Contractless in Seattle

When Ben Klausner lost his job as a contract employee at Microsoft, he was one of few in Redmond who had lost work. The company had yet to announce any major layoffs and was only quietly paring back its temporary workforce. Since then, of course, Microsoft has cut the jobs of 5,800 of its own workers and continued to pare back its spending on vendors and contractors.

For Klausner, who remains out of work a year later, that has meant even more competition. Klausner said he has been applying for tons of jobs in IT architecture and network security but gets very few interviews.

For now, Klausner says he continues to plug away, "mostly keeping my head down, and trying not to spend money." But the odds, he knows, are long. "It's a buyer's market. Recruiters tell me they get hundreds of resumes for every posting."

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--Caption by Ina Fried