’m in desperate need of advice for surviving an office environment full of extroverts as an introverted autistic woman. Please share any tips… I really don’t know how I’m going to survive this, but it is a great opportunity for me and I really don’t want to blow it. Any advice from those who also do it????

I’m disabled and have been living with a close relative since September of 2022. He’s getting evicted because he got behind on rent after being let go after 15 years of working at his company. He applied for unemployment and the company is fighting it. He likely will win but it’s been 3 months at this point. I gave every cent I had to keep the place going but we are now owe 4 months back rent. The landlord and my relative also got into a heated argument which made things worse. He has found a job but doesn’t get his first check until next week. The landlord doesn’t want him here and knows I can’t afford it on my own.
The eviction doesn’t list me on it. The landlord is well aware I live here. My legal address was changed back in September of ‘22. The electric is in my name.
Do I have any rights? This is in upstate NY. I have reached out to legal aid and have not heard back from them. I have no other friends or family to live with. I am heading to social services tomorrow but don’t think they will have much for me, at least not right away.
My relative is going to ask for an adjournment and I know he’s entitled to at least two weeks but after that I’m going to be in trouble.
I’m not trying to screw anyone over. I should have made sure I was on the lease and I take that responsibility. The place is clean and will be easy to get ready to rent again. I have looked around for roommates without any luck. I do not want to end up homeless or in a shelter so if it is in try legal rights to stay a month or two longer it would greatly benefit my chances of making out of this mess. And I feel for the landlord and what it’s like not receiving rent.
Thank you for any relative information.
The people who answer questions here are awesome.

I'm currently receiving arbeitlosengeld my, question is what happens if I get a job offer abroad? can I accept and move or will I have to pay back the money received?

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TLDR: Signed up for affordable health insurance through marketplace. Plan claims specialist is in network, but the hospital called and said the appointment won't be covered and United Health Care is not in network. I called UHC and they said some things that didn't really make sense and hung up. What Should I do? This is in Alabama btw.
I was fired form my job in February and lost my insurance which was BCBS FEP. Before I lost that insurance, I had some imaging work done for a medical issue that I am dealing with. That imaging work was done in March under BCBS. I officially lost the insurance in April. During this time I had an appointment with a specialist scheduled in May and I figured that would give me enough time to sign up for marketplace insurance. I managed to get signed up with United Health Care Silver Plan at the end of April so I would have insurance ready for my appointment in May. When I was looking for the insurance, I filtered the results to show the specific specialist that I had the appointment for and the hospital/medical center that the specialist works at. Marketplace (Healthcare gov) showed that the doctor and facility were in the network for this plan. I bought the plan and was happy thinking that everything should go smoothly for my upcoming appointment. This is where things start getting confusing. I got a call from the hospital (I believe it was the department of the specialist that I needed to see) saying that the insurance that I have (UHC) will not cover anything at all including initial visit, imaging, surgeries etc. I broke out in an instant sweat. I told her that the marketplace website said that this doctor and facility were in the network. I ended up rescheduling to late June. I keep having to push this appointment back due to the insurance issues. I called UHC to confirm whether the hospital/specialist was showing if they were in the network in their system. They did not really help much. The rep said something along the lines of "A primary care physician needs to send a referral to the specialist and they don't have it in the UHC system. The thing is I had a referral sent which is why I had an appointment to begin with, it was just sent when I was enrolled in Blue Cross Blue Shield FEP. Basically my question is: WHERE DO I GO FROM HERE? Should I file some type of complaint to get the money that I have paid for the plan? What's the point of having a plan that doesen't cover anything. I only went with this plan because of the affordability and the benefits. It has an $1800 deductible and I was pretty sure I will need some surgery. It said on the website that the facility and doctor were in the network. Should I cancel the plan and look for another plan through marketplace? I am currently unemployed and living off savings for now. I really am trying to see a doc soon because my medical issue wont allow me to exercise or exert myself. I know this may sound like I am all over the place but I am needing some advice. Also this is taking place in the state of Alabama. Just looking for some advice on what to do next. If more details are needed then let me know. Thanks.

TL/DR: Birth rates are declining from the higher opportunity cost of raising a child as people become wealthier, and not primarily because of the rising cost of living.
The impetus for my post was reading the discussion about efforts in France to increase fertility rates amid an aging population. In the comments the vast majority pointed to high living expenses, housing costs, and stagnant wages as the real issue. This narrative is fairly widespread on Reddit. I think there is a lot of merit to the underlying political issues being discussed; housing prices and the cost of living have skyrocketed, largely to the detriment of young people or those trying to start a family. In my opinion governments need to do a lot more to address these issues and I don't necessarily disagree with the sentiments of the commenters. At the same time I think the issue of birth rates is complex and does not necessarily fit neatly in this worldview.
Economic difficulty obviously affects birth rates to some extent. Recessions, declining GDP, and a rising unemployment rate have all been tied to a small but significant reduction in fertility in the West. The idea that higher housing costs would cause a reduction in fertility makes logical sense but isn't necessarily supported by empirical evidence. If a couple wanted to wait until they were a homeowner before having a child, then a higher cost of buying home would in theory reduce the likelihood that they have a child. However, in Canada, where housing prices have increased greatly, rising housing costs were not associated with changes in fertility among homeowners or renters. It is evident that there are more factors at play.
Wealthier people have less children. This is true when comparing median income between countries and fertility rates, and among individuals in the same country that are stratified by income. If the main driving force for lower birth rates were higher housing prices and the cost of living, birth rates should be higher among people who can afford houses and for whom the cost of living will be less impactful. This is the opposite of the truth. This does not necessarily disprove the reddit narrative (as correlation does not equal causation), but it is evidence against it.
In my view, the decline in fertility is in large part a consequence of the higher opportunity cost of having a child as a household becomes wealthier. This is to say that a wealthier person is leaving more money on the table by spending their time raising a child instead of working when compared to a less wealthy person. The change over time is a consequence of the average person becoming wealthier.
The opportunity cost is reflected is reflected in the "motherhood penalty", where women who have children earn less than their peers. This is the primary driver of the gender pay gap, as women below the average child bearing age earn similar amounts to their male peers, while the gap begins later. Conventionally there is a negative relationship between female labour participation and fertility (although perhaps this relationship may be reversing). My point with all of this is to say that someone who is economically prospering is not more likely to have a child, and is in fact less likely. This means that increasing economic prosperity results in less childbirth rather than stagnation or higher costs. This is of course against the popular narrative.
In my opinion this opportunity cost is difficult to mitigate. In theory, having greater parental leave should make it easier to continue working after having a child, but it is not clear that leave policies affect fertility rates. Regions with very strong parental leave laws such as Northern Europe have low fertility rates. Sweden is renowned for gender equality and a relatively lesser gender pay gap, but there is still a persistent motherhood penalty and declining fertility rate. Obviously greater gender parity and access to parental leave is a good thing, but that does not mean it necessarily causes people to have more children.
Universal/subsidized childcare or other government programs to help with child costs may help although in Quebec it does not appear to have increased fertility significantly. Other jurisdictions have had different results. Without getting too deep in this rabbit hole, I think its clear that the answer to low fertility rates may not be as simple as the government programs making it easier for people to have children. These programs obviously have other important benefits, and the birth rate is not the end all be all.
Based on my understanding of the evidence, the decline in birth rate may have more to do with the increasing opportunity cost as income (particularly among women) is increasing rather than the cost of living, housing prices, or a lack of parental leave or other programs. Obviously there are a lot of factors such as education, urban/rural split, immigration, religion, and access to contraceptives that I did not go into. I'm curious if there are convincing arguments against mine!

I had a relapse and now I'm £100 down, that doesn't seem a lot compared to all these posts but I'm unemployed and am not recieving benefits at the moment so that literally all my money. I want to self exclude but now all I can do is continue to do free spin offers and such to try get it back. That's my food money for the month gone over boredom. I feel like such a failure. Once my partner finds out I've done it again, I feel like that'll be it. FUCK IT ALL.