Comment Re:And people wonder why the US is going broke... (Score 1) 728
While it could have something to do with character 'job hopping' usually has more to do with hiring budgets. When you take on a contract there is often a small chance that you'll get hired full time, but more often than not when the contract completes there is no hiring budget -- so off you go. I would be nice to think that a performance would get a phone call when a hiring budget opens up, but it doesn't work that way.
This is of course region by region. On the West coast contacting is the norm. It's a crappy unpredictable life, but it's almost excessively common. In the Midwest I'd suspect the practice is less common, but I haven't worked there in 10 years so I have no idea.
For jobs like the ones in this article perhaps screening on 'character' as you suggest might be useful since these are fairly entry level jobs. However even for entry level 'job hopping' does not denote character...
A friend of mine finished law school with no less than 3 internships over one summer. I think one of them only lasted a few weeks. It had nothing to do with her skills or character. In fact when she graduated she moved to a small town as the count seat DA for a few years. I visited her it it was a pretty miserable town, but it got her some experience. She stayed with it 2 years. Her friends stayed in the city and continued to contract for those 2 years never gaining much experience they may still be doing that for all I know. She has now moved back into the city and is a successful trial lawyer. This has little to do with character. If my friend stayed in the city she would have accumulated numerous short term contracts despite having an immense character. Even the small town job was a bit of luck. The pattern for those towns in one slot every 2 years and you'd better hope you aren't tied to a lease/family/other responsibilities.
Just bear this in mind before you go applying blanket judgements of character over people. Get some context and think about your location, before you judge.