"Did you hear about the accident at the metal fab plant?" The question came from Felipe, one of Juan's former employees. He'd also been laid off.
"No," there was genuine concern in Juan's question. "What happened?"
"A delivery truck backed into one of the support columns," Felipe explained. "When that went down, it tipped over a fork truck carrying quarter-inch angle iron. It was a mess!"
"How bad?" Juan asked.
"I heard the angle iron fell across the welding table, and the delivery truck ruptured a water line. There was water everywhere, and it took them a couple of hours to remove the debris," Felipe talked in the rapid, clipped phrases made familiar by long, shared association. "You know that big stack of corrugated tin we used to store up in the mezzanine?"
"Yeah."
"Well, that all slid down on top of the cab," Felipe shook his head ruefully. "Smashed up the windshield pretty good, but it didn't go through."
Juan gasped. "That stuff is like razors. It could have cut the driver's head off. Is he OK?"
"He got a mild concussion," Felipe said clinically. "They took him to the hospital, but he's gonna be OK."
"Good," Juan breathed a sigh of relief. "Who was it?"
"I don't know," Felipe shrugged, "new kid."
"Where was the regular driver?" Juan asked.
Felipe glanced sideways at Juan, "I was the regular driver until Richard laid me off to save money."
"Ah!" It was a guttural sound of pure frustration. Juan pointed angrily as if he were talking to his former boss. "How much money did you save today, Richard?" he exclaimed. You pinche cabron!"
“Don’t talk like that, Juan,” Felipe nudged Juan with his elbow. “Richard's still our friend. You know that over 60% of the metal fab's operation revolves around refurbishing commercial real estate. Those buildings are sitting empty, and their owners are either going bankrupt or just cutting their losses and letting the banks take the properties back.”
Juan was an operations guy. He understood the business from that perspective. He'd relied on Richard to pay attention to the big picture and to take care of his employees. Now he and Felipe and a lot of other guys from his crew were sitting in the Labor Ready office waiting to hear if anybody was hiring for temporary positions today. "There's still some data center jobs out there, that's a pretty big company. And I heard there was some new commercial construction…" he tried to look on the bright side.
“Weren't you listening?” Felipe grunted, “There's no damn jobs!” He cursed, “The commercial real estate sector has crashed. That includes the data center!”