[mysticmissle]

Read in another thread car parts are in short supply, and prices seem low for pontiac car sales. got me wondering how much this group has been effected.
I did sell and buy a vintage pontiac this pandemic and would say the good stuff always sells, and brings what it is worth. i think they both were valued fairly, i think i got a great car, but it certainly was not cheap.
This last 4 months i have done a lot of wheeling and dealing parts, and golf carts, there are deals to be had for sure. i have flipped more this year than ever before. I attribute it mostly to timing, alot of time spent in the sale sections, and the forethought to have the cash available, and quickly respond to deals when they arise.
My younger buddy has made a fortune this summer doing the zero turn and generator shuffle. He is very talented and has bought, fixed and resold 30 plus different machine this summer. being the summer season, is almost over, he is just about ready to move to snow blowers and already has a decent inventory of refurbished equipment.
I think alot of the $600 weekly stipends got gobbled up in car parts and home improvement activities for sure. You cant go into home depot and not see people spending like it someone gave them free money.
Back to the original question, i have never stopped working, but did take a modest pay cut. my work has gotten slower, and some of the hourly guys and engineering/sales force have been on furlough or work share but I haven't missed any paid time.
Biggest difference for me has been zero racing and no car shows and swap meets. I miss both.
My friend is a fireman, so he has actually been working more than normal too, some government subsidies in the town he works for has the department working all the time. That is a different job obviously.
My wifes' company has felt a sting, but they deal mostly with state contracts. The state definatley is cutting back on spending, so that remains to be seen how much we feel that. It could be big impact.
My son works in the food business and he was out of work for a few months, now he is back to normal or busier as alot of people have delayed their return to the work force.
Have alot of people that frequent this board, that are not retired, been out of work or is the type of people that make up an antique car club, insulated from the unemployment, by the diverse types of work it takes to support out hobbies?

[The Champ]

I retired from the 40 hour grind in early 2018. But I have worked a part time job 2 - 3 days a week until the Covid lock down eliminated my position. I didn't need the money, but I enjoyed the job.

My position has been reinstated as of next Monday, so going back to work 2 days a week.

My wife is still working, but Covid changed her world dramatically. It hasn't affected her income at all, but her job has her travel around North America. She had been working on site in Yuma, AZ about 66% of the time. When the world changed in March, she has been working from home instead of traveling. She's still working on the Yuma project, just over the phone, zoom, and on her laptop. The 2 time zone difference makes for a longer day for her and it's more difficult working remotely. Her company's travel ban has been extended until the end of the year at this time.

At the same time I was furloughed and my wife's travel suspended, our grandson reported for active duty in the Marine Corps. His life (and our's) changed due to Covid also. He graduated from boot camp in San Diego in June and we were going to go out and watch him graduate. Covid canceled that. He was supposed to have 10 days leave after that and come home. Covid canceled that and he went directly to Marine Combat training at Camp Pendleton. He graduated from that in July. He's been sitting in Pendleton since July waiting to go to Pensacola for his next training gig. Normally, he'd have been allowed to take some leave during this dead time. Covid canceled that. He's currently waiting for a military flight to take him to Pensacola. Normally for a cross country relocation the military would have you take a commercial flight. Covid canceled that.

Poor kid has been restricted to a limited portion of MCRT San Diego and Camp Pendleton since he reported in mid March. When he gets to Pensacola, to the best of his knowledge, he will still be restricted to base. Unless anything changes, his first exposure to off base life could take until Thanksgiving or Christmas.

I was extremely frustrated with the limitations placed on me with the lockdown. But these young troops make my problems very small.

[PunchT37]

Never stopped. Work for utilities now, for the city. Later on today, we have to deal with a hurricane.

[RocktimusPryme]

I work with the DoD. I had about 2 weeks of telework when my GF was sick and tests were hard to come by. Other than that I have been in. The base on the whole is about 80% telework still, planned into next spring. It creates some contention. Techs like me have been asked to come in everyday while engineers, logisticians, and supervisors are working from home.

I certainly dont want to play the victim, because I know lots of people have it much worse this year, but there are definitely some sour feelings when my alarm clock goes off. I know a lot of my co workers are just going to be walking to their home computer while I am driving to work. First world problems.

[mysticmissle]

Champ please thank him for his service! that is some big bumps in a young mans world.
Punch good luck down there, it looks like it s goin t o be a **** show, be safe.
Rocktimus total parrallel, we have been very lucky, hopefully it will continue like that. I was envious of the $600 and the stimulus checks, but fortunate enough not to need them.

[GTOnly70]

Never stopped working, but I've been working from home since March - which has been great since my commute is 1 hr. each way. My company recently informed us that the work-from-home mandate will stay in effect until the end of the year, barring unforeseen developments. No complaints here.

My son is a sophomore EE major at Texas A&M. He is taking all his classes online this semester and living at home. Hopefully back to campus this spring. My daughter is a high school junior and on a hybrid schedule - twice a week at school and 3 days at home.

My side Ebay business selling car parts has been going like gangbusters for the duration. It's too bad the swap meets were cancelled this year, I badly need an inventory refresh.

[Ben M.]

I got fired right before 'ronas. Finally picked up another job in June and have been working remotely from home full time. Gives me plenty of time to get stuff done and prepare for moving, it's been on hold for 2 months now.

They don't anticipate us coming back in to the office more than a day or two until next year, and even then you must have a good reason to come in - like a project that requires in-person work.

[tempest1964]

I work at a defense facility, building tank transmissions. Never stopped.

[Lemans64]

Was off for 7 weeks, from march 17th till june, back to work and it's been busier than normal. Work for Auto Dealer, sales is picking up as well.
Toyota is where I work and we have a crap load of recalls out and everybody wants them done while they are off work. booking 2 weeks out.

[Stuart]

I'm mostly retired as of earlier this spring but my company has stayed pretty busy. They're planning on opening up the office on a limited basis starting next week, but encourage people to continue working from home as much as possible.

Originally Posted by GTOnly70

My son is a sophomore EE major at Texas A&M. He is taking all his classes online this semester and living at home. Hopefully back to campus this spring.

That's something I've been thinking about...I'm an EE as well, and when I was in school we had plenty of lab classes. Those can't be done remotely, so I wonder if they'll delay them or make them up later somehow.

[moneypit]

Never stopped, parts manager at Honda Dealership.

[shawn e.]

HVAC never stopped. Wife works at a school cluster ****!

[Ben M.]

Originally Posted by Stuart

Those can't be done remotely, so I wonder if they'll delay them or make them up later somehow.

Most labs have been focusing on programming and not actually building hardware, so that's something to consider...

[Stuart]

Originally Posted by Ben M.

Most labs have been focusing on programming and not actually building hardware, so that's something to consider...

Good point - back in my day we were still soldering wires and hooking up individual transistors and resistors.

[ZnbOlds455]

I never stopped. I work for a power cable manufacturer and our business really picked up when this hit. Our corporate office in NJ had to send whoever they could to work from home. Otherwise, we are totally normal. We hired some full time employees to do nothing but sanitize surfaces.

My wife works for a medical tube supplier and she had to work from home since most of her engineering function is interfacing with sales. Their business really dropped off, but their manufacturing plants are still running with similar protocols to mine.

My job is now engineer from 8-5, home school 3 kids from 5:30-9. School is totally virtual and is a mess. They are supposed to go to a hybrid model when/if covid cases drop below a certain threshold.

[Gastiresandoil]

Never stopped and busier than before.

We make plastic laboratory items, i.e. the stuff they are using to analysis the virus.

[mysticmissle]

extruded plastic lab items? I work for an extruder manufacturer, we have been steadily getting new orders, just had a big lull from april to july in sales

[Gastiresandoil]

Originally Posted by mysticmissle

extruded plastic lab items? I work for an extruder manufacturer, we have been steadily getting new orders, just had a big lull from april to july in sales

Injection molding - culture tubes, mailing tubes, centrifuge tubes, pipette tips, racks, pcr, etc.

[David Jones]

We closed down for a few weeks. I worked (bills paid and payroll written) about 2 days a week and somebody else came in once a day to take care of any wholesale orders and answer the phone/return missed calls. Even though the jewelry industry as a whole closed, there were a few folks out there trying. A few days after we started opening back up, my brother decided he'd caught the Covid and we shut down again until he got the negative results back. Since then the wholesale side of our jewelry business has been on fire. Our July was the best we've had in over 20 years.

[SRR]

No real change except we have to wear masks at work. If anything I'm working more hours than before and we have been setting sales records.