Freedom is the privilege to starve beneath the Brooklyn Bridge

Aside from Law enforcement the lowest form of employment is working as a temp. Like a cop no one wants a temp around until they need you. And when you show up at your assignment you're treated as if you've just landed at Kalaupapa. Full-timers believe you're taking bread from them, supervisors recoil at the thought of training yet another person who may or may not show up for the next shift, management struggles with mountains of paperwork. Temps even disdain one another; the competition is fierce at the job site as workers vie for attention and recognition. The only thing worse than working is looking for work. Temp agencies know this and go to great lengths to get workers in their data banks.
Temp agents are skillful liars. They promise potential employees incentives such as health insurance, choice of assignments, and performance bonuses. The health insurance they offer is expensive and covers almost nothing. Your choice of assignments generally implies, "Take this position or we won't be calling again, evah". Performance bonuses get eaten up in taxes. If you have been collecting state employment benefits for being out of work you can lose those benefits if you are released from an assignment. The temp agency simply tells the state employment office you were sacked. Maybe being a cop is a step above being a temp. At least as a cop one can legitimately chase someone down, beat them, and steal their drugs and cash.
Job sites vary. Depending on your skills and education you have a choice of light production, office work, or labourer. All for a dollar above the minimum wage. With three university degrees I was assigned to light production, second shift. The temp agency assured me that this was a "temp to hire position". When I inquired about permanent full-time employment I was told the company has no plans to hire new workers. Not that I want to work for this faceless multi-national, natural resource wasting corporation. The only pride I take in my work is the knowledge I have that everything in life is temporary.
Things could be worse for me on the employment front. I could be harvesting produce in unsanitary working conditions spreading e coli and salmonella. I could be teaching in the public school system suburban white middle class children whose sole ambitions in life are to be inner-city African American hip-hop "artists". Or, perhaps I could take the civil service exam for law enforcement officer. "Here's your car, your pepper spray, and your firearm, Officer Bill. Now go out there and make the criminal justice system work for you."