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The Great Resignation? More Like the Great Renegotiation

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Re: The Great Resignation? More Like the Great Renegotiation

#111

Post by kstrauser »

steelstraw wrote: post #28
softwaredoug wrote: post #3

> spectacles like the immense popularity of the "Anti-Work" thread on Reddit — have gone as far as to suggest this record-breaking trend is a movement of young, able-bodied Americans rejecting work altogether. I don't think this is the point of "anti work". The point is (to me) that people should be treated equitably at work and that work shouldn't be the center of our lives

What's up with all the language games lately? "Defund the police". No no, we don't actually mean defund the police... "Anti work". No no, we don't actually mean we're anti work...

That’s been a thing forever. See also: “states’ rights”, “small government”, “personal responsibility”, none of which actually mean what they say on the label.

Re: The Great Resignation? More Like the Great Renegotiation

#112

Post by soperj »

whiplash451 wrote: post #106
PragmaticPulp wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Constant articles and such with very little data. Very frustrating as a reader. Actual resignations are up slightly, but the idea that employees are quitting in droves is exaggerated. It’s higher than normal turnover, but the stories are written in ways to suggest that companies everywhere are gutted by employees leaving in bulk. I feel like “great resignation” was deliberately chosen to mislead people into thinkin…

Indeed. The Economist had a great article about this in their Dec 2011 edition. The article is behind a paywall, but the gist of it is that two effects explain the uptick in people changing jobs: (1) surges of job demand in new sectors boosted or entirely created by the pandemic (2) people who postponed job changes in 2020 (which hopefully will be considered as the worse year of the pandemic), effectively creating a…

December 2021 edition?

Re: The Great Resignation? More Like the Great Renegotiation

#113

Post by dkarl »

thesuitonym wrote: post #60
steelstraw wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's up with all the language games lately? "Defund the police". No no, we don't actually mean defund the police... "Anti work". No no, we don't actually mean we're anti work...

[flagged]

I disagree. I think the language was chosen to be inflammatory and overstated. The reason I think that is because everybody I know, from Republicans to moderate progressives to socialists, assumed it was much more radical on first hearing. Moderate progressives in particular were a bit alarmed by it, and then on hearing what it actually meant, were immediately on board because it's a bundle of familiar ideas that they already supported.

To put it another way, if the intention was to create a succinct label that gave people a generally accurate impression before they heard the details, it was a complete failure.

Conservatives in particular love it because if they want to misrepresent it as something radical and alarming, they just have to repeat the same name that its proponents use. (Not that that is necessarily going to work for them -- I think it comes off as a bit too obvious and lazy, especially since proponents have stuck with the label and coalesced support around it.)

I don't necessarily think it's a bad name, because it has attracted a lot of attention, and the idea has gained momentum, but it's just too obvious to deny that "defund the police" was designed to be misunderstood. For good tactical reasons, maybe, but obviously intended to mislead.

Re: The Great Resignation? More Like the Great Renegotiation

#114

Post by evilduck »

steelstraw wrote: post #28
softwaredoug wrote: post #3

> spectacles like the immense popularity of the "Anti-Work" thread on Reddit — have gone as far as to suggest this record-breaking trend is a movement of young, able-bodied Americans rejecting work altogether. I don't think this is the point of "anti work". The point is (to me) that people should be treated equitably at work and that work shouldn't be the center of our lives

What's up with all the language games lately? "Defund the police". No no, we don't actually mean defund the police... "Anti work". No no, we don't actually mean we're anti work...

Tag lines have been short and catchy for as long as humans have been shouting them or trying to put them on signage. Has there ever been a time when a group of protesters flew under the banner of a long nuanced argument instead?

Re: The Great Resignation? More Like the Great Renegotiation

#115

Post by crispyambulance »

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #36
nightski wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are doing that right here (narrative with little data). Even the NPR article says "the labor force participation rate remains significantly smaller than before the pandemic and it's still hard for employers to fill open jobs". There is data to back this up and it's not just a narrative.

> There is data to back this up and it's not just a narrative. The narrative is directionally correct. The issue is that the media (including NPR) has done everything they can think of to exaggerate it as much as possible. Once you look at the actual numbers it’s not the sea change we’ve been hearing about everywhere. The data is being omitted because the omission leaves more room for imaginations to run with the hea…

> The data is being omitted...

Looking at just the NPR article. The data is NOT "being omitted". As far as I can tell they've backed up all of their assertions in the article and are not exaggerating anything and the claims made seem reasonable.

If you want "pure data" there's plenty of sources out there, albeit with little-to-none in the way of interpretation. Those of us who aren't experts in labor economics actually need a bit of context and interpretation.

Re: The Great Resignation? More Like the Great Renegotiation

#116

Post by shrikant »

steelstraw wrote: post #28
softwaredoug wrote: post #3

> spectacles like the immense popularity of the "Anti-Work" thread on Reddit — have gone as far as to suggest this record-breaking trend is a movement of young, able-bodied Americans rejecting work altogether. I don't think this is the point of "anti work". The point is (to me) that people should be treated equitably at work and that work shouldn't be the center of our lives

What's up with all the language games lately? "Defund the police". No no, we don't actually mean defund the police... "Anti work". No no, we don't actually mean we're anti work...

Yeah wtf, Hacker News shows me next to nothing about cutting/chopping things down with repeated blows.

Re: The Great Resignation? More Like the Great Renegotiation

#117

Post by aperson_hello »

ashtonkem wrote: post #66
istjohn wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The unemployment rate, by definition, wouldn't capture people who are quitting the labor force entirely.

U-6, which covers people who have been temporarily discouraged from working but want to come back is 7.3%. If anything is keeping people out of the work force, it’s childcare issues, not anti-work.

7.3% is near historic lows on U6, but that doesn't capture childcare (like you mentioned) or retirements (at least as big of an "issue" as childcare).

Anti-work only actually comes into play in boomers who retired during the pandemic! Everyone else is effectively working if they can.

This is just a pure labor shortage - driven by demographic shifts that were years in the making and just now accelerated and by childcare shortages that are nearly fully state-driven

Re: The Great Resignation? More Like the Great Renegotiation

#118

Post by MattGaiser »

> "Yet, despite all the quitting and renegotiating, the real wage for the average American worker — meaning the true value of their paycheck after taking into account inflation — fell by 2.4% in 2021."

Because most are still not moving. If a worker won't leave under these conditions, there is no reason to ever give them a raise as you don't need it to retain them.

Re: The Great Resignation? More Like the Great Renegotiation

#119

Post by nomel »

luke0016 wrote: post #93
sjg007 wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is a time tested political tool to capture power by redefining the narrative. It's very effective as is the other strategy of manufacturing crises like the teaching of critical race theory in K-12 school or having to wear masks in schools.

I actually support masks in schools. There's solid scientific evidence backing it as a mechanism to help limit the spread of COVID. Until all ages are able to be vaccinated, it seems like a prudent course of action. It's unfortunate that people are trying to turn such things into political statements.

> limit the spread of COVID

I think it can be claimed that it limits the rate of spread, not total spread/infections.

Re: The Great Resignation? More Like the Great Renegotiation

#120

Post by dfxm12 »

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #19
duxup wrote: post #2

"The Great Resignation" feels a bit like a phrase that folks have grasped on to and just attach the narrative they want to believe to it. Constant articles and such with very little data. Very frustrating as a reader. The idea that amid a pandemic and such that there are a variety of reasons seems backed up by the data, although I admit that's what I'm inclined to believe / seen.

> Constant articles and such with very little data. Very frustrating as a reader. Actual resignations are up slightly, but the idea that employees are quitting in droves is exaggerated. It’s higher than normal turnover, but the stories are written in ways to suggest that companies everywhere are gutted by employees leaving in bulk. I feel like “great resignation” was deliberately chosen to mislead people into thinkin…

the stories are written in ways to suggest that companies everywhere are gutted by employees leaving in bulk. I feel like “great resignation” was deliberately chosen to mislead people into thinking people are just walking out of their jobs

Yes, I think this is driven by corporate friendly mainstream media to mostly drum up for support for more corporate welfare while simultaneously painting Americans as lazy and undeserving of welfare themselves.

There's a lot going on:

- Boomers, a huge part of the workforce, are beginning to retire, and they aren't coming back

- The US is near full employment [0]. As such, workers have more power. They can "resign" and go somewhere else relatively easily, or they don't have to take poor jobs

- If a business closes right now due to lack of workers, the owner might make the claim that Americans are just lazy & don't want to work, and corporate friendly media might push that idea. However, remember, we're at a time when we're approaching full employment. The business likely wasn't attractive to workers. So is it really the (lack of) workers' fault? Or was the business just poorly run? It's hard to admit that, and easy to blame others. It's OK for businesses to fail, though. Most do.

I think it's really a matter of perspective. If you're used to having a lot of workers (some of whom don't have the luxury of looking for a good job and need to take any job they can get, just to qualify for stuff like food assistance) fighting each other for the same job, so you're able to pay them less, this is a bad situation. If you're a worker who now has many employers vying for your talents, it's a good situation, but you rarely see that story being told in the corporate media.

0 - https://www.axios.com/jerome-powell-full-employment-27be7355...

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