Job fair swamped by thousands: A scary sight

At first, I thought the news feed today was video of giant insects overtaking a building.
I had the sound on the TV turned down, and have a very active imagination. When I actually tuned in to the story, I realized the news was showing aerial footage of more than 2,000 people waiting for their turn to get into a job fair in South Florida.
Two thousand people. At a job fair. A frightening statement.
The job fair was in Davie, a town of about 85,000 in Broward County that's part of the greater South Florida metropolitan area. It only lasted a few hours, but by 3 p.m. it had drawn thousands of people. About thirty companies like Aflac, Home Depot and Amtrak took part, having various positions open. I never caught the final number on just how many people these companies need to hire, but I'm sure it wasn't anywhere close to 2,000, meaning a lot of folks went home disappointed.
I hate to be so doom and gloom about our economy, but it seems that everyday I hear at least one thing about our financial mess that scares the heck out of me. I have good employment (I don't think there will ever NOT be a need for paramedics) but am fully cognizant of the fact that I am one paycheck away from being one of these people. My police officer husband, too. Let's face it, public service is going to get shaved. We could all be laid off, and waiting in line at a job fair somewhere. It's a subject my other half and I avoid discussing, but it's there all the time, like a huge elephant in the room.
There has never been a better time to support our local businesses, and keep our money here. Shop, buy, spend locally. The more we make an effort, the better off we may be, especially when the federal stimulus money finally kicks in. If we make an effort to keep jobs here in Tampa Bay, we might just be able to avoid being on the live news feed ourselves. Waiting in line and broke.