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Current DateTime: 08:55:35 10 Feb 2012
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CONTRIBUTORS


Current DateTime: 08:55:35 10 Feb 2012
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  • Cindy Perman

      News Editor at CNBC.com and the author of The Pony Blog (ponyblog.cnbc.com). She has also written a book, “New York Curiosities,” and does stand-up comedy.

  • Jane Wells

      CNBC business news reporter, based in Los Angeles, covering the defense and technology industries. She writes the CNBC.com blog Funny Business.

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ABOUT THIS BLOG

The news can get a little heavy sometimes, with debt crises, vicious markets and crappy earnings reports. So, we dispatched our crack reporters, Cindy Perman and Jane Wells, to find some levity amid all this seriousness. May we offer you a Keynesian cocktail with a side of bacon?

Why a Pony? To be clear, there were no ponies harmed in the making of this blog. The blog’s name, “There Must Be a Pony In Here Somewhere,” comes from an old joke, a favorite of Ronald Reagan’s, that essentially means, with a pile of you-know-what this big, there MUST be a pony—a bright side—in here somewhere!

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There Must Be A Pony In Here Somewhere

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Apr.08
2:23 PM ET
Wednesday, 8 Apr 2009

Job Seekers Outraged by Easter Egg Hunt

Hey, Mr. Easter Bunny — You might want to tone it down a bit this year. Tensions are high with all the pressures of the recession and your big fuzzy ears and basket of brightly colored eggs may not go over so well with those who've fallen on hard times.

Look what I found! Look what I found! A plumber hiding in the grass! And there's a secretary, a construction worker, a banker ...

It seemed innocent enough: A training center for JobCentre, the U.K. equivalent of the Labor Department, had organized an Easter egg hunt for the unemployed.

Job seekers would hunt for chocolate eggs containing prizes such as a job-application form to become a security guard, a payment for a license to work on building sites and vouchers to buy interview clothes.

A JobCentre representative said they thought it would be fun. But they thought wrong. Job seekers were furious, saying they were embarrassed enough just to have to sign up with the employment agency. Asking them to hunt around for eggs was “humiliating.”

“Some of us are not proud of signing on, and this just rubs our face in it,” Graham Barnes, an unemployed 31-year-old, told the Daily Mail.

“It seems like a kick while people are down,” Michael Harknett-Wilson, an unemployed banker, told the South London Press newspaper.

Amid the uproar, the event, scheduled for today, was canceled.

Personally, I would’ve done it just for the chocolate. But then again, not everyone likes their unemployment candy-coated.

Pony Treats:

Recession-Proof Bonnet. Recession or not, some women wouldn't be caught dead without a new hat for Easter.

Easter Dresses for Dogs. They say pets are recession proof and Easter is no exception — check out these Easter duds for dogs.

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