Frustrated Workers Take Low-Paying Jobs, as Unemployment Rate Climbs.

Byline: Karen Spiller

Jul. 11--When unemployment strikes three times in a year, it can make a person frantic, depressed and ashamed.

"It makes you feel like less of a person," said Gregg Carson, 28, of Londonderry, who forced himself to stand in the unemployment line after being laid off from jobs he thought were secure.

After losing his job as an information technology recruiter at TRS Staffing in Salem back in June 2001, he suffered through another layoff in late December 2001 at Crown Linen in Nashua, where he was a territory sales manager.

The third layoff happened two months later. He was hired at Network Plus, a communications company in Nashua, but it closed before he even started.

"They called me the Friday I was due to start and said, we know you're supposed to start on Monday, but we're having an issue we're dealing with ... we'll call you on Monday," Carson recalled.

They never called him Monday. Instead, Carson heard on the radio that Wednesday that the company was going under.

"I thought, 'why me?' " he said. "I was absolutely terrified I was never going to find another stable job again." In all, he was out of work for eight months last year.

Because he had child support to pay and …